The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1864-05-07
What the Union People Expect

Now that the Convention to alter the Con-
| stituton of this State has got fairly organ
lied and prepared for work, the people OF
the whole State look to that body with con-
fdence for a prompt and vigorous prosecu.
ton of the business confded to them.
Any faltering from the path of duty which
has been marked out for them so broadly
and distinctly by the Union men of Mary,
land, would be met by the severest condem.
nation, rs such course would tend more to
strengthen the arms, and buoy up the droop.
| ing heart of the rebellion, than reinforce.
ment of a hundred thousand conscripts.
| The first and most important question the
Contention has to deal with is slavery Are
the members comprising that responsible
body able for the task imposed upon them,
and to- the performance of which they
pledged themselves in the last Spring can
| vass?
The rebels will meet them at every step
with, as they will proclaim, insurmountable
objections. State compensation will be
insisted on, on the plea that private property
cannot be justly taken without compensation
to the owner. Without further comment,
this cant be granted. The aged and infirm
slaves will be cited as an incumbrance which
the State will be bound to assume, if univer-
sal Emancipation is decreed. But why should
the State take care of these slaves who have
grown gray in toiling for their masters pro-
fit? They have earned their support, if they
have been faithful servants, and the pianta-
tons which have been titled by the labor OF
| their hands through their youth and prime
of life should su. port those limbs which are
now grown feeble with age and toll the pro-
ducts of which went into the masters Golfers.
But there is no plantation hand or house ser.
want, unles it be in the last tottering stage
Of dotage. that will not earn livelihood by
their daily labor at the vocation they hav
spent a life time in, and whose services their
former owners will readily accept, whether
they be rendered as freenen or slaves.
The question which meets us here is shall
| these people who have worn the brightest
hours of their lives away, in bondage, be
retained in slavery still or set free? The
rights Of those might be overlooked, as the
rights Of many have been, who were too
humble to find an advocate before the court
Of justice; but will the rights of the people OF
Maryland be overlooked through Difference
to an old barbarian custom? 1t is the
right of the people of this State that they
should enjoy the blessings that are inherent
to Free State, and which are, if at all, but
partially experienced iir slave State. And
it is also their right that they should not be
taxed to support the shattered remains of an
| institution which has been burden 10 then,
for half a century.
The young slaves are also presented as
another grand obstacle to immediate Eman.
cipation, but this is fault which will every
day be mendng, and to wholly obviate the
difficulty the law provides for the indentur.
ing to some trade or useful occupation, all
young persons who are in a state, or likely
to be, of vagrancy. The first and only Ger.
tain solution to the slavery problem, over
which secessionists are processing to torture
their brains, and with which they brighten
scary Union men, is immediate EMANCIpA
TON. Then Maryland as Free State will
see the choke damp Of slavery, which is 9
moral masma, poisoning her every interest
rise and disappear like malaria from the
southern swamps before the bracing breezes
Of the frigid zone.