The New York Herald Newspaper, January 5, 1861, Page 6

EEE 6 NEW YORK HERALD, SATURDAY, JANUARY 65, 1861.—TRIPLE SHEET. NEW YORK HERALD. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR. OFTIOE N. W. CORNER OF FULTON AND NASSAU STS, deans. sent by inal will be at the ETS Ke Cee ‘THE DAILY AFRALD, too cents copy, $7 per annum, TEE WEERLY HERALD, every Sturdy ‘at iw cents ‘or $3per annum; the European Edition coery Wednesday, ‘conis per copy, $4 per annum to any part of Bread Britain, tof the Continent, both & include postage; the 0 ere eine ar lt, Gnd Slat of ‘euch snondhe at ote or $1 0 anmen. THe} Soniye on Wednesilay, at four cents per RY PON Rac CORRESPONDENCE, conteantng ianpo: tant pat akiey ‘any quarter of the world; if used, will be paid for. aa- Son FORBIGN CORRESPONDENTS Aiur *ARTIOULARLY REQUASTED TO SEAL eS AND DP AOK- (AGES SENT US. SHO NOTICE taken of anonymous correspondence, We du va ITISEMENTS renewod every day; wlvertisenents in- sorted in the Weexty Hemave, Famtry fenasp, and in the Caifoente ond er Pean PRINTING excowted with neatness, cheapness and de- Woke EXVI wc ccc cece cece cece nce Oe & AMUSEMENTS THIS EVENING. | | xs Perites Miseres vx | WIBLO'S GARDEN, Broadway. Le—Lss Deux AVEN- | a Vix Humaine—La Conve GeLEs—Amecscave at LvexRmann. WINTER GARDEN, Brondway, opposite Bond atrect.— | Consvaar Lesson—Nicuonss NioKLuny—SrecTay Brive- , Bowery—. Afternoon and evening. — BOWERY THBA’ Teouru—Monsrex oF St. Bratpine & Roger's Miouas. ONG MS WALLACK’S THEATRE, Broadway.—Paviuxn—Tox Nopor’s bucrer. LAURA KEENE'S THEAT! oe RA RB, No. 624 Broadway. NEW BOWEKY THEATRE, Bowery.—Afternoon and Evening —Msv Antuoxy Warxt—Fuisky Consixa—Cara- Bact OF THK Gances. BARNUM'S AMERICAN MUSEUM, Broadway.—Day and Evening—Tux sea ov lon—Aztuc CuipuKny—Livine Cunt sities, &0. BRYANTS' MINSTRELS, Mechanics’ Mali, 472 Hroad- ‘Wway.—Buxiusauss, Sones, Damors, &0.—Dixie's Lanv. -HOOLEY & CAMPBELL'S MINSTRELS, Nibio's Saloon, | ors, TOwIEAQONS, &O.— | j-—-KTHIOPEAN SONGS, ew Year, CANTERBURY MUSIO HALL, 66. roadway.—som Danors, Bunizsuces, dc. twos sig ‘TRIPLE SHEET. ‘ New York, Saturday, January 5, 1861. The News, Yesterday was observed as a day of humiliation, fasting and prayer for our national transgressions, in accordance with the recommendation of the President. In this city business was almost en- tirely suspended, and the churches were crowded with worshippers. We give in our columns this morning the sermons, addresses and prayers de- livered by Rev. Drs, Vinton, Raphall, Adams, Gallaudet, Hawkes, De Witt, Williams, Tyng, Bpring, White, Hoge, Chapin, Thownpson, Betinne, Chauncey, Beecher, J. C. Smith, Hogany, Van Dyke, Taylor and Bellows, together with a report of the scrwon delivered by Rev. Mr. Stockton, the venerable Chaplain to Congress, in the hall of the House of Representatives. These reports em- brace the views of the Episcopalians, Unitarians, Old and New Schcol Presbyterians, Methodists, Dutch Reformed, Baptists, Fanatico-Massachusetts and Hebrews, on the perilovs condition of the nation, arid will doubtless receive from oar readers the attention they deserve. The government arsenal at Mobile was seized by the Alabama State troops at daylight yesterday morning. It contained a large quantity of muni- tions of war. It was rumored at Mobile that Port Morgen was captured on Thursday night. From South Carolina we have a list of the members of Gov. Pickens’ Cabinet. The follow ing are the names:— A. G, Garlington are. The South Carolina Commissioners have left ‘Washington to report to the Convention the result of their negotiations with the President. It is expected that important events will follow their report. The announcement of the occupation of the fort at Beaufort by order of the Governor of North \ Carolina is not confirmed, and there is reason to believe that the report to that effect was without foundation. In our Washington despatches may ‘be found the programme of the secessionists for taking possession of all the public property, in- cluding forts, dockyards, barracks, arsenals, &., along the Southern coast from Cape Henry te ‘Texas. The pony express, with San Francisco dates to December 22, arrived at Fort Kearney on Thurs- day night. The advices by this arrival report bu- siness in San Francisco as still continuing exceed- ingly dull. The President's Message overtook the outgoing party at Kearney on the 7th of De- cember, being telegraphed entire from St. Louis. By the pony it arrived at Sacra- mento on the ,19th, whence it was tele- graphed to Sen Franciseo, and published | in the papers of that city on that day, together with the proceedings of Congress down to the 7th. The steamship Sonora sailed from San Francisco on the 224 of December for Panama, with $1,467,219 im treasure on board, of which $1,446,000 are for New York. The dates from Oregon are © Decomber 11, British Columbia to the #th, and Sandwich Islands to the Ist. The de- tails will be found in another column. The steamship Cahewba, from New Orleans on the morning of the 25th ult., and Havana on the night of the 28th, arrived here last evening. The news from