"I will tell you;
If you'll bestow a small (of what you have little),
Patience, a while, you'll hear the belly's answer."
--_Menenius Agrippa._
At the springs we parted, Mr. Warren and his friends finding a
conveyance, with their own horses, in readiness to carry them the
remainder of the distance. As for my uncle and myself, it was understood
that we were to get on in the best manner we could, it being expected
that we should reach Ravensnest in the course of a day or two. According
to the theory of our new business, we ought to travel on foot, but we
had a reservation _in petto_ that promised us also the relief of a
comfortable wagon of some sort or other.
"Well," said my uncle, the moment we had got far enough from our new
acquaintance to be out of ear-shot, "I must say one thing in behalf of
Mr. Seneky, as he calls himself, or Sen, as his elegant sister calls
him, and that is, that I believe him to be one of the biggest scoundrels
the State holds."
"This is not drawing his character _en beau_," I answered, laughing.
"But why do you come out so decidedly upon him at this particular
moment?"
"Because this particular moment happens to be the first in which I have
had an opportunity to say anything since I have known the rascal. You
must have remarked that the fellow held me in discourse from the time we
left Troy until we stopped here."
"Certainly; I could see that his tongue was in motion unceasingly; what
he said, I have to conjecture."
"He said enough to lay bare his whole character. Our subject was
anti-rent, which he commenced with a view to explain it to a foreigner;
but I managed to lead him on, step by step, until he let me into all his
notions and expectations on the subject. Why, Hugh, the villain actually
proposed that you and I should enlist, and turn ourselves into two of
the rascally mock redskins."
"Enlist! Do they still persevere so far as to keep up that organization,
in the very teeth of the late law?"
"The law! What do two or three thousand voters care for any penal law,
in a country like this? Who is to enforce the law against them? Did they
commit murder, and were they even convicted, as _might_ happen under the
excitement of such a crime, they very well know nobody would be hanged.
Honesty is always too passive in matters that do not immediately press
on its direct interests. It is for the interest of every honest man in
the State to set his face against this anti-rent movement, and to do all
he can, by his vote and influence, to put it down into the dirt, out of
which it sprang, and into which it should be crushed; but not one in a
hundred, even of those who condemn it _toto coelo_, will go a foot out
of their way even to impede its progress. All depends on those who have
the power; and they will exert that power so as to conciliate the active
rogue, rather than protect the honest man. You are to remember that the
laws are executed here on the principle that 'what is everybody's
business is nobody's business.'"
"You surely do not believe that the authorities will wink at an open
violation of the laws!"
"That will depend on the characters of individuals; most will, but some
will not. You and I would be punished soon enough, were there a chance,
but the mass would escape. Oh! we have had some precious disclosures in
our corner of the car! The two or three men who joined Newcome are from
anti-rent districts, and, seeing me with their friend, little reserve
has been practised. One of those men is an anti-rent lecturer; and,
being somewhat didactic, he favored me with some of his arguments,
_seriatim_."
"How! Have they got to lectures? I should have supposed the newspapers
would have been the means of circulating their ideas."
"Oh, the newspapers, like hogs swimming too freely, have cut their own
throats; and it seems to be fashionable, just at this moment, not to
believe them. Lecturing is the great moral lever of the nation at
present."
"But a man can lie in a lecture, as well as in a newspaper."
"Out of all question; and if many of the lecturers are of the school of
this Mr. Holmes--'Lecturer Holmes,' as Seneca called him--but, if many
are of _his_ school, a pretty set of liberty-takers with the truth must
they be."
"You detected him, then, in some of these liberties?"
"In a hundred: nothing was easier than for a man in my situation to do
that; knowing, as I did, so much of the history of the land-titles of
the State. One of his arguments partakes so largely of the weak side of
our system, that I must give it to you. He spoke of the gravity of the
disturbances--of the importance to the peace and character of the State
of putting an end to them; and then, by way of corollary to his
proposition, produced a scheme for changing the titles, IN ORDER TO
SATISFY THE PEOPLE!"
"The people, of course, meaning the tenants; the landlords and _their_
rights passing for nothing."
