Abolition a Sedition, by a Northern ManColton, Calvin
History
Abolition a Sedition, by a Northern Man
Colton, Calvin
Abolitionists -- United States; Slavery -- United States
THE CHARACTER OF THE ABOLITION ORGANIZATION.
There seems to have been a uniform impression among the great majority
of the citizens of the United States, that the Abolition movement in
this country is wrong, as it stands related to our political fabric;
but the exact character and extent of this wrong have not been so well
defined in the public mind, as to enable the people to see how a
remedy can be applied to arrest and control the mischief that appears
to be growing out of this agitation. Every reflecting person in the
land sees and feels, that it threatens to break asunder the American
Union; and few doubt, that such will be the result, if it is permitted
to go on. We take for granted, that the almost unanimous voice of the
whole country would concur in the opinion, that a violent dissolution
of the American Republic would be the greatest calamity that could
happen in this Western world. Can it be, then, that there is no
Constitutional power to suppress an organization, the rise and course
of which tend so directly and so inevitably to the disruption and
demolition of the Federal Government? Certainly, it would be a great
and notable defect in the political structure of the United States,
if there were to be found in it no principle of conservation against
such a danger, and if the people of this country were compelled to see
an enemy start up among themselves, and march directly to the
overthrow of the Government, without any power to resist. Doubtless,
in a last resort, the Union is too dear to the American people
generally to allow it to be sacrificed without an attempt to maintain
it, even if there should prove to be no provision in the Constitution
and laws. The necessity and importance of the case would create a law
for the occasion. The people would feel, that they have a better right
to defend the Union, than an enemy has to destroy it. But if the law
of necessity be waited for, the scale of chances as to the final issue
may have become doubtful--too doubtful and too portentous to be
prudently staked on such a hazard; and the American Union might be
lost forever.
If, however, it can be shown, that the Abolition movement is at war
with the genius and letter of the National Constitution and of the
Constitutions of the States respectively, and with that social compact
which created the Union, and under which it has hitherto been
maintained, then clearly there will be presented a Constitutional
basis on which this movement can be opposed, and by which, if it shall
become necessary, it can be suppressed. We propose an attempt to
establish the position, that such _is_ the character of this movement,
and consequently, that there is a remedial power against its action in
the Constitution and laws of the land.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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