Nigger Worship and Its ConsequencesNew York Herald, March 7, 1861In the midst of a momentous crisis like the present, when there is no knowing what calamity a day may bring forth, or how soon the grand fabric of our constitution will be swept away, and the arm of brother be raised against brother in deadly strife, it becomes us to ponder gravely over the dangers that surround us, and, as men and patriots, to combine in the endeavor to avert the worst of those evils by which our country is menaced. To the anti-slavery propagandism which forty years ago swayed so violently the people of England, and thence found its way into New England and the Congress of the United States, and was years afterwards nurtured so warmly by societies and a portion of the press, we may trace all the causes that distract the United States. It has ever been a prolific source of disturbances, riots, family feuds and national discord. It has led to scenes which have disgraced our halls of Congress. It has caused the proper objects of legislation to be neglected, and the general interests of the country to be injured and mismanaged, and by its pernicious agitation has engrossed the public mind to an extent that is positively lamentable.
From its inception to the present time the question has undergone three phases. In the first instance it was a moral one; provoked by discussion and prejudice in England; in the next it was a social one, induced by the Northern States finding slave labor unprofitable, and, therefore, wishing to abolish it; and, in the third, it was a politico-religious one, which we may call "nigger worship." In this last phase we find it now. It has become a pulpit theme, and diverted the stream of religion from its course heavenward to the stormy sea of politics. We have a prominent example of it in the case of Ward Beecher. It has ruined churches, ruined parties, and now it is ruining the whole country. Anti-slavery fanaticism has stamped its character upon our Northern literature, and led away the minds of those who had not philosophy enough to withstand its subtle influence, which, for the thirty years of the forty it has been in agitation, has been gradually undermining the constitution of the republic and the best interests and liberties of our people.
With the secession of seven States, and the prospect of the eight Border States adding to the number, it may be said to have rea
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