We have contemplated deferring the publication of this pamphlet until we could ascertain from the Secretary of the Interior the number of acres of unpre-empted land in each State, together with their location &c., &c., but we are informed by the commissioner of the land office in Washington that there are no data or statistics in his office that will give us that information.
As we may have to wait for Congress to assemble before we can obtain the necessary statistics, we shall send out our pamphlet at once, and set the ball in motion.
The question that has recently come up between the Secretary of the Interior and the Pacific railroads must be settled, so far as we can see, in favor of the Secretary, who has just issued a pamphlet with the grounds of his decision, and which has been sent us.
The railroads, however, may delay matters by their dilatoriness in making their returns to government of the lands sold by them, their location, &c., and it may be necessary for Congress to hurry up that matter a little, so that the land commissioner can give the desired information.
But there is no time to be lost. The "conciliated" Wade Hampton, and the Hamburg-massacre-Butler crowd have already organized the second rebellion in South Carolina, and armed their militia with "federal bayonets," over which waves the "bloody shirt," inscribed with Hampton's declaration in a speech in Sumter County, "that the Democrats must carry that county at all hazards," supplemented by Senator!! Butler, who "said it was unnecessary to tell them how to do it." "Webb," a correspondent of the Boston "Journal," tells us in the following paragraph, how they are doing it:—
SHAMEFUL CONDUCT OF THE MILITARY.
"Armed men have been stationed as pickets on roads leading to county conventions. These men were supplied with State arms, furnished through the United States, were evidently under good military discipline, had recognized officers, and were known as members of the State volunteer militia. At first they appeared without uniforms; of late they have attempted in uniform to break up Republican meetings. They have not hesitated to announce publicly that the white people of South Carolina had decided that Republican meetings should not be held, and that any attempt to hold such meetings might result in personal injury. At one of the meetings at Sumter County, one of the aids of Governor Hampton knocked the Republican chairman from the stand. Another seized the chairman by the throat and severely injured him. The speaker was Probate Judge Lee, who acted as chairman of the meeting, and who at that time was threatened both with shooting and hanging. So many authorized details of those acts of violence have been brought to the knowledge of the Administration here that the President and his Cabinet are convinced that there is an organized movement in South Carolina to put down by violence any attempt at Republican organization, and that Wade Hampton is giving this revolutionary and cowardly movement his active personal support. It is, perhaps, needless to say that the President is very much surprised at Hampton's conduct."
If "the President and his Cabinet" had consulted the Principia Club papers more, and Southern rebels less, it would not have taken them half of their Presidential term to learn that rebel promises are of no account whatever, for they would have discovered abundant evidence of their utter worthlessness. As "federal bayonets" are now so popular in rebel hands, and getting to be so useful to put down Republicanism in South Carolina, perhaps our verdant President, in his "surprise," may break the shackles with which he was voluntarily bound, and use "federal bayonets" to put down rebellion. At all events, he ought to obey the United States Constitution he has sworn to support, which tells him he "shall guarantee to every State in the Union a republican form of government." If he hasn't given away all his "federal bayonets" to the rebels, is it not about time for our commander-in-chief to use them in South Carolina? (See Principia Club Papers No. 7, pp. 152-5: The Southern Policy.)
[Special Despatch to the Boston Traveller.]
Washington, D. C., Oct. 18.—The President has taken steps, through the proper officers, to have the outrage perpetrated at Sumter, South Carolina, investigated, with a view of ascertaining who is responsible, and whether or not there has not been an open violation of the United States laws.