The Yazoo Democrat

Cuba. The United States Review is the title of a new monthly recently commenced in N. York, as a political advocate of democracy. We find in the newspapers the following extract from its columns on the subject of Cuba: "Let us approach this Cuban controversy with clean hands and calm minds; let us beware how we indulge that peculiar enthusiasm which too often vitiates the legislation of republics; which, under pretext of establishing the rights of man violates the rights of States, not less divine and benignant, since by them alone the rights of man are first made good. If Cuba is to become a member of our system, it must be because she herself has willed it; if she is to enter into a system of liberty, must possess liberty therein. The question of the admission of Cuba into our own continental system cannot be agitated until it is a settled point, un fait accompli, that she is herself a republic. If our attempts, however beneficently made; should result in the rebellion and disorganization of her slaves, she is lost to us and to the world. The period of annexation would be indefinitely postponed. Nor are we less apt to appreciate the benefits of those grand measures of extension which time is accomplishing for us with a steady and effectual hand; the boundaries of the republican empire grow outward, like the rings of the oak, by an irresistible expansion and accretion; men need larger room as their thoughts are larger; but they need not depart, in the pursuit of glorious ends, from principles of justice and humanity. If the island of Cuba is to enter into the system of the free republics, she must come in like Texas, as a sovereign State, by the strong desire and expressed will of her citizens. We do not desire to add to our system a ruined and rebellious territory, overrun by a self emancipated negro population. A more difficult problem than the annexation of Cuba as a republic has never presented itself to the minds of American statesmen. To discuss it in all its phases, to disclose all the difficulty that attends the diplomacy of its solution, would require the intellect of a Calhoun, exercised without interest or passion. A more brilliant acquisition than the island of Cuba will never be made by this republic. It is recognized by all as the grand step of republicanism towards imperial predominance Nothing is more brilliant, nothing more difficult more destructive, if precipitated by the spirit of propagandism and, reckless emancipation; more conducive to good, if managed by the conservative hand, guided by the gravity and wisdom of the empire."