The Standard’s Call to Arms
An editorial lays out a definitive Unionist platform on the eve of civil war, arguing that the Republic must be preserved at any cost.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
We believe the people of the Free States concur in opinion upon the following propositions: they demand that treason and rebellion shall be speedily crushed in every State and Territory of the Republic. They insist that the whole Union shall be preserved; that not a single stripe shall be erased, nor a single star polluted, on our National ensign; and that the Federal Government shall not be shorn of any of its ancient powers. They require that all forts, arsenals, navy-yards, and public property held in the Southern States shall be preserved at any cost. Any attempt to sit on some middle ground will only lead to a confused mass of petty and feeble municipalities, the prey of adventurers at home and the contempt of foreign states.
“They insist that the whole Union shall be preserved; that not a single stripe shall be erased, nor a single star polluted, on our National ensign.”
Published in Olympia just as the Civil War began, this piece captures the desperate local anxiety about the potential collapse of the American project. It serves as a reminder that even in the remote Pacific Northwest, citizens were deeply engaged in the existential struggle over the shape and authority of the federal government.
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