Year: 1863

guage;


"If the Cotton States unitedly and ear
nestIy wish to Withdraw peacefully from the
Union, we think they should and would be
allowed to do so. Any attempt to compel
them by force to remain would be contrary
to the principles enunciated in the immortal
/ Declaration Of Independence, contrary to the
fundamental ideas on which human liberty is
based"


On the 18th of December, when the
secession storm had come to head and
was bursting over South Carolina, the
Tribune said


"If it the Declaration of Independence
Justified the secession from the British En-
pire of three millions of colonists in l776, a0s


do not see ,chy 1t lcouZd not justify the secession
oftive millions Of ISoutBrOns from the Union in
1861"


After all the Cotton States had "sece-
ded, on the 23d of February, 1861, it
still held over them the shield of the
Declaration of Independence. Under
that date it said:


ave have repeatedly said, ard we once
more insist that the great principle embodi-
ed by Jefferson in the Declaration Of Alneri
can Independence. that Governments derive
their Just power from the consent OF the gov
erned, is sound and just; and that, if the
Slave States, the Cotton States, or the Gulf
States only, choose to form an independent
nation, they have clear moral right to do so.
Whenever it shall be clear that the
great body OF the Southern people have be-
come conclusively alienated from the Union,
and anxious to escape from it, we will do our
best to forward their views


We believe our contemporary has. since
the war began, faithfully kept its prom
Use to do its best to forward the views of
the "alienated' among the Southern peO-
pie, but it has not been by affirming their
." clear moral right to form an indepen-
dent nation" We understand the Trib-
une no longer comedies this right, and to
this extent must be said to have misled
the Southern disOrganizers who counted
on its support and cooperation. The
mode of its support and cooperation has
mot been such as they we're entitled TO
expect


There is another distinguished advo-
cate Of tie war against the insurgents
who has in like manner disappointed the
hopes he once authorized them to cher
Iish that when they stopped taking
and proceeded to action in the matter Of
dissolying the Union, they might rely
upon him to resist any attempt to "hold
men forcibly in the Union" We allude
to Senator Wade, of Ohio, the chairman
of the late Congressional Committee on
the Conduct of the War. On the 4th of
December, 1856, he held the following
language in the Senate of the United
States. [Cong. Globe, Sd Session, 34th
Congress. P. 25:


But Southern gentlemen stand here. and
in almost all Of their speeches speak Of the
dissolution of the Union as an element Of ev-
cry argument, as though it were peculiar
condescension on their part that they permit
ted the Union to stand at ALL If they do not
feel interested in upholding this Union; if it
really trenches on their rights; if it endan-
ers their institutions to such an extent that
they cannot feel seclre under it; if their in
terests are violently assailed by meanC Of this
Union, I am not one of those who expect that
they viii long continue under it. l am not
one OF those who would ask them to continue
in such a Union. Ifwould be doing violence
to the platform of the party to which be-
long. We have adopted the old Declaration
Of independence as the basis of our political
movements which declares that any people,
when their Government ceases to protect
their rights, when it is so subyerted from the
true purposes Of government as to oppress
them, have the right to recur to fundamental
principles and, if need be, to destroy the
Government under which they live, and to
erect on its ruins another more conducive to
their welfare hold that they have this
right will not blame any people for exer-
cisiug it, whenever they think the eontingen-
cy has come. 1 certainly shall be the advo-
cate Of that same doctrine whenever I find
that the principles of this Government have
become so oppressive to the section to which
I belong that free people ought not longer
to endure it. You will not then find me
backward in being the advocate OF disunion;
but that contingency never having come, I
have never yet opened my mouth in opposi-
ton to the Union. I have never entertained
thought disloyal to this Union. But say,
for Heavens sake, act, not talk. am tired
of this eternal din of dissolution OF the Un-
ion which is brought up on all occasions, and
thrust into our frees, as though we of the
North had some peculiar reason for maintain
ing the Union that the Southern States had
not hope the Union will continue forever.
believe it may continue forever. I see no
thing Gt present which think should dissolve
lit but if other gentlemen see it, I say again
that they have the same interest in maintain
ing this Union, in my judgment, that we of
the North have. If they think they have not,