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766 DOUGLASSS' MONTHLY. DECEMBER, 1862 [[line across page]] [[3 columns]] [[column 1]] known that it is not of choice, but from a conviction of its necessity as a war measure, that the President issued that Proclamation, and there can be no doubt that to it, for the same reason, he will adhere, leaving events to do justice to his discernment and patriotism, if the people of this or any other State refuse it to him. The measure is not contrary to the Constitution, is nor more adverse to it in the principle than the other sections of the Confiscation bill, and is manifestly the most effectual blow that has yet been struck at the rebellion. Some of the arrests made by the Government have, we are constrained to say apparently been indefensible, and if the President will construe the vote of the Empire State yesterday as a hint to be more chary of the exercise of an arbitrary power, we shall not be among those who will regret his interpretation of it. Of course, we may assume that Government has had reasons for its proceedings in this direction which the public have no knowledge of. But admitting this, we still think the power has not always been wisely and discreetly, we fear not always justly, exercised; though we are quite sure no intentional injustice has ever been perpetrated in its use. A little more care in the use of this always dangerous weapons is desirable, and will perhaps result from the course political events have taken in this State. We believe, however, that the vote of yesterday is mainly an expression of dissatisfaction at the slow progress the Government has made with the War. Had it, even by a stretch of Constitutional power, promptly, vigorously, peremptorily crushed out the rebellion, the State of New York would have given it a unanimous approval. It is because month after month has passed, and one immense army has been nearly frittered away, without accomplishing any grand and decisive results, that the people have at length wavered in their confidence in the Government and rebuked it by placing opponents of the Administration in power in this State, and given them seats in the National Legislature. We do not say that this withdrawal of confidence is justifiable. We do not believe that it is. We do not think that any one outside of the Administration and those fully in its confidence has the remotest idea of the magnitude of the task imposed upon the Administration or of the embarrassments by which it has been surrounded. We doubt whether any Administration could have done better than it has done. But the people look only or mainly to results. The difficulties of the position they do not see and cannot comprehend. The preparatory processes are vailed from them, and are necessarily excluded from their calculations and decisions. But the consequences are the same whether they judge rightly or wrongly. And we have very little doubt that had there been apparent greater vigor in the prosecution of the war, the vote of yesterday, in this State, would have been the reverse of what it was. And we may add the expression of a hope that the Government will take this view of it, and give the country to see, as well as permi it to believe, that it is prepared to go on as vigorously and rapidly as the people wish it to do. From The Express. The New York election does not mean any aid or comfort to the enemy, [n] or any personal hostility to the President. It means a just and Constitutional war, conducted according to civilization, to put down the rebellion and to restore the Union. It is not a war for emancipating negroes, not for abolishing State rights, nor for exterminating or subjugating any portion of the American people, but it is a war for bringing enemies in arms under the authority of the Federal Government, and for the supremacy of the national authority under the old flag and Constitution, over all the States of the Union,——a State for every star, and a star for every State. It strikes us that The Express evinces above that very 'hostility to the President' which it formally disclaims. Mr. Lincoln, in his Proclamation of Freedom, expressly and earnestly deprecates that very false construction [[/column 1]] [[column 2]] of his Emancipation policy which The Express persists in. He says: "I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America, and Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy thereof do hereby Proclaim and Declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the Constitutional relation between the United States and the relation is, or may be, suspended or disturbed," &c., &c. For eighteen months, the President has prosecuted this war according to the views of The Express, annulling the emancipation Proclamations of Gens. Fremont, Hunter, &c., while sustaining the Pro-Slavery fulminations of Gens. Patterson, McClellan, Halleck, Sherman, &c. At last, Mr. Lincoln despairing of success in suppressing the Rebellion by methods so thoroughly tried and proved ineffective, proposes to try the opposite policy——that which recognizes no loyal person as rightfully the chattel of a traitor, but invites every such person to quit serving the Rebels, escape to the Union lines, and be thenceforth FREE——The President, having patiently followed the counsels of his opponents for a year and a half, and found them unconducive to success, now proposes for the first six months of 1863, to pursue the policy ardently commended by his friends. Is it not reasonable that he should do this? Ought not those who have had their own way so far to give our policy the far briefer trial demanded? They say,indeed, that the Proclamation of Freedom is merely a "Pope's bull against the comet?"