Havana is of no importance. tinued unfavorable reports from Europe and the United States rendered the sugar market ex- tremely dull. The Cahawba, on the 27th, when thirty miles out from Haveua, met with an acci- | dent to her machinery. She experienced heavy northwest gales and unpleasant weather during nearly the entire voyage. Both branches of the Common Council brought their services for 1860 to a close last evening, Revolutions relative to the distracted condition of the country, and in favor of memorializing the Le- gislature to call a State convention, were adopted in both Bourds. The customary vote of thanks to the presiding officers were passed, and suitable acknowledgments made. The City Comptroller's budget for the year 1861, showing that an amount of #6,416,04 36 will be required to be raixed by taxation for the city go- | vernment for the current year, is given in another column, The following is a general recapitnia- tion: For the support of the city governm: 850,507 00 For interest on city debt 897,180 00 For redemption of city 71,651 36 GR. Ais ieiveds csvviai Bevieciened $6,510,108 39 ‘The «stimated amount for oppropriations re- qi ied te be made it... ... vices vse $6,810,404 86 Me Amount of same is -etimated al 100 00 Total. iv aerte + $6,416,908 86 One thourand copies were ordered to be printed. The Frevch schooner Hamecin, from Granville, on Long Beach, on Thursday morn- i lthe master, mate, two ecamen and drowned, the only eurvivor being tle, ‘The con- | Fregress of the Revolution in the South— Glcams of Light. | We submitted to the country the other day 4 "proposition for the reorganization of the Union on the basis of such a revision of the federal constitution as may be indicated by the South- crm States. We transfor to this paper 4 lead- ing editorial on the same subject from the Richmond Enquirer, from which we conclude that, notwithstanding the apparently uncom- promising secession proclivities of that journal, there is a predominant public sentiment be- hind it in Virginia strongly in favor of the Union. We accordingly accept the suggestions of eur Richmond cotemporary on this subject of “reforming the constitution” in the light of a peace offering. It is possible that in this cau- tious manifestation we may have a clue to a conservative reaction, not only in Virginia, but throughout the South. We know that the late revolutionary proceedings in South Caro lina, although committed under the assumed sovereign authority of an independent nationa government, meet with very little sympathy even among the loyal advocates of Southern rights in the North. The local authorities and people of South Carolina, however, fully recog: | nizing the right of secession, and the absoluic sovereignty of a seceded State, may plead the conscientious dischurge of sovereign | rights and personal duty in their revo- | lutionary acts, including the act of treason. This plea renders the offending individual none the less liable to the penalties of the crime, but itopens the door to forbearance and for- giveuess. Hence the generous and wise forbearance of Mr. Buchanan in reference to the revolutionists of South Carolina. They comprehend ell the authorities and all the people of the State. They believe themselves absolved from all con- neetion with and allegixnce to the federal go- yernment, and they act accordingly. But what can we gay in excure for the seizure of a fede- “val fortress by the Governor of Georgia, while that State is stil in full communion with the general government? And what of similar revolutionary acts reported as having been | committed in North Carolina and [loridat | They are tobe commended if justified by the | plea of intervention in bchalf of the federal | government against the mob; but we fear that the local authoritios, in these proceedings, have ; been led astray by the noise of the mob, or by | their sympathies with the mob, and have thus descended to the level of the mob. We apprehend, indeed, that the mob has risen to the control of the community and the au- thorities of South Carolina, and that there a substantial conservative ele- meni in that State, in the Convention, in the Legislature. and among the people, which would gladly avail itself of the first inviting | Opportunity to escape from the pressure of the mob. As in South Carolina, so, we believe, and to a greater extent, this conservative, anti-revolutionary element exists in every other Southern State. We believe that it may be specified in what Mr. Seward has heretofore designated “the slave oligarchy,” the three hundred and fifty thousand slaveholders of the South, or the bulk of them. They appreciate the expenses, the losses and the probable dis- asters of revolution, peaceable or warlike, and they are necessarily conservative. They are uow powerless and submissive under the wild excitement which surrounds them; but with a little time gained for reflection, this excitement may cool down, and then these holders of the thirty-five hundred millions of Southern slave property will be beard. ‘There are between six and seven millions of non-#lavcholding whites