"That is one beautiful feature of the morality--an eye, or a cheek, if
you will--but here is the _nose_, and highly Roman it is. A certain
portion of the community wish to get rid of the obligations of their
contracts; and finding it cannot be done by law, they resort to means
that are opposed to all law in order to effect their purposes. Public
law-breakers, violators of the public peace, they make use of their own
wrong as an argument for perpetuating another that can be perpetuated in
no other way. I have been looking over some of the papers containing
proclamations, etc., and find that both law-makers and law-breakers are
of one mind as to this charming policy. Without a single manly effort to
put down the atrocious wrong that is meditated, the existence of the
wrong itself is made an argument for meeting it with concessions, and
thus sustaining it. Instead of using the means the institutions have
provided for putting down all such unjust and illegal combinations, the
combinations are a sufficient reason of themselves why the laws should
be altered, and wrong be done to a few, in order that many may be
propitiated, and their votes secured."
"This is reasoning that can be used only where real grievances exist.
But there are no real grievances in the case of the tenants. They may
mystify weak heads in the instance of the manor leases, with their
quarter-sales, fat hens, loads of wood, and days' works; but my leases
are all on three lives, with rent payable in money, and with none of the
conditions that are called feudal, though no more feudal than any other
bargain to pay articles in kind. One might just as well call a bargain
made by a butcher, to deliver pork for a series of years, feudal.
However, feudal or not, my leases, and those of most other landlords,
are running on lives; and yet, by what I can learn, the discontent is
general; and the men who have solemnly bargained to give up their farms
at the expiration of their lives are just as warm for the 'down rent'
and titles in fee as the manor tenants themselves! They say that the
obligations given for actual purchases are beginning to be discredited."
"You are quite right; and there is one of the frauds practised on the
world at large. In the public documents only the manor leases, with
their pretended feudal covenants, and their perpetuity, are kept in
view, while the combination goes to _all_ leases, or nearly all, and
certainly to all _sorts_ of leases, where the estates are of sufficient
extent to allow of the tenants to make head against the landlords. I
dare say there are hundreds of tenants, even on the property of the
Rensselaers, who are honest enough to be willing to comply with their
contracts if the conspirators would let them; but the rapacious spirit
is abroad among the occupants of other lands, as well as among the
occupants of theirs, and the government considers its existence a proof
that concessions should be made. The discontented must be appeased,
right or not!"
"Did Seneca say anything on the subject of his own interests?"
"He did; not so much in conversation with me as in the discourse he held
with 'Lecturer Holmes.' I listened attentively, happening to be
familiar, through tradition and through personal knowledge, with all the
leading facts of the case. As you will soon be called on to act in that
matter for yourself, I may as well relate them to you. They will serve,
also, as guides to the moral merits of the occupation of half the farms
on your estate. These are things, moreover, you would never know by
public statements, since all the good bargains are smothered in silence,
while those that may possibly have been a little unfavorable to the
tenant are proclaimed far and near. It is quite possible that, among the
many thousands of leased farms that are to be found in the State, some
bad bargains may have been made by the tenants; but what sort of a
government is that which should undertake to redress evils of this
nature? If either of the Rensselaers, or you yourself, were to venture
to send a memorial to the Legislature setting forth the grievances _you_
labor under in connection with this very 'mill-lot'--and serious losses
do they bring to you, let me tell you, though grievances, in the proper
sense of the term, they are not--you and your memorial would be met with
a general and merited shout of ridicule and derision. _One_ man has no
rights, as opposed to a dozen."
"So much difference is there between '_de la Rochefoucauld et de la
Rochefoucauld_.'"
