Hamlin on the Union.
--
Mr. Hannibal Hamlin,
Vice-President of the
Yankees, has made a speech in which, to the great satisfaction of his audience, who manifested their approbation by emphatic applause, he scouted the idea of the restoration of the old Union, or any reconstruction of the defunct Government upon its ancient basis.
The South is to be made a territory and province of the
North, governed by Northern viceroys, and deprived of every badge and monument of freedom.
We are obliged to
Mr. Hamlin for this candid and logical avowal.
But if he imagines there is anything novel, startling, or alarming to anybody in the
South in the propositions which he announces with such a flourish, his absurdity is equal to his impudence.
Whatever illusion Northern Democrats may cherish, the restoration of the
Union upon its old principles is a simple impossibility.
It involves on the part of the
South degradation which subjugation does not. To be conquered and crushed does not imply dishonor, even where the combatants are equally matched, much less where the odds are four to one on the side of the victor, and where the vanquished has struggled heroically, though in vain.
No man can be degraded who is not consenting to his own dishonor.
Whatever betide us in the future, we shall never be guilty of the infamy of voluntarily living under a Government which has committed such crimes against our people and against humanity itself as the
United States.
Grasp again in friendship those hands red with the blood of our children!
The menace of subjugation is mercy itself compared to the unspeakable insult and ignominy of such a thought.
We are aware that
Mr. Hamlin and his Black Republicans mean only the most infernal malice in refusing us the precious privilege of ever again becoming their friends and countrymen.
But, whatever his motives, he proposes to us a punishment which we prefer to the infamy of a voluntary return to the
United States.
After all, he would only make us a province in name, as we were under the old Union in fact.
We were hewers of wood and drawers of water for our Yankee taskmasters, and flattered with the name of sovereign States; but the moment we exercised that essential attribute of sovereignty, of choosing to set up for ourselves,
Lincoln called out 75,000 men, and afterwards a million, to convince us, in his own words, that a State holds the same relation to the
United States that a county does to a State.
The only change, so far as we can see, which
Mr. Hamlin proposes, is to call things by their right names, and no longer to mock the old provincial of the
United States with the insignia and titles of freedom and independence.
It will be time enough, however, for the
Black Republican orators to provide for the future enslavement of the Southern Confederacy when they have shown their ability to carry out their magnificent bravado, or even to preserve their own freedom.
Their efforts hitherto to conquer us have only resulted in the loss of their own liberties.
Instead of making us provinces, they have made themselves slaves.
Their last Congress put the entire population and purse of the
North at the command of the
President; their next Congress will find the grand Army of the Potomac cowering around the fortifications of
Washington.
This is a fair illustration of Yankee promise and performance.
What a puerile and absurd people!
What mighty words and impotent action!
What
Hannibal in words, and what Hamlins in deeds!