in the South. They, under the control of the politicians, control the Southern elections. Excited, on the one hand, by the advances, the power and the declared purposes of the anti-slavery alliance of the North; and inspired, on the other hand, by five-eating politicians with visions of a great | homogeneous Southern confederacy, “based | upon military principles,” and absorbing, in rapid succession, Mexico, Central America, Cuba and other West India islands, the mass of the Southern non-slavehoiding whites are car- | ried away. They have been encouraged, also, | with the prospect of a slave or two, at least, for | every Southern white man with the revival of | the African slave traffic under a Southern con- | i ' federacy. The Southern five-eating politicians have thus raised a spirit of revolution which they cannot yeontrol. We know that among the non-laye- | holding whites of the South are numbered many good, wire and excellent men; but we know, too, that the mob in the South, as it is every- where else, is drawn from the ranks of poverty, and is always ready for revolution. Our South- ern slavebolders, a8 a class, in all the accom- plishments ond virtues of law and order loving men, will compare favorably with any other class of the American people. But they are borne along with the current which they can | no longer resist. The pressure of superior numbers is against them, and they can only sub- mit to the will of the majority of the communi- ty as to the political remedies for their political grievances. A little time, however, secured for reflec- tion, South and North, may bring all things | | { right again. Let the Southern States, ‘in general convention, indicate the terms of their continuance in the Union, | and their propositions of peace will command a | hearing in the North. State Conventions will | be cailed in every Northern State to consider this great subject of a new compromise, and in the enda new compromise, in the revision of | the constitution, will be adopted, that will restore to us that harmonious Union of States contemplated by Washington. From this Con- gress, made up of small politicians, factious demagogues and sectional agitators. we oan | expect no relief. The outgoing administration | isdoing what itcan to preserve peace and | avoid war—it can do no more. The incoming | administration promises nothing better for the | restoration of the Union than the enforcement | of the laws. The time ‘thas come for the people of the several States, North and South, to rise and reorganize the Union. The subject has grown too large for our narrow minded and | imbecile politicians. Let the conservative men, therefore, of the | Southern States proceed to ascertain the term upon which the Union will be adhered to by the South, and in good season the conservative popular majorities of the Northern States will respond. Southern slavery, after all, will be proved a reasonable institution, entitled to pro- tection, when weighed in the seales of the North against the inevitable disasters of dis- union. Let the Southern States tell us of the | North what they want, end we will cave the Unioa, Freedom of Opinion Demanded in Rela-| was so among the Puritans, who scourged, don to Social Institutions. When, in 1634, Lord Baltimore’s colony land- ed at St. Marys, in Maryland, old Father White, a Jeeuit, threw himself upon the ground, avd, with cobs of gratiiude, inaugurated, for the first | time in the history of the world, perfect free- | dom of religious worship to all sects and to all | erceds. Teun years later Roger Williams fol- | lowed bis example in Rhode Island. The seed of toleration thus sown was, however, of slow and tardy growth. The other colonies of Ame- vica struggled to smother it, and there was no precedent for it in the Old World. Yet, by de- grees, it put forth its shoots, and the common political necessities of the Revolutionary pe- riod gave an impetus to it which it could not otherwire have received. It is only within less than a century that its adoption bas been view- ed with favor, and certain religious disabilities have existed upon the statute books of New England States as recently as twenty-five or thirty years ago. The pride and boast of the federal constitution is, nevertheless, that it lays the basis of entire liberty of conscience, and it could scarcely have been supposed that in the present enlightened age there would have been found men willing to oppose it. Yet Mr. Thur- low Weed, in a recent number of the Albany Evening Journal. promulgates a wholly reac- tionary theory, and, under the pretext of ap- peal to purely political events, indulges in most intolerant sentiments. Under the heading “Mr. Chas. O’Conor,” the following article appearc? in a recent num- ber of Mr. Weed’s paper:— ‘this gentleman, in bis speech of Saturday, tho 16th inst., vases the following language:— Polit’ 1 partion should never be divided upon “moral ns they are enlled, Ty the phrase “moral ques jude the whole circle of rel gous opinions otestant Reformation in Swit Frgland, in Scotland, must have id ought to be condemned neiple the Uberation