Staunton Vindicator
Virginia Legislature
To James H. Skinner, Esq.
Public Speaking
Hon. A.H.H. Stuart
Wednesday Night
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Wednesday Night
We have space merely to state that the various candidates for seats in the Convention addressed the people of Staunton on last Wednesday night. The Court House was crowded, and among the audience were not a few ladies.
After the candidates had concluded, J.H. Skinner, Esq., was loudly called for, and coming to the stand, proceeded to deliver some stunning and forcible remarks. An attempt was made to break the force of his arguments by various gentlemen upon whose toes he was treading with a great deal of weight. Finally, it was agreed that he should address the people on Saturday night the 26th, on the issues which now engross the public mind.
The attempt to enforce gag law was in bad taste, and had a decidedly unfavorable air.
Reconstruction--Not Preservation
Speaking at Mt. Sidney
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Speaking at Mt. Sidney
Returning from Rockingham Court on last Monday evening, we stopped at Mt. Sidney to hear the candidates for the Convention address the people of that vicinity, as advertised. One of the most thoughtful, respectful and intelligent audiences, consisting of about three hundred, had assembled that we have ever seen. Thornton Berry, Esq., was called to the chair. Gen. Harman opened the discussion; Col. Baylor followed, and he was succeeded respectively by Col. Baldwin, Capt. Imboden, and Mr. Sheffey. Gen. Harman and Capt. Imboden took decided and almost similar positions, and declared their purpose, if elected, to use every effort to have our national difficulties promptly and finally settled, at least so far as Virginia's action could inaugurate a line of policy that would result in adjustment. They declared that resistance to coercion was a duty, and indicated their endorsement of the Crittenden-Douglas Compromise as a basis of settlement.
The other speakers, except when questioned, confined themselves mostly to appeals in behalf of the preservation of the Union, without defining any particular policy, except to wait for future developments. They seemed to lose sight of the fact that the Union was already dissolved, and that hence the question for the consideration and judgment of the people was not the preservation of the Union, for that was impossible, but its re-construction. They did not advert to the fact that there is no hope for the old Union--for the seceding States to come back and resume their original relations, unless the causes which led to their separation are removed. They evaded the practical points, which must be settled to prevent civil war, and confined themselves to exciting the feelings and fears of their hearers. We honestly believe this to be wrong. As much as we respect and admire the high order of talent and pure character of Cols. Baldwin and Baylor, and Mr. Sheffey, yet we are candid when we say that the speeches on Monday night last were calculated to mislead the people. We ask them what possible good can result from exciting the passions? Would it not be far more becoming in this important canvass, to tell the people plainly that we are in a revolution--lay bare the fact that five States have seceded and that to that extent this Union is dissolved to all intents and purposes? We want the plain, blunt truth presented to the voters of the county that some policy of reconstructing our shattered Union must be adopted--some terms upon which the seceding States will reunite must be adopted. We call upon the people to demand the positions of the candidates in this regard. It will not do to sing paeans to the Union and the stars and stripes when the waves of revolution and disunion are surging all around us.
We confess that we were disappointed in the speeches of these gentlemen. In our opinion, they did not meet the issues presented in the condition of the country. They consumed their time with "glittering generalities," instead of marching boldly forward and grappling with the mighty events which are upon us. We will not here particularize what we conceive to be positions fatal to the peace of the country, assumed by some of these gentlemen. We simply record our dissent from the general tone and tendency of their remarks. We can never consent to an endorsement of a temporizing, indecisive curse, when the fate of the nation depends upon a different policy.
Position of Virginia
An Unfortunate Move
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We notice in the Amelia county correspondence of the Richmond Dispatch, that a daguerreotypist was requested to leave that county on suspicion that he was too familiar with slaves. The daguerreotypist alluded to, is Mr. Berry of this county, who is just as sound on the negro question as the correspondent of the Dispatch or any citizens of Amelia. He was in our office a few days since. He has now a certificate of his residence and antecedents, with the seal of Augusta county attached, which we presume the over-wise inhabitants of Amelia will hardly disregard.
A Sad Picture
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A Sad Picture
It is a true saying that one half the world does not know how the other half subsists. We were passing, the other day, along one of our principal thoroughfares, when our attention was called to a most distressing scene--one that made our hearts ache. Beneath a stairway that led down an embankment were two poorly clad women, the youngest with an infant in her arms. Around them were several pieces of old carpet and blankets, and near by a coffee pot. They had remained there all the night previous, exposed to the chilling winds of the season--no shelter, no home, no hope. The girl, who a few months ago, was light-hearted and innocent, but had fallen, fallen, was the very picture of despair. Hair disheveled, dress torn and uncomely, she was crouched upon the floor of the porch, with her child closely clasped to her bosom, rocking to and fro, evidencing in every expression the deepest agony of spirit and soul. We felt keenly and sadly for that outcast girl--houseless and homeless in the midst of winter's storms, with scarcely a ray of hope to beam upon her broken heart. And who was the other female? Her mother!--following her child in shame and want, and clinging to her in the deep misery that surrounded her, as only a mother can cling.
Fallen though they be, they are not yet lost. A friendly word, a kind act, might stay the march of crime, and touch a chord of the heart that would awaken other feelings and aspirations, and lift them out of the mire and clay, and place their feet upon a rock. "Inasmuch as yet did it unto one of these, ye did it unto me."
Hon. A.H.H. Stuart, Col. John Baldwin and Col. George Baylor
For the Vindicator
To the People of Augusta
To the People of Augusta County
To the People of the County of Augusta
Virginia Legislature
Appointment of Commissioners and Officers of Election
Married
Died
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Died
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