But after all is said, the fact remains, that on the main issue the Abolitionists were at least working in the right direction. Sooner or later, by one means or another, slavery had to go. It is beyond doubt a misfortune that in certain districts the bulk of the population should be composed of densely ignorant negroes, often criminal or vicious in their instincts; but such is the case, and the best, and indeed the only proper course to pursue, is to treat them with precisely the same justice that is meted out to whites. The effort to do so in time immediately past has not resulted so successfully as was hoped and expected; but nevertheless no other way would have worked as well. Slavery was chiefly responsible for the streak of coarse and brutal barbarism which ran through the Southern character, and which marked the ferocious outcry instantly raised by the whole Southern press against the Abolitionists. There had been an abortive negro rising in Virginia almost at the same time that the abolitionist movement first came into prominence; and this fact added to the rage and terror with which the South regarded the latter. The clamor against the North was deafening; and though it soon subsided for the time being, it never afterwards entirely died away. As has been shown already, there had always been a strong separatist feeling in the South; but hitherto its manifestations had been local and sporadic, never affecting all the states at the same time; for it had never happened that the cause which called forth any particular manifestation was one bearing on the whole South alike. The alien and sedition laws were more fiercely resented in Virginia and Kentucky than in South Carolina; the tariff, which so angered the latter, pleased Louisiana; and Georgia and Alabama alone were affected by the presence of great Indian communities within their borders. But slavery was an interest common to the whole South. When it was felt to be in any way menaced, all Southerners came together for its protection; and, from the time of the rise of the Abolitionists onward, the separatist movement throughout the South began to identify itself with the maintenance of slavery, and gradually to develop greater and greater strength. Its growth was furthered and hastened by the actions of the more ambitious and unscrupulous of the Southern politicians, who saw that it offered a chance for them to push themselves forward, and who were perfectly willing to wreak almost irreparable harm to the nation if by so doing they could advance their own selfish interests. It was in reference to these politicians that Benton quoted with approval a letter from ex-President Madison, which ran:--