"All the difference in the world; but let me give you the facts, for
they will serve as a rule by which to judge of many others. In the first
place, my great-grandfather Mordaunt, the 'patentee,' as he was called,
first let the mill-lot to the grandfather of this Seneca, the tenant
then being quite a young man. In order to obtain settlers, in that early
day, it was necessary to give them great advantages, for there was
vastly more land than there were people to work it. The first lease,
therefore, was granted on highly advantageous terms to that Jason
Newcome, whom I can just remember. He had two characters; the one, and
the true, which set him down as a covetous, envious, narrow-minded
provincial, who was full of cant and roguery. Some traditions exist
among us of his having been detected in stealing timber, and in various
other frauds. In public he is one of those virtuous and hard-working
pioneers who have transmitted to their descendants all their claims,
those that are supposed to be moral, as well as those that are known to
be legal. This flummery may do for elderly ladies, who affect snuff and
bohea, and for some men who have minds of the same calibre, but they are
not circumstances to influence such legislators and executives as are
fit to be legislators and executives. Not a great while before my
father's marriage, the said Jason still living and in possession, the
lease expired, and a new one was granted for three lives, or twenty-one
years certain, of which one of the lives is still running. That lease
was granted, on terms highly favorable to the tenant, sixty years since;
old Newcome, luckily for himself and his posterity, having named this
long-lived son as one of his three lives. Now Seneky, God bless him! is
known to lease a few of the lots that have fallen to his share of the
property for more money than is required to meet all your rent on the
whole. Such, in effect, has been the fact with that mill-lot for the
last thirty years, or even longer; and the circumstance of the great
length of time so excellent a bargain has existed, is used as an
argument why the Newcomes ought to have a deed of the property for a
nominal price; or, indeed, for no price at all, if the tenants could
have their wishes."
"I am afraid there is nothing unnatural in thus perverting principles;
half mankind appear to me really to get a great many of their notions
_dessus dessous_."
"Half is a small proportion; as you will find, my boy, when you grow
older. But was it not an impudent proposal of Seneca, when he wished you
and me to join the corps of 'Injins?'"
"What answer did you make? Though I suppose it would hardly do for us to
go disguised and armed, now that the law makes it a felony, even while
our motive at the bottom might be to aid the law."
"Catch me at that act of folly! Why, Hugh, could they prove such a crime
on either of _us_, or any one connected with an old landed family, we
should be the certain victims. No governor would dare pardon _us_. No,
no; clemency is a word reserved for the obvious and confirmed rogues."
"We might get a little favor on the score of belonging to a very
powerful body of offenders."
"True, I forgot that circumstance. The more numerous the crimes and the
criminals, the greater the probability of impunity; and this, too, not
on the general principle that power cannot be resisted, but on the
particular principle that a thousand or two votes are of vast
importance, where three thousand can turn an election. God only knows
where this thing is to end!"
We now approached one of the humbler taverns of the place, where it was
necessary for those of our apparent pretensions to seek lodgings, and
the discourse was dropped. It was several weeks too early in the season
for the springs to be frequented, and we found only a few of those in
the place who drank the waters because they really required them. My
uncle had been an old stager at Saratoga--a beau of the "purest water,"
as he laughingly described himself--and he was enabled to explain all
that was necessary for me to know. An American watering-place, however,
is so very much inferior to most of those in Europe, as to furnish very
little, in their best moments, beyond the human beings they contain, to
attract the attention of the traveller.
In the course of the afternoon we availed ourselves of the opportunity
of a return vehicle to go as far as Sandy Hill, where we passed the
night. The next morning, bright and early, we got into a hired wagon and
drove across the country until near night, when we paid for our passage,
sent the vehicle back, and sought a tavern. At this house, where we
passed the night, we heard a good deal of the "Injins" having made their
appearance on the Littlepage lands, and many conjectures as to the
probable result. We were in a township, or rather on a property, that
was called Mooseridge, and which had once belonged to us, but which,
having been sold, and in a great measure paid for by the occupants, no
one thought of impairing the force of the covenants under which the
parties held. The most trivial observer will soon discover that it is
only when something is to be gained that the aggrieved citizen wishes to
disturb a covenant. Now, I never heard anyone say a syllable against
either of the covenants of his lease under which he held his farm, let
him be ever so loud against those which would shortly compel him to give
it up! Had I complained of the fact--and such facts abounded--that my
predecessors had incautiously let farms at such low prices that the
