The North And South

In reply to an open letter addressed to himby Mr. Chittenden in the New York Tribune, Senator Ilill of Georgia, just before leaving Xew York sent that journal a reply from wbich we make the following extracts : However rnuch we may dtffer on some questions of policy, I believe you wil! do me the justice to admit that I am in the habit of speaktng, when I speakat all, preoisely what I think on all subjects. The impression made upon rny mind by the study alluded to is not a pleasant one. I will frankly say that at no period of our Union, as it seems to ine, have the Northern people so greatly or so unjustly distrusted the Southern people, nor du I Lliink there ever was & generation at the Xorth who so little understood the constitution or so little regarded that constitution as our bond of imion. 1 do not mean to be offensive, but I do mean to be candid, when I say that to berate and misrepresent the South and to ïoisinterpret and ignore the constitution seem to be the two subjects which absorb the hearts and minds of the Kepublicaus of the North, and to which all other subjeots are held as subordínate. Your own letter f umishes strong conflrmation of this sad fact. Yon say, "Your candidate for Governpr - who is au excellent man by the wáy- saya fchat the election (in New York) 'concerns only state affairs,' but everybody laughs at himforsayíng it." Whífcl laiigh at a man for saying State officers are elected to attend only to State affairs ? You go on. "The cominon feeling seems to be that the eleciion is not only of national interest, but that it is also the final battle, with rebellion ; the climax of bitter sectional strife and probably gateway to comnarative good feeling and assuied national prosperity." Battling with rebellion Ín a State election for only State officers in Xew York nearly flfteen years af ter the war has eaded '■. Pardon me, my fi'iend, but this far exceeds Falstafí's battle with bis iinuginary but constantly increasing foes "in buekram!" Nevertheless, you seem to write correctly the views of your party in New York and throughout the North. The feeling of distrust, abuse and hate of the South in the Republicans of the Xorth exhibits all the symptoms of a mania. It is full of irrelevancy. irrationality and untruthf ulness. Even your local elections for State, county, city and town ofilcers are domiqated by this feeling of hatred and distrust for the South. It is found in your bar rooms, counting houses and pulpits. 1 1 is beyond reason, and, I fear, beyond remedy. I see no evidence that the ISTortli "is weary of seetional strife." The Ilepublican party lives on and thrives by tliis seetional strife. Bad men speculate on it, and demagogues ply it as the best means of getting office. Yon say, '-If there be anytliing so bedded in our history that it can never be got out, it is the fact that Southern ideas and Southern men have generally opposed the American spirit as represented by the people who planted androoted ourinstitutionsand thrift in the hard and thorough discipline of New England." 1 had supposed that our thrift as a people was due to the abundance of our cheap fertile lands, the great variety of oHr produetions, the industry of our people, all protected and inspired with hopeful vigor by that unprecedented constitutional system of dual federal and local fren governmeiits which Washington, Jefferson.Madison Pinckney, Hutledge and a great number of Southern men had mach todo in "planting and rooting" in tliis country. I would abate not "one jot or titile of the credit to which Xew England is entitled in this work. I desüise all sectionalism, whether againat the North or against the South. I believe no one seeüon oí this country is all virtuous or all vicious, aud no one section exceeds the other in either virtues or vices. But if our history teaches any two facts more indisputably than all other facts they are these- First. ïhut slavery was "planted" in this country from África and "rooted" in the South through ''the hard and thorough discipline of New England !" Second, Tliat sccession wa3 both "plantod and rooted" as a doctrine in our constitutional, system by New England, and was taught, advocated and threatened as a constitutional remedy for State grievances by leading jSTew England statesmen man? years before it was ever whispered in the Soxith. 'jL'he iirst threat of secession was inade in the first term of Washington's Administration. The New Engiand members iu Congress had brought forward :i proposition for the assumption by tlie General Government of certain war debts of the States. The Southern States had largely paid their debts, whilé the debts of the New England States had mostly been bought up at a large discount by speculatora, sonie of whorn. a Northern historian tells us, were then in Congress. The proposition was rejecied by' Southern votes. Great excitement followed. New England threatened to secede and Congress could do no business but adjourn from day to day, and its dissolution was imminent. At this critical moment Mr. Jefferson arrived at the capital from a foreign mission. 