This is of such importance that I beg leave to dwell on it; evidently our influence has not yet been exercised as it should have been, and if Mr. Lincoln now bends somewhat before counsels devoid of energy and dignity, it proceeds in part from our reserve, our silence, our apparent neutrality—who knows? even from the discouraging language that has been sometimes held in our name. The publication of the unlucky Morrill Tariff, (signed, we may say in passing, by Mr. Buchanan, and the revocation of which, I am convinced, will be signed some day by Mr. Lincoln,) has given the signal for political demonstrations, all of which are very far from being to the credit of Europe. Our Moniteur has published articles to be regretted, but it is above all among the English that the cotton party has had full scope.
Let England beware! it were better for her to lose Malta, Corfu, and Gibraltar, than the glorious position which her struggle against slavery and the slave trade has secured her in the esteem of nations. Even in our age of armed frigates and rifled cannon, the chief of all powers, thank God! is moral power. Woe to the nation that disregards it, and consents to immolate its principles to its interests! From the beginning of the present conflict, the enemies of England, and they are numerous, have predicted that the cause of cotton will weigh heavier in her scales than the cause of justice and liberty. They are preparing to judge her by her conduct in the American crisis. Once more, let her beware!
And under what pretexts do we chaffer with the government of Mr. Lincoln for those energetic, persevering sympathies on which it has a right to count? Let us examine.
We hear, in the first place, of the vigor of the South and the weakness of the North. It is not the first time that a bad cause has shown itself more ardent, more daring, less preoccupied by consequences, than a good one. Good causes have scruples, and every scruple is an obstacle.
I am assuredly as sorry as any one to see Mr. Lincoln struck with a sort of paralysis. To my mind, the dangers of inactivity are considerable; I believe that it discourages friends and encourages adversaries; I believe that it sanctions more or less the baleful and erroneous principle of secession, a principle more contagious than any other; I believe, in fine, that, by postponing civil war, it probably risks increasing its gravity. Nevertheless, shall we not take into account the exceptional difficulties with which Mr. Lincoln is surrounded?
The preceding Administration took care to leave no resource in his hands: he found the forts either surrendered or indefensible, the arsenals invaded, the army scattered, the navy despatched to distant parts of the seas. Is it strange that he should have yielded in some degree to the entreaties of so many able men, all urging in the same direction? If to-morrow he should yield entirely, if he should recognize the Southern Confederacy, would it be great cause for astonishment?
Let us not forget, moreover, that the border States are at hand, forming a rampart, as it were, to protect the extreme South. Several of these States, I am convinced, incline sincerely towards the North, and will remain united with it; but are there not others, Virginia, for instance, which perhaps only refrain from seceding for the better protection of those that have done so, and whose present rôle consists in preventing all repression, while its future rôle will be to trammel all progress by the continued threat of joining the Southern Confederacy?
These are serious obstacles; yet I have not pointed out the most serious of all—the intense and sincere repugnance which many Northern people, though declared adversaries of slavery, experience towards measures that are calculated to provoke slave insurrections, and endanger the safety of the planters. I must acknowledge that the patience of the strong seems here rather more laudable than the so much vaunted audacity of the weak, who count on this patience, and know that they can be arrogant without much risk.
The second pretext that is audaciously brought forward to solicit our good will towards the South, is that it has just ameliorated the Federal institutions. Let us ask in what consists this pretended amelioration? The South has not feared to write in set terms, in its fundamental law, what none before it ever dared write, the constitutional guarantee of slavery. Slavery, in accordance with the Constitution of the South, can neither be suppressed nor assailed. Slavery will be the holy ark to be regarded with respect from afar off, the corner-stone which all are forbidden to touch. By the side of this, the South ostentatiously proclaims freedom of speech, of the press, of discussion in every form! Men shall be free to speak, but on condition of not touching, nearly or remotely, on any subject connected with slavery, (and every thing is connected with it in the South.) They shall be free to print, but on condition of giving no writing whatever to the public from which may be inferred the unity of mankind, the sanctity of family ties, the great principles, in fact, which the "patriarchal system" throws overboard. They shall be free to discuss, but on condition of not disturbing this institution, impatient by nature, and still more so in future, now that it feels itself hemmed in and threatened on all sides. It will be by itself alone the whole Constitution of the South; this one article will devour the rest; in default of legislatures and courts, the Southern populace know how to give force to the guarantee of slavery, and to restrain freedom of speech, of the press, and of discussion.
It is true that adroit patrons of the South Carolinian rebellion have a third argument at their service which is no less specious. "All is over," they exclaim, "there is nobody now to sustain, there are no sympathies now to testify; in four days, peace will be made, the new Confederation will be recognized by Lincoln in person, a commercial treaty will even ally it to the United States: the affair is ended."