Slavery Question in Oregon. 319 moral obligations increased to suit the social complexities there. And why is this true? except that the social state is the sine qua non of human existence. Without it man is nothing— the same as one bee without a hive. Everything pertaining to individual freedom, inconsistent with the social state, is surrendered to it or for it. Nearly everybody has read that melancholy plaint which the poet attributed to Alexander Selkirk on the island of Juan Fernandez : Oh, Solitude! where are thy charms^ That sages have seen in thy face ? Better dwell in the midst of alarms, Than reign in this horrible place. But there is one thing we should bear in mind, viz. : that the surrender or rather the restriction the individual undergoes for the sake of society is less in that society where the social units are equal in rights, than in one where some are endowed with special privileges. For an illustration, turn to the slave- holding States of this Union, where the privilege of holding men in bondage is a feature of society, and all know that the non-slaveholding portion of the community are restricted in their liberty to an extent that the people of Oregon would not tolerate for a moment. How would a citizen of this county take it, if when he called for his mail, he were told that it had been adjudged incendiary and burnt? How would an Ore- gonian like to be subjected to surveillance concerning the books in his library or the newspapers he might subscribe for? And yet that is what will happen here sooner or later, w^hen slavery shall have been established. The Southern people are not at fault in censoring the press and prohibiting free speech, or in other means they have taken, from time to time, for the security of their system, for so long as it con- tinues such means are appropriate and necessary. The vSystem itself is at fault; it is wrong morally because it intro- duces a false principle into the social organism, one that produces disorder, interferes with the progressive tendency of mankind, requires the social units to part with rights for which there is no compensation to be found in such societj^
