According to the Duke of Richmond's letter, one of the means by which the tyrant of Rome and his colleagues have adopted for accomplishing the downfall of the government of the United States, is that of foreign immigration. Let us examine the operation of this device. The editor of theLouisville Journal, in discussing the question of foreign immigration, makes the following statement: "In 1850 our native white population was about 17,300,000. In the same year our foreign population was about 2,300,000. In 1852 the immigration was about 398,170. At that rate it would take only about six years to double the foreign population here in 1850. This is about five times our population's increase, which is in a ratio of three or four per cent, per annum, while the increase of foreigners is from fourteen to sixteen per cent, on the census of 1830, 1840, and 1850.
"In 1852 our presidential vote was about 3,300,000. In 1848 it was about 2,880,000. In 1852 our foreign arrivals, as shown, were about 400,000, and 240,000 of these were males, thus showing that in one year, the arrivals of foreign males into this country, was nearly as great as the increase of our whole voting population during four years."
IN THE UNITED STATES.The foreign arrivals by sea alone were—"In 1850 315,333"1851 403,828"1852 398,470"1853 400,777From Canada and Mexico during the sameperiod about 700,4082,118,408
It appears from the census of 1850 that the total aggregate of foreign population of the United States in 1849 was 2,210,829. If the tide of immigration has added but two millions to the number of the foreign population every four years since 1849, it must have amounted, in 1869, to 7,210,829.
All the immigrants are not, however, Catholics. Some are Protestants, some Infidels, and some Radical Republicans. The Turners, the Free Germans, and the members of the Revolutionary League are all firm friends of free governments. The proportion of Catholics among the immigrants, at a fair computation, is presumed to be about three-fourths of the entire number. They must, therefore, add to the Catholic numerical strength about 3,750,000 at every decade, besides the numerical augmentation of the Catholic church through the medium of foreign immigration, there are other appliances acting powerfully in its favor. "It is not long," says William Hogan, "since I saw a-letter from the Catholic bishop Kendrick, of the diocese of Massachusetts, in which he informs the authorities of Rome that he is making converts of some of the first families in the diocese."—Synopsis, p. 169. "I have often conversed," says he, "with American Protestants on this subject, and regret finding many of them—especially those of the Unitarian creed—are strong advocates of popery, and in favor of its introduction among the people." John L. Chapman, a Methodist clergyman, in a work written before the Southern outbreak, says in substance, according to my recollection, that a Methodist preacher cannot now address his congregation upon the subject of Catholicism with the same freedom he could formerly; that those who imagine a Methodist preacher can now utter in the pulpit, or at a tract or bible meeting, the sentiments of John Wesley respecting popery, are entirely mistaken; and that those who suppose that an editor of a Methodist periodical can now assail the errors of Catholicism without the loss of subscribers, are laboring under a great delusions. While the pulpits, revivals, and evangelical enterprises are making no converts of any account among Catholics, the confirmation services of the Catholic bishops show the great number of adult non-Catholics which they are adding to their church. The number of children kidnapped, and the extraordinary number confirmed by Catholic bishops, might suggest a suspicion that the church has not abandoned its historic mode of adding to its members. Every non-Catholic child educated in a Catholic school becomes a Catholic, or strongly biassed in favor of that church. We hear of Protestant priests, and sometimes of Protestant bishops, and of whole bodies of theological students becoming Roman Catholics.
It is an undeniable fact that the annual increase of the Catholic population far outstrips that of the non-Catholic population; and that at some future period its numerical strength will be capable of deciding in favor of the church every election that takes place. When that unfortunate hour arrives every policeman, councilman, mayor, judge, governor, delegate, congressman, senator, president, civil official, army or naval officer will be a Catholic. Then the non-Catholics will be powerless, and at the mercy of those who believe they have no rights. Then, by the secret operation of the papal machinery, one faction will be inflamed against another, and one section of the land against another. Then rapine, violence, assassination, sedition, massacre—everything that can render life and property insecure—will distract every state, city and village in the Union. Then, amid the anarchy and confusion thus produced, some Catholic tyrant will arise, and—the civil disorders subsiding at the bidding of the pope—will be proclaimed dictator. Supported by the Catholic and Protestant kings of Europe, he will abolish the republic, and establish in its place a Catholic monarchial government. Then, according to Bronson, heresy and Infidelity will be declared to have no rights. Then, according to Archbishop Kendrick, Protestantism will be declared to be a crime, and punished as such. Then, according to the archbishop of St. Louis, religious liberty will no longer be endured. Then, according to Hecker, the Catholic church will be bound to take the country, and keep it. Then inquisitions will be introduced, and stakes erected. Then the darkness of the middle ages will settle over the land. Then the school-houses, the colleges, the asylums, and the churches built with Protestant funds will be applied to Catholic purposes. Then the fortunes which non-Catholics have amassed will be confiscated. Then the territorial acquisitions of the Government, all its resources, all the advantages it has acquired by arms and treaties, its navy and its army, will become the property of the papal monarchy, and applied to its defence and extension, Then it will be the business of Americans, not to create magistrates, but to obey despots; not to share in the sovereignty of the government, but to toil in slavery to support an execrable despotism. Then liberty of speech and freedom of the press will be no more. Then the ecclesiastical dungeons, which the supineness of Americans have allowed Catholicism to erect among them, will be the homes and graves of freemen. Then will arise a government constructed of schemes for public plunder; where an aristocracy are privileged robbers; where moral worth and dignity are the helpless victims of power and injustice; where laws are made for subjects, not for rulers; and where the people are inherited by royal heirs, like so much land and cattle. Then will the monarchial demon, the God of slaves and aristocrats, seated on the people's throne, with his feet on the people's neck, quaff blood like water; and eye with scornful indifference the squalid millions whom he has doomed by an enormous taxation to huddle in hovels, without light or air, with clothing scarcely enough to hide their nakedness, with food scarcely enough to sustain life, or fire scarcely enough to keep them from freezing.
