Charlestown (VA) Free Press, “Let the People Consider,” January 31, 1861

Let the People Consider.

We especially commend to the judgment of the calm-thinking reader the admirable comments of that sterling conservative journal, the National Intelligencer, on the address of the ten Congressmen who are laboring to “precipitate” Virginia into the folly of secession, without reflection and without preparation. We have reason to believe that in less than two weeks the “wind will be taken out of the sails” of the fillibusters all over the country. Those who want a Southern Republic, simply because “the [illegible] has departed from Judah,” will find that they have forgotten the good old maxim, to “make haste slowly.” The people, (of this region at least) mean to consider well the character of the entertainment to which the “fire-eaters” have invited them.