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TURN WOLD, OA., FEBRUARY 14, 1805.
Southern Abolition.
There is an abolition party forming 1 at the
south, and we fear it has the sanction of our
chief executive. We intend to oppose abolition,
and if Pr. Davis has become an abolitionist, we
intend to oppose him, and his policy, as bitter
ly, and as fiercely, as we hare heretofore been
earnest in our support. If our rulers are turn
ing emancipationists, then we must oust them
from authority, either by due course ci law, or
by revolution.
We don’t know that the administration is in
favor of abolition, but we fear it is so. We
have strange hints, and outgivings, from Rich
mond. We have rumors that our cabinet, and
executive, bave under consideration a proposal
from England, and France, to guaranty our
independence, provided we will abolish slavery,
and one or more newspapers in Richmond,
supposed to enjoy the president’s confidence,
bave intimated their acquiescence in the propo
sition.
The Augusta Constitutionalist, a supporter,
'If not an organ of the administration, seems
farther committed to the policy of southern em
ancipation, than any other newspaper in Geor
gia, except, perhaps, the three yankee papers
published in this state. In its issue of the 24th
ult., it contains au out-and-out abolition ar
ticle, three and a half columns long, over the
signature * W. W.,* and to this article seems
to give a rjuasi endorsement, by giving it a
prominent place, under its editorial head, and
by means of a favorable editorial prefacG.
We havebeen fighting’the battle of negro
slavery against yankee journals,, all our life,
and we shall fight it no less vigorously against
southern journals. It would seem strange, in
deed, were northern men, and southern men,
now, to swap places, with reference to abolition
—northern men opposing, and southern men
favoring it. But such a thing may happen.
We propose to examine * W. W.’s ’ abolition
arguments. First, we deny what he says, when
be asserts that the southern people are not fight
ing for negro slavery. ‘ W. W.’ may not be,
since he goes for abolishing it: but it is a plain
case that the southern masses are fighting to
preserve the institution of slavery. At any-
rate, they began the fight on that account.
Now they are fighting not only for that, but,
also, because the northern people force them to
fight, by fighting them.
The correspondent of the Constitutionalist
thinks we are fighting for local sovereignty, or
state rights, and that it is necessary to sacri
fice negro slavery, in order to secure that. On
the contrary, we believe that the surest anti
dote to centralization, is negro slavery. We
believe that republicanism cannot exist with
out it. It is the one element producing among
us a quasi aristocracy—making every white
man a patrician—that has saved us from the
wild democracy, and agrarianism, now deso
lating the American continent. And this has
been the argument of the southern people, all '
their lives. But ‘ XV. W.’ would persuade
them, that, in this, they have been indulging
only a ‘ prejudice,’ which must yield, now, to
the new light that has flashed from yankee
bayonets. Strange that southern People have
dwelt in Egyptian darkness so long-'
THE COUNTRYMAN.
‘ W. W.’ is greatly troubled, on account of J
Lincoln’s abolition proclamation : and, if Lin
coln can maintain it, well he may be. But if
the southern p’eopledo not join Lincoln, in pro
curing emancipation, but will fight his aboli
tion policy to the bitter end, and arm their
slaves to fight it, the proclamation complained
of can never be enforced.
We copy, here, one entire paragraph from
• W. W.’s ’ article :
‘But more than all, and above all—of fearful
import, demanding imperatively of every man
the most serious reflection, the spirit of free
dom has been kindled in the breasts of the
slave, and, under the influences by which he
will be surrounded, in the union, it will never
die. If, today, it exhibits no sign of impa
tience, it is beeatise it looks forward, with an
assured conviction, that the day is near at hand,
when, without violence, or personal danger,
it may claim the heritage of a common hu
manity.’
How people can change, to suit the momen
tary argument 1 At this very time, the south
ern newspapers are full of articles, and para
graphs, going to shew the loyalty of our slave
population—that they trample yankee freedom
under foot, and are now, more than ever, con
tented, and happy, in their comfortable south
ern homes. But yesterday, ‘ W, XV.’ would
have made the same assertions, and used the
same arguments, in favor of slavery. It can
not be expected that he will use the same ar
guments in favor of abolition, for they do not
suit his case. What an apt scholar, in the ar
guments of Greeley, and Sumner, has ‘ W. W.’
suddenly become I These gentlemen would
have had us believe, before the revolution, that
slavery was a sleeping volcano, that only need
ed to be touched by an abolition fire-lock, to
explode, and rend the whole structure of south
ern society, and government, into bloody atoms.
