The Western Democrat

THE YANKEE CONGRESS.

The effort recently made in the yankee Congress to amend the Constitution so as to prohibit slavery in all the States of the yankee Union, proved a failure for the want of a two-thirds vote in favor of the measure. In the House of Representatives the vote stood 94 for the amendment and 64 against it. The sixty-four who voted against it were all democrats. Only four democrats voted with the abolitionists.

Although the measure has been defeated for the present, there can be but little doubt that it will yet pass. In fact the yankee papers declare that it will and must be adopted, as there can be no Union with slavery--that slavery must be entirely abolished before any effort at "reconstruction" can be effectual. They will learn after awhile that efforts at reconstruction cannot be "effectual" under any circumstances, and that the institution of slavery does not depend for existence on an edict of the yankee Congress. Our enemies can injure the institution by stealing negroes and allowing them to die and rot out for the want of proper attention; but they must remember that for every one stolen they will be required to pay the cash value in a final settlement. The British were required to pay for negroes stolen from our citizens in the war of 1812, and the yankee Government must prepare to comply with the same rule, besides giving a guarantee for good behaviour towards us hereafter.