Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 18.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

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Social Disorders.

No man can foretell the hour when the volcano will burst in Europe and overwhelm Church and State, Czar and President in one common ruin. In the North, where the industrial system has had its freest and fullest development, organized labor and agricultural discontent are the all-pervading symptoms of social disorder and the precurser of political ruin. It is certain that the present condition is only temporary. When all the property and means of living are [401] more and more accumulating in a few hands, and the political power is possessed by the many, it takes no prophet to foretell that some other arrangement must be made.

The resistance made by the South was not merely an attempt to preserve political institutions, but to perpetuate a social organization inherited through a thousand generations — the sanctity of marriage, the inviolability of the family, the faith in truth, honor, virtue, the protection of home. Historically the position of the South was impregnable.