11e found Mr. Hamilton pacing up and down in front of bis liouse (or the mansion) in utter despair of the Union. Ilaniilton explained to Mr. Jefferson the situation, and appealed to him "to save the Union." Jeiïerson did save it, IlciwV Ñotby argument, nor by denouncing the Ñew England members as traitors and crimináis, but by a trade! He propoaed a trade by whicb the Ñew England members got their money and the Southern members got the national capital located on the Totomac instead of farther norlh. For two generations afterwards the favorite method of saving the Union was by giving the north the rnoney and the South the honors. ünder this process the Xorth has grown so great that she insists upon baviag all the inoney and all the honors, and upon treating the South as crimináis and traitors ! lt is a curious fact well worth om study that the South has not made óne dollar either by slavery or slave labor. Indeed, the state of the account shows that the Bruth has lost untold mülions bv slavery and slave labor, while the North had made and pocketed every dollar of profit there was in slavery or that was realized on the products of slave labor ! The Xorth sold the slaves to the South, and then, keeping the price, denounued the idea of property in human beíngs as barbaroos. Because the South defended tlie title shc boughtand paid tor in the very manner in which Xew England had taught was constitutional, sheis denounced as rebellious and traitorous! Vou are agreat and successful merchant. Wil! you do me the kindness to cast ttp the figures and teil me how man y billionsof money New York and Masaachusetta and Fennsylvania have made out of slavery and the producís of slave labor ? If you will work this suin I think we will be able to understand your boast when you say. -'New York is now the flnancial centre of I Xorth America, and will soon be the greatesl money power in the wliole world." Will such a great and rich State, in wïiose prosperity I rejoice, st 11 insist npon treatiug as rebels and traitots the people wlio h;ive done and are still doing so much fo increase hér wealth and power? Will a State which has so much wealth forget her own State offlcers in a mad purpose to keep up a sectional öght with the impoverished South? Insanity, my friend, insanity! - the insanity of hate! May it not prove to be the very devil of final disunion ! The t-outh does not seek to control either the Xorth er the Federal Government, but the South does greatly desire to see both the Jiorth and the South restored to the control of the constitution - the constitution of Madison, of Webster, and of the Supreme Court. The South will seek to exercise no power except that to whieh she is entitled underthe constitution, and that power she desires to exercise solely for the peaoe and yrosperity of the whole country. Allow me to add that this bugaboo of Southern domination is not creditable either to the manhood or the intelligenee of the Republican party. The South is and must remaiii the weaker section. She has no interest in sectionalism, but every interest in true coüstitutipnal nationalism. The South can bave strength in the future only in advocating the soundest of sound principies for the uational credit, the national honor and the national prosperity, and sending her ablest men to Congress to maintain such principies. But you say the South votes solid with the Democratie party. Why'i Solely because the Itepublican party will not allow any Southern man to support the Republican party and preserve his self-respect. The whole policy of the liepublican party since the war has been based upon the assumption that the Southern people are crimináis and must confesa themselves to be crimináis, in your letter addressing myself you say," "You, yourself, in all your strength, cannot stand for a moment, or live, with your constituents if you say that the Kebellion was a 'ri np." Speaking for myself, I never did believe in secession as either a doctrine or a remedy under the constitution. But from the beginning much abler men than I am have taught it was both. Sorne of the framers of the constitution so taught. Many of the ablest men of New Englaiul so taught. The Southern people believed they had a right to secede, and that the peace of the country and their own safety demanded lts exereise. They did not intend to niake war on the Government as Ilepublican dernagogues so flippantlv charge. The attnmpt by the Kepublicans to treat an act which grew out of honest dift'erences of opinión as a traitorous rebellion against the Government is as unmanly as it is untruthful. But the Republican party not only insists that