of Holiand from the Spanish yoke was unjnatifiable, and ought to be con bis principle the freedom of Fngland from the sion of the ctuarts could never have boen offected, xor would this country Lave been peopied by our Puritan forefathers On this principle Christianity must be enfeebled in its efforts and tendencies to promote liberty and civilization moug mankind, Nor ean it do anything for_mollifying ment like ours, or for making but the nucleus of persecution for con- science sake, around which mistaken, short- sighted fanatice, instigated by the vicious ambition of a bloody priesteraft, have ral- lied during a0 many centuries of the world’s existence, ought always to be condemned. The enforcement of moral or religious opinions by the strong arm of the law has done more to deluge the world with blood than all other causes put together. Itia equal- ly hideous wherever it presents itself, or under whatever guise. It sullies the page of English, Swiss, Scotch and German history, no less than it disgraces the annals of Spain, Italy, Turkey or Egypt. From the time of Egyptian priest- craft, down to the period of witch-drowning in Salem, temperance law fanaticism in Muine and Massachusetts, and the anti-slavery intolerance of the present hour, it has been the in- strument which a despotic clergy has ever employed to secure its oligarchic supremacy over narrow minded, credulous and bigoted followers. Scheming intolerance has foisted the principle “euwus regio ejvs religio” upon every system of belief that has existed since the beginning of the world. The most bloody wars that have desolated the earth, and the direst calamities that have befallen mankind, have had their origin in the jealous stickling for religious absolutism of reverend monopo- lista of ecclesiastical power. The right of every man to perfect liberty of religion and conscience is a modern theory. It was not imagined to be possible until a little over a couple of hundred years ugo, and its frst practical developement was seen in the United States, in the colonies of Maryland and Rhode Island. It may safely be asserted that there never has existed a nation, Pagan or Christian, of any race, clime or creed, until the constitu- tion of the United States was framed, in which the noli me tangere anathemas of ita pscudo religionists have not paved the way for foul atro- cities, which this enlightened age repudiates as monstrous, unnatural and infamous. War, slaughter, carnage and rapine, even to “saw- ing his enemies, and driving over them chariots armed with iron, and dividing them with knives, and making them pass through brick- kilns,” were a part of the ordinary persuasive measures adopted by King David to enhance the beauty of the Mosaic code in the eyes of idolators; and these latter asserted the dignity of their graven images through the medium of “burning fiery furnaces,” “lions’ dens,” and driving the whole Jewish race into captivity. The first four centuries of the modern era wit- nessed a world drowned in blood to annihilate Christianity; yet the latter no sooner atiained power than Manicheans, Donatists, Arians, Nestorians, Eutychians, Priscillianists, Pela- gions and Catholics seemed to vie with each other in inflicting cruclties upon those who differed from them in opinion. Enlightened emperors, like Theodosius, Justinian, Gratian and Valentinian, disfigured their statute books with enactments of death, banishment, civil disabilities, fines, disgrace and imprisonment, for offences ranging between the extreme of teaching “heresy” and the slightest dissent from the prevailing doctrine. At a later pe- riod the stake became, and continued for cen- turies to be, the natural and inevitable destiny of advocates of liberty of conscience. Hang- ing and quortering began to be fashionable under Elizabeth, and drowning afterwards ob- tained favor as a certain cure for witchcraft. The wholesale slaughters of the thirty years war which preceded the pence of Westphalia; the desert into which the fields of Hngland and Scotland were changed by the hurricane | of ferocity which desolated them in the name ot religion, for a century and a half after the | Reformation; the unending butcheries of cach | other by Huguenots and Catholios in France; | the millions of corpses which have been gtvewn over battle fields throughout Europe, | have all been the reeult of the horrible teach- ing that difference of opinion upon moral, religious, and even philesophical subjects, could not be too rigidly aad stringently ¢ conraged | The clamor of thoee who thus deseorate their calling, and reverse tue spirit of religious law, | has ever been for human sactifice. Whether it | presents ilself in the pe of the car of Fug. | gernanit, the becatembs of burnings upon tha | the pyramids of Mexico, the holy bulls of | Fgypt, or the avtos da fo of Madrid, Smithfield and Goa, their appeal, ever in the same spirit, tends to drive their blindest sectators frantic with the theory that their future welfare or woe demands some bloody sacrifice to some mon- weene echome of salvation or damnation. { banished and bung the Quakers; among