The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1852-02-11

they were invoked to prevent! To deny the
right of the federal government to use force
against State, is not civil war. To contend
for Unconstitutional rights of the South is not
to assal the Union, or to weaken the bond
which constitutes its strength. To assert as a
last alternative the right of State to secede, at
the same time declaring that it was right
which, under existing circumstances, Mississippi
should not exercise, not to manifest the
purpose of secession. The reasoning of those
who contended for the opposite conclusion,
when applied to their own position, reduced
them to the most awkward predicament
They asserted that to declare the right of Sc
cession, indicated the right to secede but they
asserted the right of revolution. Them accord
ngto their logic, they had the intent to revou-
tioniae, which, according to their definition WIS
to wage civil war to cover the land with all the
horrors they so delighted to depict as the con
sequences of the success of the Democratic
State Rights ticket
The platform Of the convention Of last June,
was State Rights, because it was Democratic ;
it was Democratic, because State Rights. The
assertion Of the rights of the States by Jeffer
son and Madison, was the foundation stone on
which the temple of Democracy was built-the
structure could not stand if the foundation
should be DESTROYED
He said, he had assembled to the platform of
the June convention, with the confidence due
to the soundness of its materials; and though
to him it had proved the scalfod for political
execution, his conf ience was not impaired, and
at a iuture--no remote day--he believed some
ADLER champion of the cause would receive on
that platform the laurel Of the victor, instead of
the fate OF the martyr. In this the largest State
convention which it had been his fortune to
| h.. H.. Al. 4
web of deception should be broken the veil Of
false assurances and concealed motives should be
lifted when truth revealed, the right would be
indicated by the popular Judgment of Mis-
sissippi. He had joined his party in con-
test for principles which he believed were of
vital importance and ir Imminent danger; had
he foreseen the result, his own course would
not have been changed If his principles were
to be overthrown--if his friends were to fall in
the conflict--lhe had no wish to be the sole sur
vivor of such Il wreck he had never wished to
remain as a solitary official monument, to mark
the spot where the State Rights Democracy once
had stood. The issues rendered by the Den
crazy has not been met by the opposite party;
their principles had not been beaten; their posi-
ton had not been decided upon by the people,
except in relation to The policy of acquiescence
in the recent action of the federal government
on the territorial and slavery questions. Incon-
gruous materials combined for the spoils ofollice
Fraud and Falsehood, and Sreesol, and Foote,
and Fillmore, have triumphed in Mississippi I;
but success thus acquired must be as temporary
as its means were corrupt He had an abiding
faith in the Democracy of Mississippi, because
the cement which united them was principle;
and expected to see them in the approaching
contest, as in days gone by, with one spirit cir
cling close aud deep around their ancient stand
ard.
The mere demagogne---he who has been
thrown to the surface like dregs from the bot.
tom of the pool, by such violent agitation as
mngles heterogeneous elements, and like them
must sink to the bottom whenever quiet is re.
stored /; he must desire to continue agitation;
he from some selfish consideration must oppose
the restoration Of harmony in the Democratic
ranks, and be in all time an agitator still
But every Democrat who loves the principle
of his party, more than the spoils of cifice must
abandon coalition which would sacrifice the
public good for individual advancement, and
heart and hand join in the effort to restore power
to those by whose administration his principles
will be advanced, and the common good pro-
NOTED. TO the Union Democrats, he addressed
the argument, that if tt ~ wished to prevent
the creation of a national debt, and the over
throw of the present financial policy of the gov.
eminent, they must rely upon the Democracy;
if they wished to avoid class legislation, by the
destruction of the existing revenue system, and
IL return to protective duties, they must rely
upon the Democrity; generally, if they wished
to maintain a strict construction Of the Consti-
tuition, and thus to perpetuate the union of the
States, which their fathers had formed, they
must rely upon the Democracy.
To tie State rights men, whatever their
party alliances had hitherto been, he appealed for
support to Democratic principles, because there
they saw the doctrine of strict construction of
the Constitution, which was the doctrine Of
State rights, and to which alone he believed they
could look for respect and protection to the
rights Of the South. There was not such unani-
| nifty among Southern men as would give moral
power to a sectional minority; and the history
of the Democratic party, from the first struggle
between State rights and the spirit of consollda
ton, pointed to it as the source from which our
best if not our only hope, must be drawn.
Of those who honestly desired TO preserve
the union of the States, and had been induced
to leave the Democratic party and enter into
a new organization for that purpose, he asked,
what was there in the ancient or recent history
of Democracy, which indicated the necessity Of
such n course, or the wisdom Of their new all
lance. Who obstructed the prosecution of the
war with Mexico, by embarrassing the admins
tration Of our government, when its armies were
| fighting battles upon foreign soil Who
burned blue lights along the coast of New Eng
! land, in the war of 1872! " no has nued
recent law, passed to carry out provision of the
constitutional compact? Was it their old friends
| or new allies
| He adverted to those misrepresentation made
by sons of Mississippi, and which had spread
broad cast the impression, that there was dis
union party within our borders and said it was
one of those perversions of truth which, least of
all others, he felt able to forgive. He had, when
| her representative abroad, replied Indignantly to
such superstition, and pointed to the brief but
brilliant history Of Mississippi, as the substan
tial evidence which should have prevented any
mind from orr linating or entertaining the cal
&nny. As a senator from Mississippi, he had
| considered the honor of his State, and his own
honor involved in the superstition, that while
she KEEP: representatives to the federal govern
ment, and participated in its action, she was
| nlotlinp the destruction of that government to