lessees had been enabled to pay the rents for half a century by
subletting small portions of them, as my uncle Ro had intimated, I
should be pointed at as a fool. "Stick to your bond" would have been the
cry, and "Shylock" would have been forgotten. I do not say that there is
not a vast difference between the means of acquiring intelligence, the
cultivation, the manners, the social conditions, and, in some
senses, the social obligations of an affluent landlord and a
really hard-working, honest, well-intentioned husbandman, his
tenant--differences that should dispose the liberal and cultivated
gentleman to bear in mind the advantages he has perhaps inherited, and
not acquired by his own means, in such a way as to render him, in a
certain degree, the repository of the interests of those who hold him;
but, while I admit all this, and say that the community which does not
possess such a class of men is to be pitied, as it loses one of the most
certain means of liberalizing and enlarging its notions, and of
improving its civilization, I am far from thinking that the men of this
class are to have their real superiority of position, with its
consequences, thrown into their faces only when they are expected to
give, while they are grudgingly denied it on all other occasions! There
is nothing so likely to advance the habits, opinions, and true interests
of a rural population, as to have them all directed by the intelligence
and combined interests that ought to mark the connection between
landlord and tenant. It may do for one class of political economists to
prate about a state of things which supposes every husbandman a
freeholder, and rich enough to maintain his level among the other
freeholders of the State. But we all know that as many minute gradations
in means must and do exist in a community, as there exist gradations in
characters. A majority soon will, in the nature of things, be below the
level of the freeholder, and by destroying the system of having
landlords and tenants two great evils are created--the one preventing
men of large fortunes from investing in lands, as no man will place his
money where it will be insecure or profitless, thereby cutting off real
estate generally from the benefits that might be and would be conferred
by their capital, as well as cutting it off from the benefits of the
increased price which arise from having such buyers in the market; and
the other is, to prevent any man from being a husbandman who has not the
money necessary to purchase a farm. But they who want farms _now_, and
they who will want votes next November, do not look quite so far ahead
as that; while shouting "equal rights," they are, in fact, for
preventing the poor husbandman from being anything but a day-laborer.
We obtained tolerably decent lodging at our inn, though the profoundest
patriot America possesses, if he know anything of other countries, or of
the best materials of his own, cannot say much in favor of the sleeping
arrangements of an ordinary country inn. The same money and the same
trouble would render that which is now the very _beau ideal_ of
discomfort, at least tolerable, and in many instances good. But who is
to produce this reform? According to the opinions circulated among us,
the humblest hamlet we have has already attained the highest point of
civilization; and as for the people, without distinction of classes, it
is universally admitted that they are the best educated, the acutest,
and the most intelligent in Christendom;--no, I must correct myself;
they are all this, except when they are in the act of leasing lands, and
then the innocent and illiterate husbandmen are the victims of the arts
of designing landlords, the wretches![21]
[Footnote 21: Mr. Hugh Littlepage writes a little sharply, but there is
truth in all he says, at the bottom. His tone is probably produced by
the fact that there is so serious an attempt to deprive him of his old
paternal estate, an attempt which is receiving support in high quarters.
In addition to this provocation, the Littlepages, as the manuscript
shows farther on, are traduced, as one means of effecting the objects of
the anti-renters; no man, in any community in which it is necessary to
work on public sentiment in order to accomplish such a purpose, ever
being wronged without being calumniated. As respects the inns, truth
compels me, as an old traveller, to say that Mr. Littlepage has much
reason for what he says. I have met with a better bed in the lowest
French tavern I ever was compelled to use, and in one instance I slept
in an inn frequented by carters, than in the best purely country inn in
America. In the way of neatness, however, more is usually to be found in
our New York village taverns than in the public hotels of Paris itself.
As for the hit touching the intelligence of the people, it is merited;
for I have myself heard subtle distinctions drawn to show that the
"people" of a former generation were not as knowing as the "people" of
this, and imputing the covenants of the older leases to that
circumstance, instead of imputing them to their true cause, the opinions
and practices of the times. Half a century's experience would induce me
to say that the "people" were never particularly dull in making a
bargain.--EDITOR.]
We passed an hour on the piazza, after eating our supper, and there
being a collection of men assembled there, inhabitants of the hamlet, we
had an opportunity to get into communication with them. My uncle sold a
watch, and I played on the hurdy-gurdy, by way of making myself popular.