the crazy sacrificers of witches, hounded on by clergymen, in the days of Cotton Mather; they were fitly represented by an eminent divine, who, only thirty years ago, declared that his sect must “wade through asea of blood” to become the State religion of the land; the same idea initiated Liquor laws and the Personal Liberty bills of our Puritan States, and it has now girded on the sword of abolitionism as a means of domineering over the minds of its followers. It is the last “moral question” through which an arrogant, self-sufficient cler- gy, has gradually suceceded in “dividing poli- tical parties.” Pushed to its last logical limit it would hang, burn, behead or otherwise de- stroy every slaveholder in the land. It seeks to make of a mere social institution a quevtion of national and individual salvation and dam- nation, and creates, as an intolerant, aggressive religious dogma, the necessity of undying hos- tility to what is woven into the common law and constitution of the country. What public feeling in the United States now demands is an overthrow, once and forever, of this infamous tyranny, and it vehemently protests that if pro-slavery or anti-slavery are to become distinct tenets, precisely th¢same right to believe with the South or with the North is to be protected as is looked for by Catholics, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Metho- dista, Baptists, Unitarians or Nothing-arians, in advocating and maintaining their opinions. Let the abolitionist of Massachusetts prohibit slavery, locally, for his own people if it suit him; but he must none the less be compelled to recognise as his neighbor the Southern fellow citizen who sojourns with slaves in Boston. New Bedford, Newburyport or Lowell, and whose ideas reapecting the social institution di- verge from his own. When the constitution of 1787 was formed, slavery was a part of the common law of the United States. It remains so, and, upon the basis of that common law, the conelitution was erected. Nothing more is asked than that the Southorn slaveholder should be allowed now what was cheerfully yielded to him then. Subsequent local legislation has been exceptional, and what is needed is, that we should retarn to our pristine ideas of tole rance, and that amendments to the constitution should be adopted guaranteeing to all citizens afike the freedom of opinion and of action which, by “dividing political parties on a moral ques- tion,” has been encroached upon and partially lost within the past few years The Venetian Question—The March. As spring approaches the European mind naturally becomes agitated by the reflection that it brings with it the certainty of the re- newal of war, unless, in the meantime, some amicable solution can be found for the Vene- tian difficulty. Garibaldi has assembled around him at Caprera the leading spirits of the revo- lution, and the plan of a fresh campaign is being chalked out. No one doubts that he will carry out his threats in regard to Venice. He may fail in the realization of his hopes, but his failure will not give increased security to Aus- tria. So long as there is a national life in Italy she must not only be prepared to defend Ve- nice by an enormous military force, but also to secure Hungary against revolutionary propa- gandism. In the effort to do this she will ex- haust hers®If, and be compelled to yield from sheer weakness that which she now resists against the public opinion of Europe. The cession of the Venetian territory to Italy, for a money indemnity is the only compromise that will eave her honor and exclude the chance of the question being reopened at some future time. The arguments in its favor are being Wigea ata BCH tr vy M_ Grandguillot in the columns of the Constitutionnel; but they are still more conclusively stated in a pamphlet which has recently appeared in Paris under the title of “The Emperor Francis Joseph and Eu- repe.” This brochure is attributed to the pen of M. Pereire, the eminent banker, who is heavily interested in Austrian securities, and this fact gives all the greater weight to its reason- ing. The writer contends that the cession of Venice to Italy for a fair indemnity is the only effectual, reasonable and humane solution of the question. He shows that there would be no dishonor in Austria releasing herself by such an arrangement from a difficulty which is not only ruinous to her finances, but perilous to the integrity of her empire, In parting with Venice in this way, she would be doing no more than the first Napoleon did in the case of Louisiana, or the King of Holland in that of Belgium. These sovercigns preferred to relin- quish their claims in both cases sooner than to expose their people to the risks of a doubtful conflict. Austria occupies a precively analo- gous position, with perhaps this difference: that under no circumstances can she ever hope to derive any benefit from Venice. M. Pereire thinks the sum of $126,000,000 would be a fuir compensation for the Venetian territory; and this could be at once raised amongst Européan capitalists, if the continental governments, in conjunction with