Conspirators, and other Slave-owners also, had, by this time, come to
hate the Northern free-thinking, free-acting, freedom-loving mechanic
and laboring man, because the very fact and existence of his Godgiven
Freedom and higher-resulting civilization was a powerful and perpetual
protest against the--abounding iniquities and degradations of Slavery as
practiced by themselves.

Hence, by trickery, by cajoling the People With his, and their own,
assurances that he was in favor of Protection--they secured the election
in 1844 of a Free-Trade President, the consequent repeal of the
Protective-Tariff of 1842--which had repaired the dreadful mischief
wrought by the Compromise Act of 1833--and the enactment of the infamous
Free-Trade Tariff of 1846, which blasted the manufacturing and farming
and trade industries of the Country again, as with fire.

The discovery of the great gold fields of California, and the enormous
amount of the precious metal poured by her for many succeeding years
into the lap of the Nation, alone averted what otherwise would
inevitably have been total ruin. As it was, in 1860, the National
credit had sunk to a lower point than ever before in all its history.
It was confessedly bankrupt, and ruin stalked abroad throughout the
United States.

But while, with rapid pen, the carrying out of that part of the Southern
Conspirators' Disunion programme which related to Free-Trade, is thus
brought again to mind, the other part of that programme, which related
to Slavery, must not be neglected or overlooked. On this question they
had determined, as we have seen, to agitate without ceasing--having in
view, primarily, as already hinted, the extension of Slave territory and
the resulting increase of Slave power in the Land; and, ulteriorly, the