At the time that the north is seeing, and la
menting its mistake; at the time that southern
people generally are congratulating themselves
on the docility of the negro, and taunting the
..north with its error ; while the last files of Eu
ropean newspapers are filled with articles ad
mitting, and wondering at the slave’s loyalty
to his master, ‘ XV. W.’ steps forward, and tells
the world, ‘gentlemen, don’t be in a burry:
there is a slumbering volcano id the bosom of
southern society: wait just a little : it will ex
plode after awhile: vve southern people were
mistaken : the very element we have all along
told the world was a conservative element in
oui% system, is incendiary, and dangerous, in
the highest degree 1’
We sicken with disgust, ad nauseam, as we
pursue the argument of ‘ XV. \V.,’ at this point.
And we have less stomach tor the whole bitter
medicine, as our olfactories recognize in it, the
manipulations of Greeley, and Beecher, whose
nostrums we have so long prepared the south
ern stomach to reject.
The funniest part of the article before us, is
that which wishes the relation of master and
slave abolished, to have substituted that of
guardian and ward, between the white man
and the black man. Have not the southern
people always contended that the relation of
master and slave was virtually that of guard
ian and ward?
The object of * XV. XV.,’ in advocating aboli
tion, is, that the negroes may be put in the
army. Now, we can put the negroes in the
army, without abolition. We cannot see that
a promise of freedom will add, in the least, to
their efficiency. On the contrary, we believe
that to make good soldiers, under all circum
stances, where obedience, more than bravery,
is necessary—(we are speaking, now, of ne
groes)—it is best for them to be slaves. The
slaves of Greece, and Rome, being of equal
race with their masters, fought as soldiers for
those masters. No evil results folfoWed. On
the contrary, they won the day tor their mas
ters. So it has been, throughout Europe, Asia*
and Africa, for indefinite ages past.
We call upon the southern people to look well
to the abolitionism springing up among them,
and to nip it in the bud. This war was brought
about by abolition, and to yield to it, is to yield
everything. Talk about local sovereignty, and
state rights! What are they worth to us,
merely in the name, while vve yield to the pre
judices of outsiders—to the ‘ moral influence of
the world,’ as ‘ W. W.’ has it—and abandon
the very foundation-stone of our prosperity-
negro slavery’?
We repeat what We sard in a former article,
* we would, a thousand times, rather go back to
the old union, with our ancient rights and sys
tems all guarantied, if possible, than to have
separate nationality, with slavery abolished.’
The Richmond Enquirer has said that if Eng
land and France would offer to guaranty otfr
independence, provided we would abolish slave
ry, it would be prepared to consider the propo
sition.
We say, if the United States would offer to
guaranty our title to our slaves, and our right
of state sovereignty, upon our return to the
union, wo would much rather consider that of
fer, than any proposition by England and
France, for abolition, and independence.
It is perfectly absurd to talk of abolition and
independence, in the same brgath. We have
never agreed, voluntarily, to abandon our in
stitution of slavery. We are fighting the north
to prevent it from forcing us to do it. Why
should vve invite England and France to force
us to do a thing which we fight to prevent the
north’s forcing us to do ? II we put it in the
power of England and France to force us to
abandon the chief element of our nationality—
if we grant them the power to regulate our in
ternal affairs for us, and to fix our institutions
for us, are vve not the slaves of foreign nations?
And to talk of national, or any other indepen
dence, under such circumstances ! Surety some
of our people have gone stark mad !
The policy of the Confederate States seems
plain to us. It should be. the policy, too, of the
American continent. We see very little pros
pect of the pacification of this continent, with
out a European war. The American people
seem to be determined to fight, and it would be
better for them to fight Europeans, than to
fight each other. T-hey ought to unite, now,
upon the basis of state rights, local sovereign
ty, negro slavery, for each state that wants it,
the Monroe doctrine, and a continent-bound
confederacy of confederacies. Had our states
men been wise, they would have brought about
a foreign war, instead of a domestic one. It
would have cost less treasure, and less blood,
to annex Canada, Cuba, Mexico, and Guatema
la, than to fight the war we are now waging.
And it would have infinitely strengthened the