England, would guarantee the loan. Such a guarantee would fix more surely the frontiers of the new kingdom than all the treaties concluded between two adversarics, with or without an indemnity, after a san- guinary conflict. The advantage that so large asum world prove to Austria, in the present exhausted and bankrupt condition of her trea- sury, would amply compensate her for any sacrifice of pride that the arrangement might cost her. If Francis Joseph has only the courage and nobleness of soul to initiate the proposition, it will disarm and disinterest the Italian patriots from any propagandiam in his States, whilst at the same time it will secare to Austria, in the definitive regulation to which all the Powers must proceed, a justly respected influence. These views are in marked accordance with the opinions that we have put forth from time to time in connection with this question. Look- ing to the quarter in which they originate, there is reason to believe that the solution to which they point is regarded with favor by the French Emperor, and would meet with the ready concurrence of the other European go- vernments. But if the latter would avert che dangers that are impending over them they will not content themselves with a passive approval of it. They should signify, collectively, to Aus- irla that she roust at once change her policy in regard io Venice or cede it peaceably. No go- vernment has a right to endanger the public peace by treating its subjects ina manner to continually provoke revolution. If Francis Joseph is not bent upon his own destruction he will not await such a notification. In the ar- guments of the publication to which we have referred be will Gnd a faithful reflection of Ides views entertained by the world gencrally as to the untenable nature of the position that he oc- eupies in regard to this question. He may alvo read in them the condemnation that will await him if he again exposes Europe to the horrors and anxieties of war without having securely calculated all the chances of the struggle. The Crisis and the Remedy in the North and in the South. The conservative masses of the people, North as well as South, have become fairly aroused to the conviction that, in this most critical period of our nation’s history, no remedy whatever is to be looked for from their representatives in Congress. A background of incapacity, stu- pidity, imbecility, gross ignorance and habitual venalily only presents in stronger relief such weakness and cowardice, on the part of the ma- jovity of the members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, as has but one or two parallels in the history of con- stitutional "governments. At a moment when the discretion, judgment, patriotism and pres- tige are needed of statesmen, similar to those produced by the country in the days of Wash- ington and Jefferson, there is only to be found a desolate blank in knowledge and sagacity at the source from whence sound and healthy le- gislation should proceed. Each incumbent of office, North and South, for the term of two or six years, lives in deadly fear of incurring un- popularity among the populace of his own dis- trict or State; and even the few who possess the ability are wanting in the moral courage, independence and freedom from local domin- ion which” are indispensable for the comprehension of those broad views of inter-State policy which must be developed to heal the present and avert the impending evils that menace the prosperity of the coufedera- tion. Such is the humiliating prospect which grects citizens of the United States in the hulls of the Capitol. If they turn their cyes to the present and incoming administrations, an equally sickening state of affuirs is presented to view, without the slightest hope of remedy. The wise recommendations of Mr. Duchanan in his an- nual Message, and the decided stand he has taken with regard to the South Carolina Com- missioners, commend themselves to the favor of the nation; but Congress burrows forward in its molehill, and refuses to adopt his sug- gestions, and to strengthen his hands to stay the downward descent towards disintegration and anarchy. Mr. Lincoln occupies himself with figuring out a Cabinet; and in awarding spoils he may not be permitted to distribute, while not a man of his adherents gropes at any interest beyond such as is individual, or shows an appreciation of the gravity of the mo- mentous questions of the hour. Yet clear, unmistakeable, demonstrated, stands the inextinguishable love of five-sixths of thé population of the United States for the Union. Neither abolition fanatics and perse- cutors at the North, nor fire-eating logocrats and mobocrats at the South, can quench the patriotic fire which was kindled during the seven years’ war that achieved our national in- dependence. The ashes of expiring fossilism in Congress cannot smother it, nor can it be extinguished by either the aggressions of South Carolinian rebels or the Funeuil Hall bmrangues which have provoked them to frenzy. It is the great vox populi, which will unfold blessings and unity to the confedera- tion, and build