That nearly half the population of
the Border Slave States are in favor of it is a patent fact, since
they are now fighting in its defence. It is not probable that they
would be willing to fight directly against slavery. The Republicans
well know that if they can re?stablish the Union, they gain everything
for which they originally contended; and it would be a plain breach of
faith with the Southern friends of the Government, if, after rallying
them round its standard for a purpose of which they approve, it were
suddenly to alter its terms of communion without their consent.
But the parties in a protracted civil war almost invariably end by
taking more extreme, not to say higher grounds of principle, than they
began with. Middle parties and friends of compromise are soon left
behind; and if the writers who so severely criticize the present
moderation of the Free-soilers are desirous to see the war become an
abolition war, it is probable that if the war lasts long enough they
will be gratified. Without the smallest pretension to see further into
futurity than other people, I at least have foreseen and foretold from
the first, that if the South were not promptly put down, the contest
would become distinctly an antislavery one; nor do I believe that any
person, accustomed to reflect on the course of human affairs in
troubled times, can expect anything else.
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