But even if the right of intercepting their slavers
were acknowledged by treaty, which it never would be, the arrogance of
the Southern slave-holders would not long submit to its exercise.
Their pride and self-conceit, swelled to an inordinate height by their
successful struggle, would defy the power of England as they had
already successfully defied that of their Northern countrymen. After
our people by their cold disapprobation, and our press by its
invective, had combined with their own difficulties to damp the spirit
of the Free States, and drive them to submit and make peace, we should
have to fight the Slave States ourselves at far greater disadvantages,
when we should no longer have the wearied and exhausted North for an
ally. The time might come when the barbarous and barbarizing Power,
which we by our moral support had helped into existence, would require
a general crusade of civilized Europe, to extinguish the mischief
which it had allowed, and we had aided, to rise up in the midst of our
civilization.
Pages:
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47