Year: 1860

.
reader will find an article, cited from the columns
of the Greensborough (N CD Patriot, containing
some observations upon the alleged designs of such
among the Democratic leaders at the South as are
believed to be inimical to the Union of the States


Whether the representations made by our North
Carolina contemporary are founded in reason or
not, it cannot be doubted that the apprehensions
expressed are sincerely entertained by large num-
Der of the most intelligent and patriotic of our
countrymen, who look with mingled sadness and
alarm upon the unhappy alienation which exists
between different sections of a common country.
Where the dragons teeth are SO profusely sown,
they naturally expect sooner or later, to see the
armed men spring up from the ground


We approach the consideration of this subject
with unaffected reluctance; nor would we even
now address ourselves to its discussion if the article
TO which we allude had not been brought to our
attention by leading public man of the South,
accompanied with the expression of his belief that
the warnings which it contains are equally serious
and timely. As the Union of these States, whether
considered in the light Of political blessing or
civil necessity, is not with matter for argument
any more than the benefcence of the sunshine or
the harmonious arrangements of the solar system,
we do not permit ourselves, on light or transient
occasions, to be diverted from the ordinary walks
of journalism by any and every fippant represen-
tation which assumes to call in question either the
value or the stability of the Federal Union. With
an eminent statesman of the South, we hold that
the very mention of disunion is public injury"
because it tends to corrupt at its very fountain the
lifebood of the nation impairs the healthy tone of
the public mind and, by familiarizing the ear with
the possibility of such calamity, bunts the popu
lar sensibties in view of its approach, just in
the time of public pestilence whole masses of men
have teen known at last to breathe the tainted air
in stod contempt or reckless disregard of impend-
ing death The veriest phantasms of the brain, if
once they take permanent possession of the thoughts


become sometimes the blind, unconscious agents
of their own realization, as visions no more real
than "the stuff that dreams are made of, once
lodged in the chambers of the soul, may haunt
their victim to his own destruction, and thus pre-


cipitate the doom they seemed to pre6gure.


While it cannot be doubted that much disaffec-
ton is cherished towards the Federal Union by
some among the Democratic leaders Of the South


we must still refuse to believe that this dsloyalty
is either SO general SO confirmed as seems to be
thought by our North Carolina contemporary


And, admitting the sincerity of those who are
engaged in designs hostile to the stability of the
Republic, 10th so far to discredit their in
teligence as to suppose that they seriously conte


plate the folly of suspending such an issue upon
such pretext they are said to have selected for
the consummation of their purposes. They who
profess to be pre-eminently the friends and up
holders of the Constitution will surely have saga
city enough not to write their own condemnation
by seeking to make the constitutional election
of President of these United States the cause
and the occasion of destroying the very Constitu-
tion in whose behalf they purport to act. Such
contradictions might give point to an epigram, but
they rarely take place in real life Mr. Knickerbocker
recites believe, in his veracious history Of New
York, that there were those among the Manhattoes
who, in times of sudden confagration, were wont
prudently to throw costly mirrors and other sucn
fragile but valuable articles from the third STORY
window to the ground that they might be pre-
served from the destroying element, but we
doubt whether any at the present day will take a
hint from those ancient burghers by making haste
to destroy the Constitution of their country that it
may have the privilege of dying before its time at
the hands of its unnatural friends rather than of
its enemies. a-


Rrrf = ia &bok -, &l,sr xaol
ness could SO far forget the method necessary to
conceal their nfatuaton, it would none the less be
true that the great mass of their countrymen would


Indignantly refuse to convict themselves of the stul
tiGcation implied by such programme. We cannot
believe that the people of any State in this Union
willing to parley with theory which is as de-
rogatory to them as it is disloyal to the Govern
ment. For on what grounds is it sought to recon-
cile the public mind to dissolution of the Union


in case an unacceptable President should be consti-
tutionally chosen at the approaching election To
state them will be enough for their confutation.s


It is said, then, that it would be degrading to
the Southern States if they should allow sectional
majority to install its candidates in the high places
of the Federal Government We certainly do not
look with any complacency on the triumph of Sec
tion section, but SO long as no constitutional
limitation is infringed by the successful party,
the mere possession of Office, in regular and law
full manner, cannet be construed into an invasion
of the fundamental rights possessed by the minority
The Wings of Virginia, though comprising in their
number large proportion Of the wealth, intelli-
gence, and worth of that great State, have for a
long series of years been as effectually excluded
from official place by the dominant majority as if
they were alien enemies but, not having been af-
feeted in their life liberty, property, it never
occurred to them that they were despoiled Of their
"vested rights because left without share in the
wretched spoils of Office If, then, through any
cause the political divisions of the country unfor-
tunatey sectional aspect, it is to be expect