New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-05-31

TIE OLD SECTIONS OUT OF THE WAY.
Mr.. D. 81. Hill, of North Carolins, pub
fishes an address in which he rsnews the
doctrine, that the United States must be
under the control of one of two sections,
called the North and South. His descrip-
ton of the characteristics which distinguish
these competitors for administration is
very terse and comprehensive, and Is
couched in the words of 'the gifted DR..
Chalmers" who wrote nearly half CEN
fury since. The words are
That tho great passion Of the South was
for political power, while the great passion
Of the North was for money.
At the date when this opinion was pro-
nounced there was q contest between these
two sections. In the great debates of
1858 the representatives of each section
presented the population, wealth and
productive capacity Of each, and the
duration of the Union was supposed
to depend Upon the question whether
the one or other section should
triumph. Since that period two great
events have occurred to destroy the
sectional issue of Mr.. Hill. The first is
the admitted fact Of emancipation. This
has added to Southern representation
some twelve or thirteen members. It has,
however, dissolved the Southern alliance
which once stood on the same muniments
Of title. So far from these States stand
ing together as Fl rmly, the construction OF
railroads has made each of the Southern
Atlantic States an ally Of the Western
producers and commercial and political
competitor of each Of the other Southern
Atlantic States. The Southern Atlantic
States, once the allies Of Louisiana, are
now among her competitors for the Mis-
sissippi outlet trade. the greater part OF
which has been diverted by the Eastern
railroads. The former Southern alliance
has been thus dissolved.
The second event initiating against the
old sectional issue is the immense and
rapid growth of the Western and Pacific
States.
Living in North Carolina and addicting
himself chiefly to the antiquities of the
Mechlenburg declaration Of independence
and of the late civil war, it seems obvi-
GUS that Mr.. Hill does not appreciate the
extraordinary progress of political power.
Five years is Western century. 1t
would surprise Mr.. Hill to know that the
congressional vote of Illinois, once a
county in the State Of Virginia, exceeds
in the present Congress that of Virginia
and North Corolina both. The congress
sional vote of the States created from the
territory coded by Virginia now exceeds
that Of all the Southern Atlantic States
put together. When we remember that
at least one third of the Southern repre- |
sentation is due to the negro population,
and that this has been increased in the
ratio stat ed; when we know the fact that |
immigration passes through the Atlantic
States and carries its physical and polit-
ical power to the w est, We see that ''the |
sceptre has pissed forever from the South
ern Atlantic Judah and the lawgiver from |
between his feet" Mr.. Hill enumerates
the Southern men of courage and ability
who have distinguished the annals of the
republic. This is an honorable and un-
doubted truth. Immi giants came out of
all the shires Of old England; some set
tied at the North and some at the South. |
They certainly agreed in their ideas Of
civil and religious liberty, since they de-
clared their united independence and
fought together the two wars indispensa-
BILE to its maintenance.
It seems to be an inherited idea Of Mr..
Hill that peculiar class called Cavaliers
came to inhabit the more Southern colon
les. There were undoubtedly large grants
of colonial lands made to court favorites,
but these lands we're settled and cultivated
by the hundreds Gin the steerage" who
are creating the Western empire of to-
day. The colony Of Virginia was always
Her first rebel was Ma
thaniel Bacon, an English Republican, who
at the head of the plain planters drove the
royalist and aristocratic Governor Beverly
across the Chesapeake, held session of
the Legislature, and enacted into law in
1876 the identical principles enounced by
Jefferson, the Republican, century later.
The Republicans of 1876 were sup
pressed at the time, but when the revolu-
lion came on they were in the field against
royalty and aristocracy from Boston to
Yorktown, under Jefferson, their
Republican leader. They extermina-
ed every institution Of the Cavalier
party, in repeating the law Of primo
,eniture and the established church.
t is a fallacy to imagine that there is any
Inference in the love of Republican lib
rty between the men Of New England or
# Georgia. Daniel Webster and Henry
LAY both belonged to the planter class,
nd neither represented the aristocracy of
be South or the imputed ascetism of the
North. That the men Of the South are
rave and able is, we repeat, source Of
american pride. But as there were