Des Arc citizen., 1866-08-25
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BsIy" There are men who say that seces- sion caused slavery to be abolished, that if the Southern States had never attempted
 to established an independent government, slavery would still be in existence; and they are ready, either privately or publicly to cast censure upon those whom they call the leaders of the secession party for the loss of their slave property. Such men have certainly y never read what the Rcpub- lican papers say on the subject ofabolition. They "with one accord" assert that the abolition of slavery was one of the great objects of their party, and they now con sider it one of the great achievements of the age. This shows what was their inten- tion all the time. The South, in order to prevent the abolition of slavery, attempted to seccde, but by force of arms was pre- vented from doing so. Mir. Seward and Mir. Lincoln both declared, prior to 1860, that it was the purpose of the Republican party, sooner or later, to abolish slavery. Mir. Lincoln said slavery must be placed in such a condition that the public mind would rest satisfied that 1t was in the course of ultimate extinction " It was on this account that the proposition made by lief ferson Davis, then Senator from Missis- sippi, to Mr. Seward and other Republican Senators, in 1861, was rejected namely that if they would make the Missouri Compromise part of the Constitution, as Mr Crttendcn's resolutions contemplated, although this was much less than he
 thought the South was entitled to, yet he
 would use his influence to induce his own and the other Southern States not to secede, but to remain in the Union. Had his proposition been accepted, there would have been no attempt at secession, the ordinances which had been passed would
 have been revoked there would have been
 no WAT, and the Union and the Constitution
 would have been preserved. It was reject ed and we know the result It is for inn partial history to decide upon whom rests
 the responsibility We'll admit that MT.
 Lincoln and MT. Seward did not intend or expect to abolish slavery immediately but in the course ofa few years. It is now abolished, and we propose to show that 1t is much better for it to be as it is than to have been put off fifteen or twenty years, and then to have been abolished In the
 year 1860 it was estimated there were four millions of slaves. Had things remained as they were there would have been in twenty or twenty five years near eight millions ofslaves, so rapidly did the negroes increase under the humane system of sla- very as it existed in the Southern States
 The whole slave population in the United States in 1900 was 993,000, which had increased to near 100000, as before stat ed, up to 1860. Now suppose the abolition of slavery had been postponed until there were eight millions of negroes in the South ern States, with perhaps decreased and decreasing white population, what would have been the consequences? It is bad enough as 1t is, when there arc only four millions and they are scattered from the Ohio and the Potomac to the Gulf. The evil would have been increased the longer it had been postponed, The idea of gra- dual emancipation with colonization IS mere dream. It never could have taken place, The negroes themselves would have preferred slavery to forced emigra- tion, and the abolitionists, who controlled the Government, never would have per mitted it. We were compelled to have