an enduring fabric of national greatness upon the ruins of the sectional ugita- tion which has been created by narrow minded sectional tyranny on the one hand, and undi- gested, crude, unconstitutional resistance of wrong on the other. Let the people, therefore, speak. Of the five milliana af wateas in sha Tinited States. itis within bounds to say that four millions three hundred thousand are conservative in senti- ment &id prepared to concede to the South their reasonable demands. A constiiuent con- vention of the Southern States is already im- pending. The effervescence which has resulted in mob rule, violence, the seizure of national fortresses, custom houses, post offices and arsenals in South Carolina, is generally disap- proved of, even in slavcholding communities. Ifsimilar acts are committed elsewhere they will be isolated and irresponsible, and the popular voice will fail to sanction them. The gencral idea at the South, as is,apparent from a study of the advices from the separate States, is that cach aggrieved member of the confede- ration should secede, but that, once having passed acte of secession, they should leave rela- tions with the federal government as they are, and have recourse to a constituent convention of the Southern States, to decide upon future defi.ite action. It is from such a Southern constituent con- vention that welfare to the Union may yet pro- ceed. It will be assembled, necessarily, to the comparative exclusion of the small fry of mere sectional politicians, and the guarantees which it asks will be sensible, reasonable, and such as must commend themselves to the common sense of the masses of the people in the Cen- tral and Western States. They will insist upon the recognition of the property rights of their citizens everywhere; upon the needful stipula- tions which intolerance has hitherto denied; upon full liberty to carry slaves into the com- mon territory, and upon the recoghition of uni- versal toleration of opinion respecting slavery as a social institution in the several States of the Union. They will submit these different conditions, as amendments to the constitution, to the Northern States, earnestly inviting their acceptance of them, and assigning a period, similar in principle to that which was appoint- ed for the ratification of the constitution of 1787, when all States which shall have agreed to them eball be considered as fornting thence- forth the future United States of America. It cannot be doubted for an instant, by those who have carefully analyzed the vote at the last Presidential election, and considered the reaction in the republican ranks which has since taken place, that the people of the North and West will respond at oncesto the rational requirements of their Sonth- ern fellow citizens. They will not pause in choosing between the happiness and prosperity which will flash upon the country out of con- cord, and the misery which perseverance in the chaotic byways of abolition would produce But, in order to be prepared to act with the promptitude which the occasion demands, the voice of the Northern States ought to be raised now, without the procrastination of an instant, in calling for constituent State conventions by the Legislatures north of the Potomac. The propositions of the South must be submitted to the non-elaveholding States separately, and these latter should hold themselves ready to onsider thom, It is not an issue of parties, IL is the people only, who, “like the voice of many waters,” must ove*power and drown be- neath a deluge of patriotism the anti-Unios heresies which infect the republic, Let maas meetings everywhere call upon our Northera State Legislatures to summon together con- stituent State conventions. If New York be- gins, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Miehigan, Ti- linois, Indiana, will speedily follow her ex- ample, and a contagion of those sentiments which lighted the fires of Bunker» Hill, and stained with blood the ice blocks of the Dela- ware, will spread from the Atlantic shore to the log cabin of the most distant squatter im Ne- braska. “The Union must and shall be pre+ served,” will be echoed and re-eehoed far ani near, and may even produce its rebound in the frozen consciences of the inhabitants of Masaa- chusetts and Vermont. In « constituent Southern convention, and in constituent State conventions, assembled at the call of mass meetings everywhere by our Northern State Legislatures, to consider the amendments to the constitution which the exi- gency of the time demands, is to be found the remedy for every evil. Itis possible that States east of the Connecticut river may reject the propositions which the South presents; but if they do so let them act upon their own peril. Let them elect Garrison, Greeley or Wendell Phillips as the President of a rigid abolition republic; let them annex themselves to Canada; let them feed upon their own provincial self- conceit, love for isms, hatred for everybody except themselves, and console themselves in the enjoyment of a petty, intolerant, hard bar- gaining, lawless, clergy-beridden nationality, with