January 28, 1861, The New York Herald
We are glad to see by the message of Governor Pettus, of Mississippi, and the proceedings of the Louisiana Convention, that the people of those States have no idea of following the suicidal example of South Carolina, and ruining their own commerce in order to carry out their extreme political notions. The subject of the navigation of the Mississippi is one of the great practical importance, perhaps the greatest among all the complications involved in the problem of disunion. Five and twenty years ago, before the whistle of the locomotive – the herald of progress and civilization – had been heard west of the Alleghanies or south of Baltimore, the act of shutting up the lower Mississippi to Northern trade would have ruined the great West. Now, however, the farmers and producers of Ohio, Illinois, Indian, Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin have other markets, and the south depends upon them, not they upon the South. If Louisiana and Mississippi agreed to throw obstacles in the way of the free navigation of the Father of Rivers, they would cut their own throats; and they know it as well as we do. Latterly there has been a great excitement all over the North and West in consequence of the fact that the State authorities of Mississippi had caused the erection of batteries near Vicksburg, and that steamboats passing down the river were fired upon in case they did not stop at that point. There was a good deal of fierce talk on both sides, and some Western Governors drew ensanguined pictures of possible difficulties to take place among the canebrakes and woodyards of the Mississippi. It appears however, that these batteries were temporary affairs, built to prevent the reinforcement of the forts at points below Vicksburg, more especially those at New Orleans. The Louisiana Convention made haste to declare that the navigation of the river should be free to all States and Powers. The Governor of Mississippi recommends that the prompt and efficient measures be adopted to make known to the people of the Northwestern States that peaceful commerce on the Mississippi river will neither be interrupted nor annoyed by the people of Mississippi. We agree with the Governor in the statement that will preserve peace between the South and the Northwest, if it can be preserved. Further than that, we believe that civil war, if it comes at all, will not break out in that quarter. The war policy of the new administration would undoubtedly be the starvation of the South, by blocking up its ports and destroying its commerce. Accordingly to present appearances, the Charleston and Mobile people having saved the republicans the trouble of shutting out their foreign and coasting trade, and the Orleanois seeming almost as crazy as their friends on the seaboard, there will be no necessity for coercion in that shape. However that may be, we regard the course of Louisiana and Mississippi upon the matter of the river navigation as being not only very important in a commercial point of view, but likewise a very cheering sign that our political affairs are not in such a bad way as to be altogether hopeless. Let Chicago rejoice and Wall street be comforted. Trade, calm health of nations, will still flow unrestricted from the Falls of St. Anthony to the Delta of the Mississippi.