The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1894-07-07

msnts that shall perpesuats the memory
Of noble deeds without charging them also
with the perpeluation Of bitterness"
Mr.. Wattsrson, ex-Corfederate soldier
that he Is, fairly asks: What cause has
the South lost thar remains TO be vindt-
Gated or which can De recovered" lie
holds that only two issues we're involved
In the great civil war-the right Of the
ownership Of slave property in the terri
tories. and everywhere else, unabridged
and unasssiled. and the right of state,
peacefully and at its own viii, to secede
from the Union
Forty years of agitation eliminated IN
four years Of war. IL was q final trial By
arms. and the verdict went against the
South Whatever peaceful right Of Sc
eession a state might havs legally pos
sessed. tbs var practically demonstrated
that it could never be carried into effect IS
long as human nature remains what 1t IL.
and. since slavery existed no longer, its
right in the territories, or elsewhere, could
not seriously interest or concern any
body"
Thirty years Of peace have confirmed
the verdict of these four years of war.
Minus slavery, the people Of the United
States are exactly where they were before
the var. Mr.. Watterson says:
There has not been the slightest change
In our Federal system. There is not the
slightest abridgrnent Of the rights Of any
citizen. Human liberty has been enlarged.
not contracted. Nor is there the least dis
elimination between the citizens OF the
North and the citizens of the South, or be-
tween the soldiers who wore the blue and
the soldiers who wore the gray, except in
the matter of the pension list, and surely
no brave or honest Confederate soldier has
ever been heard 10 complain that any
brave and honest Union soldier has had
his service thus recognized. In all things
else ii Is one with the men who followed
Grant and with the men who followed Lee.
They sit side by side in congress; they
serve side by side in the cabinet: they
have represented the country and are rep
resenting it in its foreign diplomatic serv-
ice with an ability and loyalty which, as
between the two, cannot be distinguished
the one from the other"
One of the chiefs Of secession died upon
the supreme bench. Two Confederate sol
dIers sit there now. One ex-Confederate
brigadier is secretary of the navy. A
Southern boy, the son of distinguished
Confederate general. has just graduated at
the head of his class at the naval acad-
envy. The naval academy at Annapolis
and the military academy at West Point
are full of Southern boys. and distin-
gulshed and brilliant Confederate officer,
ex-United States Senator Eustis, is our
ambassador in France. There Is not a
right enjoyed by Massachusetts, which is
not enjoyed by Mississippi. Mr.. Waiter
son recites these facts and asks: what
cause has been lost that We ought to main
tain and that time will restore to US?
1t cannot be African slavery. tor among
the last words of Alexander ii. Stephens,
vice-president of the Southern Confeder-
acy, uttered on the floor OF congress, was
an eloquent expression of thankfulness
that the milestone of slavery had been cut
from the neck of the South by the hand of
war and was gone forever. 1t cannot be
the right of secession. Suppose Colorado
should follow the crazy counsels of Gov.
Waite and undertake to secede from the
Union on the question of silver. Does
any sane man suppose the South would
not vote with the North to whip her back
into the Union? Mr. Watterson insists
that as individuals the South could not be
better offifthe Confederacy had succeeded,
and would probably be much worse of.
Mr.. Watterson closes his eloquent reply to
Gen. Rosser and Parson Cave as follows:
"All the people, North and South. stand
on common ground. Ii is no longer a
huddle of petty sovereignties divided by
sectional lines but a nation held together
not merely by legal hooks of steel, but by
hearts and hands, which the dizzy elo-
quence of unbalanced minds can nowise
shake, whether they preach the fanaticism
of conquest or the fauaticism of revenge.
Ii is a nation. bound together by a consti-
tuition as regnant in the South as in the
North, not a confederacy hanging by
rope of saad, despised by all who would
escape or refuse its restraints. IL is
nation for all time aud all men: and, in
stead OF seeking TO raise up a generation
of young vipers to undo the good that God
has done-instead of seeking to make
traitors of the fair lads whom we are
sending 10 West Point and Annapolis
the true preachers and the true women of
the South, yea, the very widows and the
daughters of the Confederate dead, have
been and are and will ever be found ad-
dressing them selves To the noble work of
rearing the one set TO DO good American
citizens. the other set TO be good soldiers
and sailors of the Union. with no other
thought or care for the future than tn at il
may preserve our free fabric and bless our
dear land.