Early apprehensions of dissolution.
The fathers of the
Republic seemed to have had a very plain perception of the probable disruption of the
Union by reason of its magnitude.
It has been a favorite theory of our later times, that wide extension and great diversity of interests tended to strengthen rather than weaken the federal bond.
This would undoubtedly have been the effect in fact, but for the persistent efforts of Northern agitators to place the
Southern section under the law of public opinion.
A long, systematic effort has been made to degrade one-half the
Union in the eyes of the other, and of mankind.
The spirit of mutual hatred and animosity has been planted in the hearts of the two sections, and we have at length realized all the fears of the founders of the
Confederacy.
However strong and compact the
Union might have been rendered by expansion, if fraternal sentiments had continued to pervade the people, it is plain that expansion has hastened and ensured the dissolution of a divided and alienated Confederacy.
The necessity of union for self-protection which originally consolidated the Colonies and the infant States together, has passed away; each section of the
Confederacy is strong enough to defend itself against a world in arms; hatred and hostility have rendered association odious, and dissolution results.
From a painful and ever-present fear of dissolution, from rapid growth in national prosperity and greatness,
Washington wrote his
Farewell Address, warning against what constantly loomed up with gloomy portent in his imagination — sectional alienation and geographical parties.
It never occurred to him that a free people would brook an administration of the
Federal Government by sectional organizations.
He seemed to consider that the success of a geographical party in seizing the powers of government, would of itself be a dissolution of the
Union; and thus, that very
Farewell Address of his speaks trumpet tongued the duty of the
South in the present emergency.
Jefferson entertained as lively a fear of dissolution from the same cause, declaring that the introduction of the slavery question into Congress ‘"fell upon his ear like a fire bell in the night."’ He regarded the introduction of the subject there as lighting the flames of a conflagration which must consume the whole fabric.
So far from having extinguished the flame, what has Congress not done to feed and magnify it?--He saw that the edifice of Union must disappear; for he felt that the
South was too spirited to brook an assault upon her domestic institutions.
These very fears of
Jefferson become now a lesson of duty to the
South; for, if we submit to what he thought our manly instincts would rebel against, we are not the people he esteemed us to be.
Henry Clay, as well as his great compeers of '37 and '50, was equally emphatic in his deprecation of the slavery agitation, as a lover of disunion.
His most thrilling outbursts of patriotic eloquence were drawn forth by the lively apprehensions of disunion, which he entertained from this cause.
His estimate of Southern spirit was the same as that of
Washington and
Jefferson. He predicted inevitable dissolution from the agitation, if it was not brought to an end in 1850.
It has gone on till 1861; and the six seceding Gulf States have but accepted the recourse indicated by
Mr. Clay. The departed fathers of the country look down from their present exalted abodes upon these seceding States, doubtless with regret, but without one word of reproach; and every word they ever uttered in deprecation of sectional warfare, and in prediction of dissolution, is a word of burning shame to the States that linger and debate, and vex the spirit of their people by leaving undecided the question of which side they will join.
There is no alternative for secession on the part of all the
Southern States, short of a popular declaration in good faith from the
North that they hate us no longer and will agitate against our domestic institutions no more.
No scheme of compromise that does not virtually convey this language from the
Northern masses to the
Southern people will be worth the paper it is written on. If the
Union can be preserved by an empty abracadabra of words, which shall leave all the present bad blood festering in the bosoms of the sections, and the angry agitation now rife widening and still widening the present gaping chasm of popular alienation, then
Washington,
Jefferson and
Clay were indifferent judges of human character, and the
Southern people fitter material for vassalage and serfdom than they esteemed them to be.
