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A FIRE-EATER’S MEDITATION ON THE ST. LOUIS EMANCIPATION VICTORY.
From the Richmond South, April 11.
From the adverse vote of the Legislature, the Anti-Slavery party in Missouri have taken an appeal to the people. In the recent municipal election in St. Louis, emancipation was the issue which determined the contest, and the result is the success of the Anti-Slavery party by a plurality vote of fifteen hundred!
Now, some stupid individual will say, “all this means nothing. It is a joke, a hoax,” this Abolition triumph in the capital of a first-class salve State. There may be certain people in the South to whom so significant an event is a matter of no interest or concern- an amusing little incident over which they can enjoy a quiet chuckle. It is not so regarded among the Abolitionists of the North.
Equal importance will be attached to this Anti-Slavery triumph by all reflecting men in the South. They see how it will strengthen the hands of the Free-Soil party in Kansas; and what a prodigious impulse it will impart to the aggressive movements of the Abolitionists in the North. It is a victory without parallel for them- it is a deplorable defeat for us. Heretofore, Abolitionism has been content to restrict the expansion of Slavery, and the South has had to lament only some negative repulse. This is the first instance in which Abolitionism has achieved an incontestable triumph on a distinct issue in the heart of a Southern State. This is the first time Slavery has been routed in one of its own strongholds. Think you so extraordinary an event will be without consequence? Is it nothing for the Abolitionists to discover that they can invade the soil of a Southern State with impunity, and may even reckon upon the succor of Southern people? Is it nothing for Black Republicanism to plant its banner on one of our own citadels? Is it nothing for Slavery to lose the spell of invincibility, and the South to be bearded and bullied on Southern Soil? Is there no significance in this indication of an ebbing tide- the first backward step in the march of Southern power? Will the example provoke no more audacious aggression, and invite no imitation?