Concord Register

FOR THE CONCORD REGISTER.

MR. KIMBALL—

With feelings of satisfaction which I do not always experience in reading his ordinary newspaper publications of the day, I have perused the communications in your paper upon the Presidential Question over the signature of "Marcellus." The writer discovers an intimate acquaintance with his subject; and in treating it, although he occasionally indulges in considerable severity of remark, he generally exercises a candor which does not always characterize the productions of a partizan writer. In the preference which he manifests for Mr. Adams, in opposition to Mr. Crawford, on a comparison of their respective talents and public services, I am induced from the fullest conviction to unite with him: and upon a consideration of their private characters also, so far as they have been exhibited to the public view, I cannot hesitate to declare my full conviction that the example of Mr. Adams is far more worthy of imitation than that of his rival. However the practice of duelling may be approved or justified in some sections of our country, or by some high-toned individuals; it is and must be unequivocally condemned by every one, who holds in veneration the commands of heaven, or the laws of his country. Thou shalt not kill—has the same binding force, and imposes the same obligation to obedience now, that the same mandate did when proclaimed in thunders from mount Sinai.

But however odious and savage, in the estimation of a virtuous and intelligent people, the murderous custom of duelling is; there are to be found those—and those too, who profess to be the instructors and the guides of the people—who can pass lightly over it: who can declaim in the pathetic strains of morality and religion against the wickedness and barbarity of a practice so destructive to both: who can even say, that to approve this custom—“this fashionable mode of committing murder”—by rewarding its abettors with office, is a disgrace to the country; and yet, in certain cases, and for certain purposes, they can at once hush these their pious feelings, and soften their holy indignation at such outrages upon humanity and justice, and in obedience to the dictates of their party leaders, confer the highest honors upon "an experienced duellist!" Yes—even "Marcellus," with all his moral and religious sensibilities; with all his love of justice and detestation of crime—the crime of duelling—is "free to admit," and to declare, that if Mr. Crawford—the man in whose public life there is nothing to be found but "unwelcome evidences of his folly or crime"—had he been nominated by a decided majority of the republicans in Congress, "though hundreds of others might better deserve, and have higher qualifications for the presidency"—he, the pure Marcellus, would be as fond and as willing as any sycophant could be, "of hushing all talk about his duels, his official blunders, his intermarrying projects with the Indians, &c." and would be ready and willing to advocate with all his power "the claims of the Treasury candidate!!"

And is it so, Marcellus? Has a majority of the republicans in Congress the power of absolution? Can they render an action inoffensive, which by the laws of God and our country is stamped with the infamy of murder? From whom did they receive the keys of Saint Peter, and the authority, that whatsoever they should bind or loose on earth should be ratified in heaven? Or, have not you, with pure sycophantic devotion, committed your conscience to the keeping of this majority? or discarded every conscientious scruple, and are ready at the bidding of these republicans to commit any outrageous act that may advance their designs? I had hoped better things. I had hoped that "Marcellus," with so fair a promise of an independent course in his outset, would not so soon have descended from his honorable height, and with an ill-judged dash of his pen so precipitately lowered himself from the lofty elevation of a freeman to the abject condition of a slave. But "the truth will out." The shackles of party devotion are too firmly rivetted upon the slavish mind of Marcellus to permit him to attend to the dictates of his own conscience. If his masters, a majority of the republicans in Congress, bid him support the man, whom they choose to consider as best suited to promote their views, he will at once renounce his own opinion, and the use and authority of his reason, and "be ready to advocate the claims" of their candidate: even if those claims are polluted with the crime of murder, and there should be hundreds of others, who better deserve, and have higher qualifications for the office. Such sentiments most admirably harmonize with those of a raving partizan, who declared he would rather vote for the Devil, if nominated by his own party than for an Angel of light if supported by his political opponents.

DETECTOR.