the reflection that not only the Southern, but the Middle States, are glad to get rid of them, and have regarded them as an incubus upon the Union for over a quarter of a cen- tury. Meanwhile, let the action of the Union loving States of the confederation be prompt. There is no time to be lost. With proper dili- gence mass meetings may initiate action oa the part of all our Northern Legislatures within the present month. In February the Soute will be ready to present its propositions, and before the period has arrived for the inaugura- tion of Mr. Lincoln the tempest that now threatens so menacingly may have been en- tirely dispelled from our political horizon. The Compromise Emanating from New York. We are in favor of Mr. Crittenden’s plan of compromise, or any similar mode by which a settlement of the dangerous question which now menaces the peace of the country may be effected. But it appears to us that the method proposed by Lucius Robinson—a republican member of the New York Legislature—is de- cidedly the best, because the simplest, the most easily understood, most in accordance with the constitution, and most certain to prevent a re- currence of the slavery agitation in Congress, and to get rid forever of all difficulty about the Territories. The proposition of Mr. Robin- son is to admit Kansas as she is on her present application, and to divide all the remaining ter- titory so as to form two States, to be ad- mitted as States of this Union immediately upon the adoption by the inhabitants of such State constitutions as the constitution of the United States prescribes. Thus the great “dis- turbing element in our national councils” would be excluded for all future time, and the federal republic, instead of jarring to its own destruction, would work harmoniously with its complicated machinery and its wheels within wheels. The adoption of this measure by Congress, and the placing of the Fugitive Slave law on the same basis as the law for the reclaiming of criminals, or as the treaty with England for the rendition of persons charged with felony, would be amply sufficient to settle the whole question at issue between the North and the South. When England demands a fugitive from justice, in pursuance of the extradition treaty, it is not permitted us to try the case upon the merits by a jury. The accused must be tried in the country whence he has escaped. All that is needed here is that a prima facie case be made out as to the identity of the par- ty and the nature of the offence, and the fugi- © tive is delivered up. This is the common sense way of carrying out the provision of the con- stitution for restoring fugitive slaves to their masters, and the constitution might be so amended as to have it inserted as a supplemen- tary provision. This and the territory are really the only two questions to be settled; and if the New York Legislature, now in seasion, will adopt the proposition submitted to it by Mr. Robinson, the effect will be instantancous and immense upon the other Northern States and upon Congress, Such a proposition, coming from the great Empire State, will be respectfully received everywhere, and probably adopted by the Legislatures now sitting or about to be convened. To make aasurance doubly sure, a convention ought to be called in this State to endorse it, and public meetings ought to be held in every city and town to obtain an ex- pression of the public opinion. Thus the pa- triotic ardor of the people would be spread from State to State in favor of Union and peace, instead of civil war to coerce fifteen States into Union aguinst their will—aa attempt which would result {n certain failure, whatever political Hotspurs or men unac- quainted with military history and the art of war may think to the contrary. By this simple ineasure, which calls for no sacrifice of prin- ciple o? of party, the disunion spirit in the South would be appeased, and the secession movement would be arrested. Nine-tentha of the Southern people are in favor of the Union, if they could obtain justice in it, and not one- tenth in favor of secession at all hazards. whether justice be rendere by the North or not. Dut if equity is refused, then the propor tion will be the other way, and nine-tenths will be for separation, either by peace or war, and not one-tenth in favor of a Union in which the Southern States are denied the rights of oo equal partners. By the pressure of State Legislatures and public opiaion, developed through public nyret ings, Congress would be compelled to sic- cumb, and adopt the compromise pro. posed in the New York Legislature Tf Congress continued to resist “the voice of God.” as expressed through the people, then the peo- ple, by their State conventions, could soon set- tle the matter. The petitions to Congress, pour: ing in from democrate and republicena alike, im favor of Crittenden’s propoeition to axtend the Missouri line, show that the people want tom- promise, and (hat they would go heartily for the plen proposed by Mr, Robinson, which notonly carries ou! the idea of the other compromise, "put gettles the question speedily, because by 9a