New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-08-01
Especial Correspondence of the Republican,
NORTHERN POLITICS..
Peace or War.

, c. Calhoun, of South Carolina, Alexander
81. Stephens, of Georgia, and Governor
! Foote, Of Mississippi, with other leading
conservative statesmen of the South, pre-
dicted war as the result of the sectional
character of the Southern politics unless
the cause of Southern sectionalism was re
; moved. That cause was found. according
to these Southern Conservatives, in the
pressure of the North upon the South in
the matter Of slavery and in q tariff system
which enriched the manufacturing States
at the expense of the agricultural. So the
South, in ante bellum days, demanded free
trade and non-interyentiOn by the national
government in the domestic affairs OF
the States. Northern States then saw also
that the sectional antagonism til US pro-
duced by dissmilar social institutions and
different industrial interests must lead
sooner or later to conflict to end in civil
war. But these far-sighted and clear-sig GIFTED
men could produce no serious impression
on the country. The nation drifted steadily
into the vortex Of revolution under the
operation of laws as fixed and immutable
as those Of gravitation. l presume the
blindest partisan will not dispute these
facts.
Remembering the past, and remembering
that what has been may be, it is only neces-
sary to examine the causes of revolution
as these now exist in the United States to
determine with measurable accuracy the
/ nhoh frr<,r nf %6o<
future involves the question Of peace or
war. Such an examination will show that
| the elements in favor or war, as these ele-
| ments now exist in America, are far more
| dangerous than in 1850 and 1861 that the
war into which We are drifting will be far
| more bloody than the one through which
We have just passed, and that the party of
national peace and national good will must
| organize at once for the control of the ma
ton. or the new war will be upon us IN less
than ten years.
First, then, of the elements which are
driving us into war, as these stand in con.
trast with the war elements Of 1850 and
1860. In the times past, there existed in
each Southern State an influential party,
opposed to the State rights theory of gov
ernment, and to the extreme pro-slsvery
dogma. The traditions of the war of the
revolution, of the war of 1912, and the Mex
lean war, had not lost their power over the
Southern mind or heart. The names of
Washington, Jefferson and Madison, were
revered by the South as household posses
sions, and beloved as the common property
of all Americans. The property interest
involved in slavery (including lands)
"bound the South to keep the peace" in a
bond of unusual power. The South shared
fully in all the employments and and honors
Of the general government. She held
controlling position in national politics.
The States of Delaware, Maryland, Ken
lucky, Missouri, Virginia and North Caro-
lima were union by every tie which could in
fuence their people. A genuine love of
American ideas and traditions permeated
every ramifcation of Southern society.
The impartial observer of Southern affairs
at this time will find all this "past" in
strong contrast with the present" The
Confederate war wiped out as with
bloody spon &c all these American elements
place of Washington in the affections of
the Southern whites, and the traditions
and memories of the Confederate cause are
to-day the dearest things on earth to those
who sway Southern society from Delaware
to Texas. This Confederate South is more
po werful than ever inside OF the Union
controls the legislation of Congress, and
yet is not "recOgnized" on q footing of per-
1ect political confidence or equal political
brotherhood, as evidence of which both sof
the great national parties, iutheir recent
conventions, studiously avoided placing q
Southern man on either of the presidential
tickets. In the meanwhile, the Confederate
Representatives and Senators in the Amer
ican Congress are so devoted to the party
fortunes of their Northern Democratic
allies that they fritter away their power in
promoting party schemes, and leave the
tariff laws and appropriations for in
ternal Improvement to the care of
Northern manufacturers, thus evading
Southern discomfort as of old over the |
tariff. To all this add the negro question |
as it now stands and where are we to find |
the restraining" influence which is to hold |
this turbulent, war-loving, martial South |
from another conflict of armss The eman-
cipated race, educated, armed, and free and |
determined to remain free, living side by /
side with this Confederate element, adds to |
the danger of the situation. Are not the |
reasons which make the repression of the /
negro political necessity to the Confed-
war increased hundred-foId by the eman-
cipation3 And does not this necessity, add. |
ed to the combustible material which |
revolution is thus heaping tOgethera 1t |
may be replied to all this that Confederate |
conservatism, Confederate forbearance and |
Confederate statesmsnship will prove them |
selves capable of preventing war and of |
saving and perpetuating The Union. To
which Confederate policy can be added |
also the alleged docility of the negro who,
it is said, will submit to anything and all |
things.
Secondly, as to the character of the new
war. 1t will be more bloody than the first
civil conflict, because it will involve war
inside of the Union; because it will ill
volve necessarily war Of races also at the
South, and because it will be more or less
a religious war.
Thirdly, this conflict, if the present revo-