After this beginning, the discourse turned on the engrossing subject of
the day, anti-rentism. The principal speaker was a young man about
six-and-twenty, of a sort of shabby-genteel air and appearance, whom I
soon discovered to be the attorney of the neighborhood. His name was
Hubbard, while that of the other principal speaker was Hall. The last
was a mechanic, as I ascertained, and was a plain-looking working-man of
middle age. Each of these persons seated himself on a common "kitchen
chair," leaning back against the side of the house, and, of course,
resting on the two hind-legs of the rickety support, while he placed his
own feet on the rounds in front. The attitudes were neither graceful nor
picturesque, but they were so entirely common as to excite no surprise.
As for Hall, he appeared perfectly contented with his situation, after
fidgeting a little to get the two supporting legs of his chair just
where he wanted them; but Hubbard's eye was restless, uneasy, and even
menacing, for more than a minute. He drew a knife from his pocket--a
small, neat penknife only, it is true--gazed a little wildly about him,
and just as I thought he intended to abandon his nicely poised chair,
and to make an assault on one of the pillars that upheld the roof of the
piazza, the innkeeper advanced, holding in his hand several narrow slips
of pine board, one of which he offered at once to 'Squire Hubbard. This
relieved the attorney, who took the wood, and was soon deeply plunged
in, to me, the unknown delights of whittling. I cannot explain the
mysterious pleasure that so many find in whittling, though the
prevalence of the custom is so well known. But I cannot explain the
pleasure so many find in chewing tobacco, or in smoking. The precaution
of the landlord was far from being unnecessary, and appeared to be taken
in good part by all to whom he offered "whittling-pieces," some six or
eight in the whole. The state of the piazza, indeed, proved that the
precaution was absolutely indispensable, if he did not wish to see the
house come tumbling down about his head. In order that those who have
never seen such things may understand their use, I will go a little out
of the way to explain.
The inn was of wood, a hemlock frame with a "siding" of clapboards. In
this there was nothing remarkable, many countries of Europe, even, still
building principally of wood. Houses of lath and plaster were quite
common, until within a few years, even in large towns. I remember to
have seen some of these constructions while in London, in close
connection with the justly celebrated Westminster Hall; and of such
materials is the much-talked of miniature castle of Horace Walpole, at
Strawberry Hill. But the inn of Mooseridge had some pretensions to
architecture, besides being three or four times larger than any other
house in the place. A piazza it enjoyed, of course; it must be a pitiful
village inn that does not; and building, accessories and all, rejoiced
in several coats of a spurious white lead. The columns of this piazza,
as well as the clapboards of the house itself, however, exhibited the
proofs of the danger of abandoning your true whittler to his own
instincts. Spread-eagles, five-points, American flags, huzzas for Polk!
the initials of names, and names at full length, with various other
similar conceits, records, and ebullitions of patriotic or party-otic
feelings, were scattered up and down with an affluence that said volumes
in favor of the mint in which they had been coined. But the most
remarkable memorial of the industry of the guests was to be found on one
of the columns; and it was one at a corner, too, and consequently of
double importance to the superstructure--unless, indeed, the house were
built on that well-known principle of American architecture of the last
century, which made the architrave uphold the pillar, instead of the
pillar the architrave. The column in question was of white pine, as
usual--though latterly, in brick edifices, bricks and stucco are much
resorted to--and, at a convenient height for the whittlers, it was
literally cut two-thirds in two. The gash was very neatly made--that
much must be said for it--indicating skill and attention; and the
surfaces of the wound were smoothed in a manner to prove that
appearances were not neglected.
"Vat do das?" I asked of the landlord, pointing to this gaping wound in
the main column of his piazza.
"That! Oh! That's only the whittlers," answered the host, with a
good-natured smile.
Assuredly the Americans _are_ the best-natured people on earth! Here was
a man whose house was nearly tumbling down about his ears--always bating
the principle in architecture just named--and he could smile as Nero may
be supposed to have done when fiddling over the conflagration of Rome.
"But vhy might de vhittler vhittle down your house?"
"Oh! this is a free country, you know, and folks do pretty much as they
like in it," returned the still smiling host. "I let 'em cut away as
long as I dared, but it was high time to get out 'whittling-pieces,' I
believe you must own. It's best always to keep a ruff (roof) over a
man's head, to be ready for bad weather. A week longer would have had
the column in two."
"Vell, I dinks I might not bear dat! Vhat ist mein house ist mein house,
ant dey shall not so moch vittles."
