Now these views of the Governor may not be exactly correct, and I freely acknowledge that I do not adopt them myself; but what is there in any of them, I ask, that ought to excite the alarm, or kindle the indignation of the Reviewer? Obviously nothing at all. Yet after quoting them at full length, he proceeds to comment upon them in the following words: "It is in these passages that we think lurks the fallacy, and we might add the _mischief_ of the Governor's views. He sets out first by deprecating all legislative interference on the subject." Where? In what part of the Report? For I have not seen such a thought in it; and I have read the whole, though the Reviewer it seems has not; and the passages under his notice most certainly do not suggest any thing like it. On the contrary, they directly advise that the Legislature _shall_ interfere in the case, although not precisely in the Reviewer's way. But he goes on: "'Let us alone' is his cardinal maxim, and the maxim of the school of politicians to which he belongs. Let individuals take care of themselves, and of each other; but let not government presume to thrust its paternal care upon the community." And where does he get this idea from again? Not certainly from any thing in the Report before him. And was it right, then, was it courteous in him to travel out of the record to arraign the _political_ opinions of the Governor, and the school of politicians to which he belongs? Was it proper even to glance at such a martial topic in the amicable columns of the _Literary_ Messenger? Or if it was, and if the Reviewer believed that the favorite maxim of the Governor, and the school of politicians to which he belongs, is, "Let us alone," did he think it fair to represent him as holding it in all the extent of its terms, without limitation or reserve? Or, is the maxim itself utterly and absolutely false, to all intents and purposes whatever? And is there nothing--nothing at all--to which it may be properly applied? Is there nothing which the Legislature ought not to meddle with? If this is his opinion, it is easy to see to what class of politicians _he_ belongs, and it is one whose _latitudinarianism_--but I will not follow the bad example which he has set me, and abuse your peaceable pages to expose the danger of its doctrines, and the folly of its flights.
Justice Report
The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. I., No. 5, January, 1835 — Part 20
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