The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1874-09-04

country arc always few compared with The
millions unseen who only await opportunity
to act and speak. Can we really reconstruct
the Southern States without the aid of the rea
sons of the South? We have tried to do So
depending upon the ignorant freedmen who
yesterday were slaves and the unscrupulous
white Adventures who yesterday fed from the
North as political mendicants and soldiers OF
fortune. There is no reconstruction. On the
contrary we see disturbance, civil outbreaks,
corruption and disorder, and, worse than all, a
war upon the national credit by means of re-
pudiation that will be as disastrous to the
Union as if the rebellion had been success
1t would certainly be better in the interests Of
civilization and liberty to have two confedera-
cies, governed by statesmen of honor and
character, who respected credit and sacred
certainly see if Arkansas and South Carolina
are permitted to drag these federal States into
the abyss of bankruptcy. This can be in no
respects wholesome living Union, and the
end will be destruction by reputation more
disastrous than would have been the destruc-
ton by war.
What then is the remedy? 1t is idle to
talk of military power to keep the peace. No
military power can keep the peace in coun-
try bent upon disturbance unless by the ex-
termination of the people. Spain has been
trying for forty years to preserve order in her
Biscayan provinces, and in the end she has O
civil war as irritating as it was when Espar-
tero made himself the Duke of Victory. The
public sentiment of this country would not
admit of any policy which looked to the
armed occupation of the South. 1t would be
an expense, an offence, scandal, burden
that could never be cheerfully borne, viola
ton Of the genius of our institutions. On the
other hand this public sentiment would never
consent to the revival of slavery to the recog-
milton of its existence in any form, except as
q crime happily abolished and atoned. Nor
would it accept any Of the responsibilities of
those who made the rebellion, the Confederate
debt, the cotton loans, the losses of those
who went into secession and whose property
was taken by troops, the sequestration
of lands like those of Arlington Nor can
we consider for moment any policy that
would regard the negroes of the South who
were formerly slaves as in any other relation
than that of freemen, citizens, and entitled to
every right of citizenship. There are certain
inevitable facts growing out Of our war, just as
they grow out Of all wars and all revolutions.
The English Revolution made Parliament free
and destroyed absolute power. The French
De-, o1,,t,1 A. IL
tage and the glory of every Frenchman, and
decreed noble and peasant equal before the
law. Our own secession revolution consoli-
dated the Union and emancipated the slaves.
These are the fruits of the contest, the newt
able facts that came from it, that can never be
destroyed or taken away, and for which we
should 60 to war tomorrow as eagerly as Eng
land for the freedom Of her Parliament, or
France for the preservation of the fruits Of her
revolution.
But there are other questions in no way
vital which do not affect these newt
which craftsmanship would impose upon
us. Have we not imposed too heavy fine
upon the South as the consequence of the
war? Have we not punished her, although
sister Commonwealth, ten times more severely
than France was punished by the alien in
vader? If Germany astonished the world in
exacting five milliards from France what must
be thought of the fine of ten milliards, which,
estimating each slave at five hundred dollars,
was imposed upon the South by the proclama-
ton of emancipation? Should not some COM
pensation be made to the South for this enor-
paid to former shareholders, but in the devel-
opment of industries in the South that were
destroyed by the war? If we of the Northern
States for generations sustained, approved
and profted by slavery when it was
an institution, should we not as
sumo some of the expense and respon-
sibility of regarding it as a crime? Be-
cause we conquered the South have we any
right to desolate it? Can there be any form
of desolation more thorough than to compel
the people to bear all the burdens of the war
which they assumed-of the abolition of
slavery which we at one time guaranteed to
them as all institution, as we'll as of the debt
we contracted ourselves to suppress the rebel
lion? Can there be any genuine reoonstruc-
ton that makes it the object OF the Southern
leaders to aim to destroy by reputation the
Union they failed TO destroy by secession?
These are grave questions To the minds of
some of our readers they may no doubt be
novel, and it may be said that we take o
gloomy or q fantastic view Of the situation in
the South. But there certainly is an evil in
the South that we have not reached. We are
rapidly drifting upon chaos, disorder, war
of races, reputation. We have made our
brothers of yesterday our enemies, and not
only enemies but we surrender to their mercy
the credit of the nation and the happiness of
the four millions of slaves we emancipated.