"By letting 'em so much vittles there, they so much vittles in the
kitchen; so you see there is policy in having your underpinnin' knocked
away sometimes, if it's done by the right sort of folks."
"You're a stranger in these parts, friend?" observed Hubbard,
complacently, for by this time his "whittling-piece" was reduced to a
shape, and he could go on reducing it, according to some law of the art
of whittling with which I am not acquainted. "We are not so particular
in such matters as in some of your countries in the old world."
"Ja--das I can see. But does not woot ant column cost money in America,
someding?"
"To be sure it does. There is not a man in the country who would
undertake to replace that pillar with a new one, paint and all, for less
than ten dollars."
This was an opening for a discussion on the probable cost of putting a
new pillar into the place of the one that was injured. Opinions
differed, and quite a dozen spoke on the subject; some placing the
expense as high as fifteen dollars, and others bringing it down as low
as five. I was struck with the quiet and self-possession with which each
man delivered his opinion, as well as with the language used. The accent
was uniformly provincial, that of Hubbard included, having a strong and
unpleasant taint of the dialect of New England in it; and some of the
expressions savored a little of the stilts of the newspapers; but, on
the whole, the language was sufficiently accurate and surprisingly good,
considering the class in life of the speakers. The conjectures, too,
manifested great shrewdness and familiarity with practical things, as
well as, in a few instances, some reading. Hall, however, actually
surprised me. He spoke with a precision and knowledge of mechanics that
would have done credit to a scholar, and with a simplicity that added to
the influence of what he said. Some casual remark induced me to put
in--"Vell, I might s'pose an Injin voult cut so das column, but I might
not s'pose a vhite man could." This opinion gave the discourse a
direction toward anti-rentism, and in a few minutes it caught all the
attention of my uncle Ro and myself.
"This business is going ahead after all!" observed Hubbard, evasively,
after others had had their say.
"More's the pity," put in Hall. "It might have been put an end to in a
month, at any time, and ought to be put an end to in a civilized land."
"You will own, neighbor Hall, notwithstanding, it would be a great
improvement in the condition of the tenants all over the State, could
they change their tenures into freeholds."
"No doubt 'twould; and so it would be a great improvement in the
condition of my journeyman in my shop if he could get to be the boss.
But that is not the question here; the question is, What right has the
State to say any man shall sell his property unless he wishes to sell
it? A pretty sort of liberty we should have if we all held our houses
and gardens under such laws as that supposes!"
"But do we not all hold our houses and gardens, and farms, too, by some
such law?" rejoined the attorney, who evidently respected his
antagonist, and advanced his own opinions cautiously. "If the public
wants land to use, it can take it by paying for it."
"Yes, to _use_; but use is everything. I've read that old report of the
committee of the house, and don't subscribe to its doctrines at all.
Public 'policy,' in that sense, doesn't at all mean public 'use.' If
land is wanted for a road, or a fort, or a canal, it must be taken,
under a law, by appraisement, or the thing could not be had at all; but
to pretend, because one side to a contract wishes to alter it, that the
State has a right to interfere, on the ground that the discontented can
be bought off in this way easier and cheaper than they can be made to
obey the laws, is but a poor way of supporting the right. The same
principle, carried out, might prove it would be easier to buy off
pickpockets by compromising than to punish them. Or it would be easy to
get round all sorts of contracts in this way."
"But all governments use this power when it becomes necessary, neighbor
Hall."
"That word _necessary_ covers a great deal of ground, 'Squire Hubbard.
The most that can be made of the necessity here is to say it is cheaper,
and may help along parties to their objects better. No man doubts that
the State of New York can put down these anti-renters; and, I trust,
_will_ put them down so far as force is concerned. There is, then, no
other necessity in the case, to begin with, than the necessity which
demagogues always feel, of getting as many votes as they can."
"After all, neighbor Hall, these votes are pretty powerful weapons in a
popular government."
"I'll not deny that; and now they talk of a convention to alter the
constitution, it is a favorable moment to teach such managers they shall
not abuse the right of suffrage in this way."
"How is it to be prevented? You are a universal suffrage man, I know?"