the Southern people are all traitors, but that they shall confess themselves to be traitors. The result is that 110 Southern man can affiliate with the Republican party without confessmg himself a criminal and agreeing to treat all his ovvn people as crimináis. By sucli confession he would show himself unfit to be trusted by any party. By this policy of the Republican party everything decent in the South ia driving into the Democratie party, and tlien the Republican party raises the cry for a "solid Ñorth against the solid South!" I do not know whutelsemay happen in the future, but tliis much I do know come what may, the Southern people will never confess themselves traitors. Their children will never confess it, and if the intelligent people of the North shall see proper to BOlidify and keep the sectionul Republican party in power unül this confesslon sliall be made, then your hope of only one more year of sectional agit.ition is the dream oí a distempered brain, anda cordial reunión is hopeless. ïhe Southern people abandon, and abandon forever, both secession and slavery. They adrait that superior physical forcé has settled what argument was unable to settle. They accept in good faith the constitutional amendmenta. They desire to exercise only their proportion of power, under the constitution and laws. They neither desire, nor will they allow if they can prevent it, any more civil or sectional wars. This they abundantly proved to all fair-miuded men in the presidential count. They will not under any circumstanccs "starve" the Government, nor seek any control over the North. But they intend to preserve their selfrespect, and to deserve the respect of all brave and honorable men everywhere and for all time, and this they cannot do by confessing themselves to be crimináis, as the Republican party has demanded and still demanda. Xow. my friend, what are j ou intelligent men in the North going to do about itï Will you insist upon keeping the South solid by demanding their self-dishonor, and then insist upon making the North solid because the South refnses self-degradation at your (Iemand ? Well, auppose you succeed V Suppose you succeed, by your absurd and ünpossible stories of (innatural outrages at the South. In making every man in the North hate and distrust every man in the South ? Will that break the solid South ? Will that allay sectional strife? Will that bring peace to the country, prosperity to the nation or prosperity to the Union? I have always believedtheseccessionists were the most damaging enemies the South ever had. Uut they did not intend damage. They intended to relieve the conscience of the North on the subject of slavery and preserve their own property on their own responsibility. They were mistaken, but they were not traitors. I equally believe that the Republican party is the most dangeroua enemy the Union ever had. It lives on sectionalism. It teaches the North to hate the South, and compels the South to hate the North. If the people of the Xorth are nut capable of seeing the end of such a policy, they are Incapable and unworthy of free government The Southern people lost fortune, faine and power by the war. Hereand there a man may be found wuo, by reason of his connection with the war, bas reached positions for he would never otherwise iiivp been thcuglit of, but there aievery few such. It would be uiuiatural for such a people to desire further seetional strife. But at the Xorth there are thousands of men vvho liave made fortunes 'bv the, war, and many have made faine and power. Mány ;vre adulated who but tor ■ luck, of wa would never have been known. Mil.lionairesare on ever band who but for the war would be paupers. It is unnatural for men who have made so inuch by war not to regret its occurrencenoy to deprécate aaother ? May not very inany othera who see these examplesof wár fortunes naturally desire or l)e willing to have like good luckV Is it strange that leaders who have grown rich and powerful hy sec tionalism should desire to make asolid North against a solid South, and thus perpetúa tethéir fortunes and power? but it will be strnnge il! ai. intelligent people cannot penétrate such a transparent purpose and prevent its accomplishment. I bope and believe the present will prove a year ot purgation to the Democracy, and cleansing the party of its interna] t'eu'ls and its running af ter issues, will recall it to sound principies and a healthy condition in 1S80. If so.we shall be able to present a man for the Presidency whose nominátion will be an honor to the party, whose elèction will Le an honor to the people, and whose wise and patriotic administration will inspire coufldence in al! good men, will maintain the national honor and the national credit and advance both ; f rom under whose presenee rogues will retire abashed, and under wliose iniluence sectionalism will wither forever.