Occupying the South.
We have before published a plan of a Yankee General, Casey, we believe, found on the battle field of the ‘"Seven Pines,"’ for the permanent military occupation of the South. Casey being the General who lost everything he had in that battle, ought undoubtedly to be high authority on the subject of permanent military occupation. He proposes a standing army of 150,000 men, to be distributed at specified points of the South as soon as conquered. One would think he might wait until that contingency should occur before bringing forward his programme of occupation; that he might follow the sensible recipe of the housewife for cooking turbot--‘"first catch it."’ But the Yankees are always certain of their fish, even more so before Manassas than they are now. They had brought with them on that occasion not only a plan for holding the country, but appliances for a grand ball in Richmond, and handcuffs and halters for its inhabitants. This plan for a permanent occupation of the South by a General who could not occupy his own battle-field is not calculated to excite much alarm. Nevertheless, that such is the purpose of the enemy, if they can succeed in our conquest, is too plain to admit of a doubt.The spirit and principles upon which they carry on the war, give no indication of that desire which some of their conservatives profess, to bring the States together again, in peace and harmony, upon the old basis of the American Constitution. Congress avows principles and enacts measures which are clearly designed to disturb and subvert the established institutions of the States; sweeping confiscation acts are passed, which look to the universal plunder of individual property, as well as the overthrow of State rights; Generals entice away multitudes of slaves or proclaim their emancipation in whole States, and, if the President disapproves such a decree as that of Hunter, he reserves to himself the right, if he sees fit to perpetrate this monstrous violation of the Constitution. The spirit in which the war is waged is as atrocious as its principles. The bombardment of towns full of women and children, the brutality of the Butlers and the ferocity of the Wools are not calculated, nor, we believe, intended, to make us hold any relation hereafter to one another, save that of conqueror, and conquered. The only condition practicable to the South hereafter, in the American Union, is subjection to a military despotism, and it is for the mode and manner thereof that Gen. Casey, the fugacious, has prepared his plan of permanent occupation. A hundred and fifty thousand men is the number that Gen. Casey thinks would be sufficient to ‘"hold, occupy, and possess,"’ a vast and sparsely settled territory, occupied by a population of ten millions! This is of a piece with Lincoln's call for Seventy-five thousand men to put down the Southern rebellion, which he found it necessary to increase to six hundred thousand, and, even then had to call for more troops to protect his own Capital! It is the universal testimony of history that it is more difficult to hold a country than to obtain possession of it, and the South would form no exception to that rule. Gen. Carey's hundred and fifty thousand men scattered over such a territory as that of the Southern States, would be a mere drop in the bucket. The very diseases of the climate would decimate them without the use of a weapon. The cities which they are to garrison are themselves mere specks in the wide ocean of Southern territory, and might be held by an enemy for centuries without accomplishing the overthrow of Southern Independence. So long as the Southern people remain true to themselves, no spot of Southern earth, except that which is hold by their bayonets, can ever be occupied even temporarily by the armies of the Union.