"Yes, I'm for universal suffrage among honest folks; but do not wish to
have my rulers chosen by them that are never satisfied without having
their hands in their neighbors' pockets. Let 'em put a clause into the
constitution providing that no town, or village, or county, shall hold a
poll within a given time after the execution of process has been openly
resisted in it. That would take the conceit out of all such law-breakers
in very short order."
It was plain that this idea struck the listeners, and several even
avowed their approbation of the scheme aloud. Hubbard received it as a
new thought, but was more reluctant to admit its practicability. As
might be expected from a lawyer accustomed to practice in a small way,
his objections savored more of narrow views than of the notions of a
statesman.
"How would you determine the extent of the district to be
disfranchised?" he asked.
"Take the legal limits as they stand. If process be resisted openly by a
combination strong enough to look down the agents of the law in a town,
disfranchise that town for a given period; if in more than one town,
disfranchise the offending towns; if a county, disfranchise the whole
county."
"But in that way you would punish the innocent with the guilty."
"It would be for the good of all; besides, you punish the innocent for
the guilty, or _with_ the guilty rather, in a thousand ways. You and I
are taxed to keep drunkards from starving, because it is better to do
that than to offend humanity by seeing men die of hunger, or tempting
them to steal. When you declare martial law you punish the innocent with
the guilty, in one sense; and so you do in a hundred cases. All we have
to ask is, if it be not wiser and better to disarm demagogues, and those
disturbers of the public peace who wish to pervert their right of
suffrage to so wicked an end, by so simple a process, than to suffer
them to effect their purposes by the most flagrant abuse of their
political privileges?"
"How would you determine _when_ a town should lose the right of voting?"
"By evidence given in open court. The judges would be the proper
authority to decide in such a case; and they would decide, beyond all
question, nineteen times in twenty, right. It is the interest of every
man who is desirous of exercising the suffrage on right principles, to
give him some such protection against them that wish to exercise the
suffrage on wrong. A peace-officer can call on the _posse comitatus_ or
on the people to aid him; if enough appear to put down the rebels, well
and good; but if enough do not appear, let it be taken as proof that the
district is not worthy of giving the votes of freemen. They who abuse
such a liberty as man enjoys in this country are the least entitled to
our sympathies. As for the mode, that could easily be determined, as
soon as you settle the principle."
The discourse went on for an hour, neighbor Hall giving his opinions
still more at large. I listened equally with pleasure and surprise.
"These, then, after all," I said to myself, "are the real bone and sinew
of the country. There are tens of thousands of this sort of men in the
State, and why should they be domineered over, and made to submit to a
legislation and to practices that are so often without principle, by the
agents of the worst part of the community? Will the honest forever be so
passive, while the corrupt and dishonest continue so active?" On my
mentioning these notions to my uncle, he answered:
"Yes, it ever has been so, and, I fear, ever will be so. _There_ is the
curse of this country," pointing to a table covered with newspapers, the
invariable companion of an American inn of any size. "So long as men
believe what they find _there_, they can be nothing but dupes or
knaves."
"But there is good in newspapers."
"That adds to the curse. If they were nothing but lies, the world would
soon reject them; but how few are able to separate the true from the
false! Now, how few of these pages speak the truth about this very
anti-rentism! Occasionally an honest man in the corps does come out; but
where one does this, ten affect to think what they do not believe, in
order to secure votes--votes, votes, votes. In that simple word lies all
the mystery of the matter."
"Jefferson said, if he were to choose between a government without
newspapers, or newspapers without a government, he would take the last."
"Ay, Jefferson did not mean newspapers as they are now. I am old enough
to see the change that has taken place. In his day, three or four fairly
convicted lies would damn any editor; now, there are men that stand up
under a thousand. I'll tell you what, Hugh, this country is jogging on
under two of the most antagonist systems possible--Christianity and the
newspapers. The first is daily hammering into every man that he is a
miserable, frail, good-for-nothing being, while the last is eternally
proclaiming the perfection of the people and the virtues of
self-government."
"Perhaps too much stress ought not to be laid on either."
"The first is certainly true, under limitations that we all understand;
but as to the last, I will own I want more evidence than a newspaper
eulogy to believe it."
After all, my uncle Ro is sometimes mistaken; though candor compels me
to acknowledge that he is very often right.