The weekly North-Carolina standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 186?-1869, 1866-02-21

tne stiehSch, anu enterprise, and expansive
energy OF freedom, made answer, though re-
iuctantly: Be it SO; let there be no strife
between brethren; let freedom and slavery
compete for the Territories on equal terms, in
a falr held, under an impartial administra-
ton" and on this theory, if on any, the con
test might have been left to the decision of
time.
DRIED SCOTT DECISION. a
The South started back in appallment
from its victory; for it knew that fair COM
petition foreboded its defeat. But where
could it now find an ally to save it from its
own mistake? What | have next to say is
spoken with no emotion but regret. Our
meeting to-day is, as it were, at the grave
In the presence of Eternity, and the truth
, must be uttered in soberness and sincerity-
In great republic, as was observed more
'haa two thousand years ago, any attempt to
ayerturn the state owes its strength to aid
\ from some branch of the government. The
Chief Justice of the United States, without
any necessity or occasion, volunteered to
come to the rescue of the theory of slavery,
And from his court there lay no appeal but
to the bar of humanity and history Against
the Constitution, against the memory of the
nation, against previous decision, against
series of enactments, he decided that the
slave is property, that slave property is emit
tied to no less protection than any other pro-
perty, that the Constitution upholds it in
every Territory against any act of local
Legislature, and even against Congress- it
self; or, as the President tersely promulgated
the saying I" Kansas is as much slave
State as South Carolina or Georgia; slavery,
by virtue of the Constitution, exists in every
Territory" The municipal character of
slavery being thus taken away, and slave pro-
perty decreed to be sacred" the authority
of the courts was invoked to introduce it by
the comfy of law into States where slavery
had been abolished; and in one Of the courts
of the United States Judge pronounced the
African slave-trade legitimate, and numer-
Gus and powerful advocates demanded its
restoration.
TANEY AND SLAVE RACES.
Moreover, the Chief Justice, in his elabo-
rate opinion, announced what had never been
heard from any magistrate of Greece or
Rome what was unknown to civil law, and
canon law and feudal law, and common law,
and constitutional law, unknown to Jay, to
Rutledge, Ellsworth. and Marshall-that
there are " slave races Thespirit of evil is
this decision, five States swiftly followed the
earlier example of sixth, and opened the
way for reducing the free negro to bondage;
the mi grating free negro became slave if he
but touched the soil of seventh and an
eighth, from its extent and soil and mineral
resources destined to incalculable greatness,
closed its eyes on its coming prosperity, and
enacted-as by Taney's decision it had the
L. l. l. L
would live within its limits must accept the
condition of slavery for himself and his pos
terity
SECESSION RESOLVED ON.
Only one step more remained to be taken
Jefferson and the leading statesmen of his
day held fast to the idea that the enslave-
ment of the African was socially, morally,
and politically wrong. The new school was
founded exactly upon the opposite idea ; and
they resolved first to distract the Democratic
party, for which the Supreme Court had now
furnished the means. and then to establish
new government, with negro slavery for its
cornerstone, as socially, morally, and politi-
cally right.
THE ELECTION.
AS the presidential election drew on, one
of the old traditional parties did not make
its appearance; the other reeled as it sought
to preserve its old position; and the candi-
date who most nearly represented its best
opinion, driven by patriotic zeal, roamed the
country from end to end t. speak for union,
eager at least to confront its enemies yet not
having hope that it would find its deliver
ance through him. The storm rose to
whirlwind; who should allay its wrath p
The most experienced statesmen ofthe coun-
try had failed there was no hope from those
who were great after the flesh; could relief
come from one whose wisdom was like the
wisdom of little children?
EARLY LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
The choice of America fell on a man born
west of the Alleghanies, in the cabin of poor
people of Hardin county, Neutrality-suspicious.
ham Lincoln.
His mother could read, but not write his
father could do neither; but his parents sent
him, with an old Spelling book, to school,
and he learnt in his childhood to do both.
When eight years old he feated down the
Ohio with his father on a raft which bore the
family and all their possession to the shore
of Indiana and child as he was, he gave
help as they toiled through dense forests to
the interior of Spencer county There in
cabin, with the solemn solitude for his teach
er in his meditative hours. Of Asiatic liter
allure he knew only the Bible of Greek,
Latin, and medieval, no more than the trans
lation of Esop's Fables; of English, John
Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress. The traditions
of George Fox and William Penn passed
to him dimly along the lines of two centu-
ries through his ancestors, who were Quakers.
HIS EDUCATION
Otherwise his education was altogether
American. The Declaration of Independence
was his compendium of political wisdom,
the Life of Washington his constant study,
and something of Jefferson and Madison
reached him through Henry Clay, whom be
honored from boyiood. For the rest, from
day to day, he lived the life of American
people; walked in its light; reasoned with
its reason; thought with its power of
thought; felt the beatings of its mighty
heart and SO was in every way a child of
nature-a child of the West-a child of
America.
HIS PROGRESS IN LIFE.
At nineteen, feeling impulses of ambition
to get on in the world, he engaged himself to
go down the Mississippi in fat-boat, re-
ceiving ten dollars month for his wages,
md afterwards he made the trip once more,
At twenty-one he drove his fathers cattle as
the family migrated to Illinois, and split rails
to fence in the new homestead in the Wild
At twenty-three he was a captain of voun-
teers in the Black Hawk war. He kept
shop; he learned something of surveying;
but of English literature he added to Bunyan
nothing but Shakespeare plays. At twenty