ly _human slavery_, often professing
to believe it of _divine right_.

XXII
DISSOLUTION OF THE UNION

Secession was at hand! At first it was justified under the banner
of state-rights, on the theory that the Union was a voluntary
compact of States which could be broken at the will of one or all.
That a Republic was only an experiment, to exist until overthrown
by any member of it. That the blood of the Revolution was shed,
not for the establishment of an independent nation, but for a
confederacy of separate states. In the guise of nullification it
appeared, as we have seen, 1832; excessive tariff duties were the
pretext. In 1835 it assumed to be the champion of slavery, because
on the slavery question only could the South be united. It is due
to history to say, of the decade preceding 1860, patriotism was
not universal even in the free States. Slavery had her votaries
there. Interests of trade affected many. Prejudice against the
blacks and ties of kinship affected others. Parties and affiliations
and love of political power controlled the policy of influential
men in all sections of the country.

The South was aggressive, and smarted under its defeats in attempts
to extend its beloved institution. The prayer of Calhoun for a
united South was fast being realized, and a fatal destiny goaded
on its leaders. Slavery, indeed, no longer stood on a firm
foundation. Public sentiment had sapped it. It could not live
and tolerate free speech, and a free press, or universal education
even of the white race where it existed. All strangers sojourning
in the South were under espionage; they, though innocent of any
designs on slavery, were often brutally treated and driven away.
It was only the distinguished visitors who were entertained with
the much boasted-of Southern hospitality. The German or other
industrious foreign emigrant rarely, if ever, ventured into the
South.

Its towns and cities languished. Slavery was bucolic and patriarchal.
It could not, in its most prosperous state, flourish on small
plantations; nor could the many own slaves or be interested in
their labor. Not exceeding two tenths of the white race South
owned, at any time, or were interested in slave labor or slaves.
The eight tenths had no political or social standing. They were,
in a large sense, in another form, white slaves.

The Border States held their negroes by a precarious tenure. The
most intelligent were constantly escap