——That is to say, it will, in their judgment, have no practical result. But we think very differently, and ask that the experiment be fairly tried. Give it a fair chance! At all events do not traduce it and libel the President by imputing motives which he so pointedly disclaims. You admit that he is honest: do not attribute to him purposes which he solemnly disavows! He says that he resorts to Emancipation absolutely and only to save the country from destruction, and you should either believe his assertion or square brand him as a hypocrite and a falsifier. [[line]] A Change of Base and of Commanders——The Future——Our Route From the Potomac——Men Absent, Women in Mourning——The Slaves——"Ruined" Planters. [[short line]] WARRENTON, Va, Nov. 9, 1862. Here we reach a change of base and of commanders, and end the first stage of the campaign. Our supplies now come from Alexandria via the Manassas Gap Railway; but a few days will suffice for rebuilding the bridges on the Orange and Alexandria road. Thenceforth that will be our supply line. The army will have its back toward Washington, instead of its left flank. It will be swelled by the troops of Sigel and Heintzelman, and, we hope, by the new levies massed around Washington. It will be led by a favorite General, of energy, daring, and promptness in following victories. What then? Like Old John Brown's soul it will still be "marching on." There knowledge ends, and conjecture begins. It is believed, however, that the enemy expects to fight us in the vicinity of Gordonville. But the future is a forbidden subject. Not so the route we have left behind from the Potomac——the country bounded on the west by the Blue Ridge, on the cost by Kittoctan and Bull Run Mountains. It is one of the fairest portions of Virginia. It is a region of fifty-acre corn and wheat fields, with rich stacks, shocks, and sheaves; of high, ample dwellings, shaded by tall trees, and often furnished with modern conveniences; of thousand-acre plantations, with solid stone fences; of great grist-mills, with huge overshot waterwheels; of substantial old planters, with full, round faces, and suits of gray homespun; of many middle, well-to-do farmers, and very few poor whites. The country is utterly swept of horses and of abled-bodied men. In traveling through it for thirteen days, I have not seen half a dozen white men or negroes between the ages of [[/column 2]] [[column 3]] eighteen and forty. The whites are in the Rebel army. The fearful number of women dressed in mourning tells at what a sacrafice of life. Many of the negroes have been carried South on the approach of our army. Many more have escaped to the North. The slaveholders talk of the latter with great bitterness thus: 'If they were not the most treacherous people in the world, they would not desert us now. I have a negro boy of 18, a body servant, whom I have raised as kindly as one of my own children. He never had much to do, and never knew what it was to want for anything. Yet——will you believe it, Sir?——a week ago he saw three cavalry men down the road, and went up to them and asked, 'You are what they call Yankees, I reckon? They were really Confederate soldiers, but one of them replied,'Yes, we are Yankees. 'Well,' say she, 'you come here to-night, and I'll show you where you can get two of my master's horses the finest in this country.' They came back and told me, and when I spoke to the boy about it he never denied it, but said it was true! I never punished him, or even reprimanded him for it. The treacherous scoundrel! If he wants to leave me I am willing that he should go." This is the general expression. Little effort is made to reclaim slaves who decamp. The conviction seems to be general that the institution is destroyed in this part of Virginia. Still the negroes who remain at home are treated with unwonted deference and kindness. Sambo is master of the situation, and no one knows it better than himself. There is some complaint of 'impudence' concerning those who remain——old men, women, and children——but none of general insubordination. I hear none of them express personal ill will toward their masters; on the contry, they generally speak of them kindly. Affection for them is often warm; but, as with all humanity, the instinct of freedom is stronger than any other feeling. The country has suffered materially by the passage of our army; still there are much corn and wheat, many sheep and cattle left behind. The people lament their losses with great demonstrativeness. If we receive their statements, every man, woman and child on our route is utterly ruined. Time and again I have heard old planters, with scores of fat cattle, hundreds of sheep, and shocks of corned without number, protest that they would starve before the winter was over. One, who owns an elegant house and a farm of 780 acres, which he admits would now command $50 per acre in cash, was particularly dismal in his lamentations. He had perhaps, suffered damage to the amount of $300, and he drew for my benefit a fearful picture of impending starvation. 'I could bear it myself,' he said, 'but it is hard for my black family, for these little negroes, who are almost as dear to me as my own children' running about the room. The only perceptible difference was that the former had curly hair, while that of the others was straight. [[line]] THE DISMAY CAUSED BY THE PROCLAMATION [[short line]] From the Richmond Examiner, Nov. 5. The enormous and rapid increase of the enemy's naval power in this war is one of its most painful subjects of interest. This arm has grown to such size as to threaten us in many respects more seriously than the enemy's land forces. The Yankees have now afloat at least 200 vessels of war more than they could boast when the war commenced. Large and active preparations have been made for naval movements this Winter, and it is generally estimated that there are now about 50 iron-clad men-of-war building for the Yankee Government, besides those afloat. There is good reason to suppose that the Yankee fleet, which is to fall upon our coast this Winter, will be stronger in point of armament and class of ships than any which has yet embarked on an offensive movement. The [[/column 3]]
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