It was previously observed in these columns that President Lincoln, legally cautious, constitutionally conciliatory, by birth a citizen of the border slave state of Kentucky, is escaping only with difficulty from the control of the “loyal” slaveholders, seeking to avoid any open breach with them and precisely thereby provoking a conflict with the parties of the North which are consistent in point of principle and are being pushed more and more into the Together with Garrison and G. Smith, Wendell Phillips is the leader of the Abolitionists in New England. For 30 years he has without intermission and at the risk of his life proclaimed the emancipation of the slaves as his battle-cry, regardless alike of the persiflage of the press, the enraged howls of paid rowdies and the conciliatory representations of solicitous friends. Even his opponents acknowledged him as one of the greatest orators of the North, as combining iron character with forceful energy and purest conviction. The London Times—and what could characterise this magnanimous paper more strikingly—today denounces Wendell Phillips’ speech at Abington to the government in Washington. It says it is an “abuse” of freedom of speech.

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’Anything more violent it is impossible to imagine,”.says The Times, “and anything more daring in a time of Civil War was never said in any country by any

And The Times, in spite of, or perhaps ‘because of, its hatred of the Union government, appears not at all disinclined to assume the role of public prosecutor!

In the present state of affairs Wendell Philips’ Abington speech is of greater importance than a battle bulletin. We therefore summarise its most striking passages.

“The government,” he savs anong other things. “is fighting for the preservation of slavery, and therefore it is fighting in vain. Lincoln is waging a politucal war. Even now he ts more afraid of Kentucky than of the entire North. He beheves in the South. Vhe Negroes on the Southern battlefields, when asked whether the ram of cannon-balls and bombs that tore up the earth all round and split the trees asunder did not terrify them, answered: ‘No, massa; we know that they are not meant for us! Phe rebels could speak of McClellan’s bombs in the same way. They know that they are not meant for thei, to do them harm. I do not say that McClellan is a trator: but Tsay that, if he were a traitor, he would have had to act exactly as he has done. Have no fear for Richmond; McClellan will not take it. ithe war is continued in this fashion, without a rational aim, then it is a useless squandering of blood and gold. It would be better were the South independent today than to hazard one more human life for a war based on the present execrable policy. “Fo continue the war in the fashion prevailing hitherto, requires 125,000 men a year and a million dollars a day. But you cannot get rid of the South. As Jefferson said of slavery: “The Southern states have the wolf by the ears, but they can neither hold him nor let him go.” In the same way, we have the South by the cars and can neither hold it nor let it go. Recognise it tomorrow and you will have no peace. For 80 years it has lived with us, in fear of us the whole time, with hatred for us half the time, ever troubling and abusing us. Mace presumptuous by a concession of its present claims, it would not keep within an imaginary border-line a year—nay, the moment that we speak of conditions of peace, it will ery victory! We shall never have peace until slavery is uprooted. So long as you retain the present tortoise > at the head of our government, you make a hole with one hand in order to fill it with the other. Let the entire nation endorse the resolutions of the New York Chamber of Commerce?6 and then the army will have something for which it is worth while fighting. Had Jefferson Davis the power, he would not capture Washington. He knows that the bomb that fell in this Sodom would rouse the whole nation.

“The enure North would thunder with one voice! ‘Down with slavery, down with everything that stands in the way of saving the republic!’ Jefferson Davis is quite satisfied with his successes. They are greater than he anticipated, far greater! If he can conunue to swim on them till March 4, 1863, England will then, and this is in order, recognise the Southern Confederacy.... The President has not put the Confiscation Act into effect. He may be honest, but what has his honesty to do with the matter? He has neither insight nor foresight. When I was in Washington, |

“ An Act to confiscate the property of Rebels for the payment of the expenses of the Abolitionist Demonstrations in America 935 ascertained that three months ago Lincoln had written the proclamation for general emancipation of the slaves and that McClellan bullied him out of his decision and that the representatives of Kentucky bullied him into the retention of McClellan, in whom he places no confidence. It will take years for Lincoln to learn to combine his legal scruples as an attor ney with the demands of the Civil War. This is the appalling state of a democratic government and its greatest evil.

“In France a hundred men, convinced of the righteousness of their cause, would carry the nation with them; but in order that our government may take a step, 19 million people must previously put themselves in motion. And to how many of these millions has it been preached for years that slavery is an institution ordained by God! With these prejudices, with paralysed hands and hearts, you entreat the President to save you from the Negro! If this theory is correct, then only slaveholding despotism can bring a temporary peace.... E know Lincoln. T have taken his measure in Washington. He is a first-rate second-rate man. He waits honestly, like a new broom, for the nation to take him in hand and sweep away slavery through him.... In past years, not far from the platform from which I now speak, the Whigs 247 fired small mortars in order to smother my voice. And what is the result

“The sons of these Whigs now fill their own graves in’ the marshes of Chickahominy! 248 Dissolve this Union in God’s name and replace it with another, on the corner-stone of which is written: ‘Political equality for all the citizens of the world’... During my stay in Chicago I asked lawyers of Illinois, among whoin Lincoln had practised, what sort of man he was. Whether he could say No. Vhe answer was: ‘He lacks backbone. If the Americans wanted to cleet a man absolutely Incapable of leadership, of initiative, then they were bound to elect: Abraham Lincoln... Never has a man heard him say No! TP asked: ‘Is McClellan a man who can say No: The manager of the Chicago Central Railroad, on which McClellan was employed, answered: ‘He is incapable of making a decision. Put a question to him and it takes an hour for him to think of the answer. During the time that he was connected with the administration of the Central Railroad, he never decided a single important controversial question.”: “And these are the two men who, above all others, now hold the fate of the Northern Republic in their hands! ‘Phose best acquainted with the state of the army assure us that Richmond could have been taken five times, had the do-nothing at the head of the army of the Potomac allowed it: but he preferred to dig up dirt in the Chickahominy swamps, in order to ignominiously abandon the locality and his dirt ramparts. Lincoln, out of a cowardly fear of the border slave states, keeps this man in his present position; but the day will come when Lincoln will confess that he has never believed in McClellan... Let us hope that the war lasts long enough to make men of us, and then we shail soon triumph. God has put the thunde bolt of emancipation into our hands in order to crush this rebellion...”