There is no more prospect of a reconstruction of the old Government than there is of a return of Northern arrogance and fanaticism to right reason. This new government is no visionary phantom—it is a living actual reality, its machinery is already in motion.
Original passage & context
"To our mind there is no more prospect of a reconstruction of the old Government than there is of a return of Northern arrogance and fanaticism to right reason and self-sacrificing justice, a thing that they are incapable of doing, even if they had the disposition. [...] This new government is no visionary phantom, as some may seem to think—it is a living actual reality, its machinery is already in motion—it has its mission to perform and its destiny to realize"
Three weeks before the guns, the Confederate capital's own paper kills the last northern hope out loud: there will be no reconstruction, no stray sheep returning to the fold. The essay is aimed inward as much as outward — it scolds Southern Unionists for keeping the North's illusions alive. Two passages joined with [...]; the second is preceded in the source by an em dash. Fetched from the AHA "Sixteen Months to Sumter" archive.
Read it in the original — Montgomery Weekly Post, Mar 26, 1861 ↗