National Republican., 1883-05-18

national affairs and restored the protective
principle to our tariff laws the southern free
traders, the proslavery allies of the British
trader, fred on Fort Sumter.
Here was n " "flagitious enterprise" which
fired the British traders heart. Here
British troachery, the purpose Of all Eng
lands previous intrigues in our domestic
adairs-the Punica fdes Of perfde Albion---was
exposed in all its villainous features by q
practical coalition of the typical Britisher"
aud the confederates in arms for the de-
structon of the American union For years,
in Britain, abolition societies and the British
press, stimulated pretendedly by an abhor-
renee Of slavery and q love Of freedom, and
supported by tho gentry Of England, had
arraigned before the world, not merely the
southern or slaveholding states, but the
whole American union, and our constitution
and laws for the toleration of slavery. Eng
lish free trade emissaries, British abolition
orators in our cities, had seditiously labored
TO intensity the hostility between the sec
tions, to sow fiery discord between them, and
manifesty to involve them in civil war.
They had denounced Shareholders and slavery
had denounced all who supported or afiili-
ated with them, and had insultingly labored
to outlaw us among civilized nations.
But here, in 1861, when their free-trade
allies the southern slaveholding secessionists,
throw up the banner of revolt, when they
raised their mailed hands against freedom and
the union in an effort to establish proslavery
despotism upon the ruins of the union, these
English gentry supported the slave holder
against the forces of nationality and freedom.
The destruction of the American union, the
maritime aud industrial rival of England, was
and is the grand end OF the typical Brit
isher" English gold lavished freely in re-
turn for worthless confederate bonds. Eng
lish guns and English munitions of war; Eng
ltab nfn9 III fOnpntlnR
tion in the rear of our armies in the loyal
states, and piratical English cruisers on the
OCEAN, supported the flag ofslavery and greatly
prolonged the war Of the rebellion with its hor-
rors and awful sacrifices and cost. Everywhere,
throughout the rebellion, our loyal forces,
the hopes of the union and OF American ma
tionality and freedom were confronted by
the power and forces ofBritain under the con
federate flag The British trader was the
ally of slavery and secession-the enemy OF
American nationality and union. Again he
failed in his "nagitous senterprisc"-the over
throw and destruction of his great maritime
and industrial rival
But the triumph of American nationality
and union, the triumph of the civilized forces
of freedom over his barbarous proslavery al
lies, did not wholly discourage the British
trader. With the fall of slavery and the con-
fcdcracy, he revived on n grand scale, and
continues to-day his impudent intrigues to
undermine and ruin our vast industrial fabric,
built up during the war ut such frightful
cost in treasure and blood. Golden free
trade clubs, n subsidized press, merccnary
pamphleteers, both English aud American;
British emissaries of every grade and charac-
ter, supported by English gold, swarm
throughout the land, and flood the states
with impudent English free trade literature,
with the evident object of subverting our in
dustrial prosperity.
The practical questions, divested of all sub
terfuge, pretense, or fraud, which they thus
insolently raise, is, whether the products of
English or American capital intelligence, and
| skill, whether the products of English or
American labor, shall be consumed in the
| United States Whether the prodigious sums
| invested in our home manufactures, thou
sands of millions of American capital, shall
| be sacrificed, and our tens of thousands OF
manufacturing establishments be closed {
Whether our hundreds of thousands of work
ingmen, engaged in all the employments OF
labor, and all now so prosperous, shall be re-
duced to subsist upon starvation wages, or
wholly thrown out of employment, and over.
whelmed in idleness, poverty, misery
and crime? In word, whether the
foundation and forces of the wealth, power
and prosperity of the United States shall be
destroyed in order that the British trader, the
| great and sanguinary enemy of American ma
| tionality and union, shall monopolize, with the
cheap products of his poorly paid and hall
starving laborers tho markets Of the United
| States?
Shall this "fagitious enterprise" succeed
Truly grave and portentous question, which
| addresses itself as we'll to the business So.
| gacty or practical wisdom as to the patriot
| ism OF every genuine American.