Year: 1861

From the Montreal Canada Gazette.
The Reign of Terror.


The New York World in the article
from which we re-published extracts yes
terday pronounced it falsehood that a
"peace-at-any price-and-compromise-if-we-
can " party was growing up in the North
ern States Now one Of two things must
certainly be true, the World itself must
be guilty of falsehood, or tho action of the
Governmen is utterly wanton and unrea-
sonable. Why have papers which advo-
cate peace been suppressed, if their appeals
were unheeded? If there is no response
to the call for peace which they have made,
why are they treated as dangerous censpira-
tors against the government? The answer
is obvious; the conduct of the Government
is disgracefully unnecessary, or the World
is guilty of untruth in its denial of Mr..
Russelps statement. There is abundant
evidence to prove that the writer in the
New York World and not Mr.. Russell is
the utterer of untruth. The Journal of
Commerce preached peace and its cirula-
tion rose in the Northern States till it
more thar made up for the loss of readers
in the South cut off by the war. LIE
Courier des Etats Unts and the Stats
Zeitung of New York representing the
foreign element on which the Government
has to depend largely for recruits are stop
ped in their circulation because they have
protested against the war. Recruiting
goes on Slowly, for peace men are found
to disuade, and intending recruits to listen
to reasons against fratricidal war, and
convention after convention of the old de-
mocratic party, has given utterance to
opinions showing that they deem the cause
OF compromise and peace; of the most vi
tai Importance to their distracted country.
Scarcely day passes but from the columns
of the New York journals, which consent
for the time to be mere panderers to popu-
lar fury, or lackeys to government officials,
some new proof is to be found of the exis-
tence of the under-current of feel ng,
yearnlng for peace at any price, of cool
common sense which cannot see the OBJ
ject to be gained by even successful war
against the Southern States. Another
proof of this is to be found in the fact
that the Northern papers find it so necessa-
ry to resort to palpable and unblushing
talsehood to ipfame the popular feeling.
The cry is raised that they must fight for
their homes, that the safety of their homes
and hearths is endangered. Now, every
well-lnformed person knows how utterly
without foundation in fact such cry is;
but it seems to deceive the ignorant and
unthinking. The South never had, or ex-
pressed any intention of invading the
North, if they were let alone to enjoy in
peace the lot which the people, through
their State Legislatures and Conventions,
have deliberately chosen, as best for them.
All the bubbles that Northern journalists
can devise, cannot make this, in the eyes
OF the world, other than an aggressive war,
q war of conquest of the North upon the
South. The only conquest the South seek
is that Of their own independence.


And what a spectacle-what specimen
of freedom do the Northern States now
present to the wonder of mankind! A
press that dares speak but in one tone;
hundreds of men imprisoned, languishing
week after week, for months in military
duranee, without trial of even formal ac-
cusation, the right of hadeas co,psss denied
them; the constitution trampled under foot
in Missouri, and giving place to arbitrary
martial law, no rights recognised but those
Of the strong hand and the General will;
in Maryland, members of the Legislature
prevented from the exercise of their func-
tions by being dragged to prison liberty
of action denied, liberty of speech and Of
printing being crushed out. These are
the means adopted to carry on the war Of
freedom, and for the establishment and
maintenance of free institutions Well
might Madame ROLAND cry "Oh! liberty,
what crimes are committed in thy name"
1t is the fate of those embarked in course
of arbitrary rule to 60 on from bad to
worse, and the two latest phases of the
despotism of President Lincoln's Govern
ment, and of the love of despotic authori-.
ty in the sycophantic journalists, who ad-
mire his advances in the path ofsubduing
the constitution and laws to his will, are
the worst yet seen. The acts Of the pre-
sent Emperor Of the French which most
outraged the public opinion of, free COM
munities, was the imprisonment of the
leaders Of opposition in the Legislature.