Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1867-09-05

Meanwhile, the eternal strife between
evil and good went OH in the under-cur-
rents of the nations life. As IL waxed
strong in prosperity the plague-spot grew
also, and infused its poison into the North,
as well as the South.
We were a homogeneous people, one in
language and in laws, free and slave la
Dor developed side by side, the one grow
ing commerce, manufactures, internal
improvements, education the other
growing negroes and politicians.
The one opened the resources of the
earth, its iron and coal, its copper and
lead, grew rich in inventions, and by the
appliances of skill to economy of labor,
tended constantly to the equalization of
labor and capital.
The other combining itself to the pro-
duction of a few eXhausting staples, in
vested its capital in land and slaves,
swallowing up small estates, thus FORM
ing and maintaining the greatest mon
opoly of the world. Mr.. Henry Clay
computed the value of the slaves in the
United States at 81, 200, 100000 and the
three hundred and fifty thousand slave
holders, who represented this monopoly,
became virtually the managers of our ma
tional affairs.
1 say they virtually took possession of
the Government, for, up to the time of
Mr.. Uincoln's election, the Presidential
chair had been occupied for .fOrty-eight
gears by Southern men and shareholders
-four more by Buchanan, who was sepa-
rated from them by the accident of birth,
and tacenty-three gears by men of the
North.
Nor was the preponderence less in
other important offices of the Govern
ment.
That they held this great power, this
control of the army and navy, the Treas
ury and Judiciary, in the interests of
their own sections, no one pretends to
deny; or that they did it in violation of
the principles of true republicanism and
constitutional liberty.
They introduced that plentiful source
of public corruption, the dispensing of
Government patronage for political and
party services. "TO the victors belong
the spoils,n was their motto. They at
tempted to stitle free speech and discus
sion. They disgraced the high councils
of the nation with the brutality of per-
sonal assaults. They interfered with and
thwarted the peaceful settlement of our
territory in the interest of freedom, and
melted savaga strife upon our borders
Planting themselves upon misinter-
preted constitution, they intimidated US
with threats of disuniOn and civil war.
The free States, in a spirit of patience
and concession, thought they vindicated
the Constitution by enduring in silence
the aggressions of the slave power; by
rebuking, again and again, at the ballot
box, the tendency of anti-slavery agita-
ton to promote disuniom, at the same
time they held inviolate their doctrine
of State rights, and the right of new
States to repudiate slavery, and by their
separate and independent action to con-
fine it within existing limits.
The foresight of Calhoun led him to
anticipate the inevitable conflict. His
ambitious dream was to establish new
confederation, better suited to the genius
of autocratic and oigarchial institutions
than was that founded by the Fathers of
'76. For thus said this great falsitier
of the charter they bequeathed us,
Washington himselfdid not understand
the Constitution.
We see in this assertion of the man
whom General jackson denounced as
worthy of the gallows, on account of his
national heresies-we may see, my hear
ers, in his bitter sectional teaching. the
foundation for the persistent and impu-
dent assumptions of the "my policyn
party. OF course, the loyal North does
not understand the Constitution as Mr..
Buchanan and JEFF. Davis interpret ted it
in 1861, but | think we can afford to share
the ignorance of George Washington, to
say nothing of our loyal representatives
in Congress.
AS the great nullifier's schemes to
overthrow the Union began to work, and
the animus of the South became more
apparent, in the North two pal ties began
slowly to define themselves. One, through
its political ambition and part ly through
cupidity, allied itself with the interest of
slavery, and took for its watchword con-
servatism, which means, in English, to
stand still, and perpetuate the existing
state of things.
The other, rooted in the eternal prin-
ciples of Justice and Right-willing to
concede any thing which did not put
these in peril, under various names (some
of them unhandsome epithets donated
by their opponents) took the position of
protestants, maintained the divine right
to agitate any and every subject of i'm
portance to the national welfare; the
right of the North to an equal share of
the functions of the Government, and
the right of the majority to rule.
Well, the time came when the Consti-
tutional election of Mr.. Lincoln threat
ened to restore the balance of power in
our national afiairs.
Then, in factious opposition, the threats
of disunion, the low murmurs which pre-
ceded the coming storm, we began to
realize that the question compromisedin
Seventy-siX was still unsettled; that over
eighty years of unbrcken prosperity had
been given us to accumulate energy for
the great conflict about to open.
The partnership of Northern mer-
chants, soulless planters, ambitious poll
ticians and tine-serving ecclesiastics,
with their sneers at the doctrine ofequal
rights, with their howls, and holy horror
of Abolitionism, could no longer stitle.
the voice of the free people.
1t is from no disrespect to religion or
the sacred office of the Christian minis
ter that include the clergy in this crimi-
nal calendar. Shakspeare's words to the
Archbishopof York-do not they tit with
more than poetic nicely that fighting
Bishop Polk, when he says:
.'It better showed with you,
When that your flock, assembled by the bell,
Encircled you To hear with reverence
Your exposition on the holy text,
Than now to see you here an iron man,
Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum,
Turning the Word to sword, and life to DEATH
Who hath not heard 1t spoken,
How deep you were within the Books OF God?
Te us, the speaker In his paTllament;,
To u.s. the Imagined voice of God himself,
The very opener and intelligencer
Between the grace, the sanctities of Heaven,
nd nur dull WORKINGS. o. who shall believe