When the pope shall have succeeded in his attempts to establish such a monarchy over the American people, he will next proceed to enlarge its dominions by the annexation of Canada, Mexico, all South America, and all the Pacific and Atlantic islands. With such a dominion, such resources, such an army and navy, he will be master of the land and the ocean. He will then proceed to plunder and discrown the very kings that had assisted him in erecting his colossal power. He will then enforce, by the thunders of American monitors and war steamers, his claim to the crowns of England and Russia; his claim to be the disposer of all crowns; his claim to be the only monarch that ought to wear the token of royalty; in fine, his claim to the supreme temporal and spiritual monarchy of the world. Then England will awake, but it will be in the vengeful folds of a serpent crushing out her life. Then the European despots will awake, but it will be amid the crumbling of their thrones. Then the papal allies will awake, but it will be to find their limbs fettered, and the foot of the sacerdotal monarch placed in malignant triumph upon their necks. Then the world will awake, but it will be to find that it has suffered the extinction of the last star of liberty, and involved itself in a night of despotism without the hope of a morn.
But the spirit of freedom is immortal; its conflict with despotism will be eternal. Bolts, dungeons, shackles cannot confine it; racks, flames and gibbets cannot extinguish it. To annihilate it, the most formidable efforts of bigotry, the most ingenious arts of statesmen, the combined power of church and state, have been applied in vain. Though the blood of freedom's sons have streamed in torrents, and the smoke of their stakes have darkened the face of heaven, yet their spirit has still walked abroad over the world. So it has been in the past; so it will be in the future. If the Catholic demon should massacre all the freemen in one age, they will rise up more powerful in the next; and successively as time rolls on, shake with their energy the accursed throne. Hence civil war will never cease, fields will eternally reek with gore, burning cathedrals and convents will illuminate the night, till the world, instructed by its past errors, will unite in a natural union for the extinguishment of Catholicism.
We have now alluded to the dangers which begin to blacken our political firmament. Can the storm be averted? We believe it can. A union of the Protestants, Jews, Spiritualists, Free Religionists, Infidels, Atheists, Turners, Free Germans, and of all non-Catholics, without regard to creed, race or color, on a basis of universal civil and religious liberty, with a judicious policy, and a corresponding system of measures, will prove adequate to the emergency. Such an organization, if sufficiently liberally constituted, might command the support of Gallic and Fenian Catholics. The life, liberty and welfare of all non-Catholics, if not, indeed, of the Fenians and Gallicans themselves, are in equal danger, and why should they not organize for mutual safety? Does prejudice forbid it? Millions of lives must be sacrificed if a union be not effected. Who would, then, hesitate to sacrifice a prejudice that it may be effected? A tyrant may demand concessions without rendering an equivalent, but freemen can not. Can Americans sleep in peace, while the clang of the hammers that are forging their chains are sounding in their ears, and the pillars which support their government are tottering over their heads? It seems impossible. Their obligations to their country, to posterity, to the world, demand union. Union or slavery; union or confiscation; union or the rack, the stake, the gibbet. One or the other is inevitable. Which do you now chose? A few more years hence you will have no choice.
Every citizen knows that under the present form of government his merits have rewards, and his industry has encouragements enjoyed by no people in any country, or under any other form of government. The poorest and the richest are here accorded equal chances, equal privileges; and an equal voice in selecting legislators, judges and rulers. They are equally untrammelled by legal impediments in seeking the highest positions in the government. Each citizen is an integral part of the sovereignty of the nation; he participates in its management, and shares its greatness and glory. It is a consolation enjoyed only by an American, that if fame nor fortune should gratify his ambition, he can still bequeath to his children a richer inheritance than that of either fame or fortune, the inheritance of a free government. Judging of the future by the past, it is his privilege to believe that the republic will continue to grow in power and greatness with each succeeding age, until the light of her glory shall fill the earth; until despots shall tremble before the majesty of the people; until the clank of slavery, and the groan of the oppressed shall no more be heard; and until the united world shall rise to the majesty and greatness of equal privileges, equal rights and equal laws.
Such are the blessings guaranteed, and the expectations warranted by the continuance of the republic; but monarchy, like a deadly blast, annihilates them all. With the liberty, it lays the greatness and glory of the nation in the grave. Intolerance will then re-establish its racks and torture. Industry will then be oppressed, and enterprise annihilated. This land, which has so long resounded with the song of liberty, will then reverberate with the clanking irons of servitude. This nation, which is now the wonder and glory of the earth; which is so powerful and prosperous; this nation will be no more. Her life and splendor will have departed with her freedom. History may record her eventful story; her sons may clank in chains around her tomb; future freemen may curse the degenerate sons who wanted the valor or unanimity to transmit to their posterity the government which they inherited from their ancestors; but these will not call her to life and glory again. Like a wave she will have rolled away; like a dream, she will have departed; like a thunder peal, she will have muttered into eternal silence. Like these she had but one existence, and that will then have ended.