Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1875-02-03
THE SECOND RERELLION.

THE SECOND REBELLION.
Thoughtful citizens will not sleep when
public dangers threaten. The inclination
of majority Of the people of the North to
ignore disagreeable facts in the South has
been repeatedly illustrated in trying peri
DDS of our history. Peaceful, prosperous,
obedient to the laws and loving the Union
and the principles on which it is founded
with constant devotion, they are reluctant
to credit the accounts Of disloyalty, vio-
lence, and crime in the Southern States.
Busy in their own affairs, they do not
stop to interpret the facts which find their
way North in spite Of the Inscriptions eff
forts made to suppress them or to dinin-
ish their importance. The thousands OF
men murdered because of their Republi-
can principles, the widespread anarchy,
the social and commercial ostracism, the
prevailing ignorance among whites and
blacks. the cherished deadly hostility to
the government and to national unity
these unmistakable indications of existing
treason and future danger seem to many
as exaggerated stories of excited parti-
zans, instead Of being as they are, far
short of the real truth. Thus it was prior
to 1861 running back many years. Every
device and falsehood were brought into
use to mislead the citizens of the Free
States as to the cruelties and dangers of
slavery and the atrocious purposes OF its
supporters and partizans. The men who
went South for purposes of business or
pleasure were taken possession of and not
allowed to know the depth of pro-slavcry
wickedness and the desperate schemes
maturing for the overthrow of the Repub-
lie and the establishment Of a Confederate
government on the foundations Of human
bondage. The courtly generosities and
honied Inequalities of the prosperous fam
lilies of the cities were made to represent
the actual status of Southern society and
to screen from scrutiny and study the vast
domain of plantations and thinly popula-
ted districts. where prevailed the most dis
gushing servitude and vice, violence, and
ignorance unknown in free and more civ
ilized countries. Those who went South
for trade, pleasure, or health were easily
duped, for they had no strong motive for
prying scrutiny. but had controlling rea-
sons of interest to make their customers
and friends Of the South to appear at the
best possible advantage. They knew well
enough that to do otherwise would make
it uncomfortable for them to 60 again
South either for profit or pastime. Thus
these Aattering, vanished descriptions of
slavery, courtesy, and chivalry in the
South deceived and deluded great ma
iority Of the citizens of the Free States.
The editors, the planters, the merchants,
the politicians, the churches, and the
scholars of the South were closely COM
bined to keep up this stupendous false
hood. and hundreds Of thousands of good
men in the North sufficiently intelligent
on other subjects knew as little of what
was really transpiring over nearly one
half the extent of the Republic as of the
interior OF China or Hindostan. There
was terrible volcano soon to burst upon
the country, yet they dreamed not of it.
Those fearless and truthful men who
lifted the veil and to some extent de-
scribed the crimes, the tendencies, the in.
ifat Ia do Ed
threatened, osiracised, and sometimes
mobbed. Meetings of SO called conserya-
tive citizens. opponents OF all interference
with Southern affairs, were called in Bos-
ton. New York, Philadelphia and other
cities and no eloquent tongue all aaame
with a sense Of his country's shame was
there allowed utterance. Then as now a
majority OF the leading presses of our
large cities were or the side of the op-
press0r and cried peace where there was
and could he no peace. Especially con-
spicuous and blatant on the side of inius-
,ice and slaveocratic politicians was the
New York press. One mighty engine
there was on the side of Truth and Free
dom-the Tribune Of Horace Greeley
Alas! the powerful hand which once
launched Its thunders to wake the nation
from its sleep to a sense of its peris, is
cold 10 death and the great newspaper
which for thirty years he toiled to create,
Is now doing the work Of the enemy. Its
bitterest gibes and satires are against the
half-emancipated colored millions, no:
against their oppressors and murderers.