The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1852-07-12
The Fuss and Feathers,o and Trials and
Troubles or tho WhIg Party.


The vhig party has become an object Of COM
miseration. We pity Mr.. Webster, and sympa-
thixe with him in being finally set aside for "a
hasty plate Of soups" but the wing party is still
more entitled to our pity and sympathy, and the
prayers Of the church. IL is now in a state of
change, transition, dissolution, and decay 1t is
manifestly going the way Of all flesh. Parties like
men aud vegetables, have their day They spring
MP, and flourish, and run to seed, and die
The wing party has substantially run itself out.
vanquished upon all its great original issues, it |
has made merit of necessity, and abandoned them,
excepting upon the tariff, where it adopts the Ian
guage Of Folks Kane letter, and contents itself
with the very modest request for specific duties in
certain cases. 1t says nothing of minimums and
home valuations, those splendid features of the
schedules Of 1872. Those hslcyon days have gone
by. We may also except very largely modified
declaration relating to rivers and harbors-these
improvements are to be limited to works OF ma
tional and general character. Excepting these
small items, the whg party has no platform of is
own, but has come ever to the democratic ground.
Yes, there is principle yet upon which it widely
differs from the democratic party-the principle Of
Intervention. The democrstic platform is broad
enough to take in Cuba, a slice of Mexico, to say
nothing of Canada, or European intervention; but
the whig platform, fully endorsed in this particular
by General Scott, expressly interdicts American
cupidity sympathy, generosity, or enterprise, from
" leaving our to stand on foreign ground"
This, in fact, is the only feature preserved to the
WING party Of its original identiy and here ii stands
in the relation of the conservatism Of the last
tury, when steam power was a chimera, in opposi-
ton to Young America and steam power, as IL
Illustrated in locomotives and in the Collins ships-the
one making morning excursion OF half the length
of the land-the other reducing the Atlantic
TO n mere ferry.
Now, there are, perhaps, not less than three hum
bred thousand voters in the United States, who SYM
pathize directly with the doctrine of intervention
in all of its various applications to Europe
and the American continent, North, Central and
South America but while the adverse party leaves
the whole question at least open question, the
wings have shut down the gates, and entered alb
solute interdict upon any against quitting
our to stand on foreign ground" This is almost
sufficient. of itself, TO reduce the wings to the limits
Of native American party. The farewell speech
of Kossuth in this city, his address to the Germans,
and the movements Of that immense body of our
adopted citizens the intervention question, are
destined to prove serious drawback to the progress
] of Gen. Scott.
But tho causes Of the most alarming troubles Of
the whig party lie within its own ranks For many
years past, Seward and his industrious instruments
have been instilling into the whig church of the
North the most odious doctrines of agra ranis abo-
litionsm, and social and political decentralization.
1t is from this prolific source Of mischief that the
whig party are reaping their blightea harvest.
| Hence the protest of Southern wings in Congress
against supporting General Scott. He is the can
ddate of Seward and his clique, and only Swallows
| the compromise from compulsion Hence the indie
| pendent Union movements in Georgia and else
where. In the North, the honest adherents to the
peculiar doctrines of Seward, Gerritt Smith, Fred
Douglass, and Lucretia Mott, cannot support the
nomination of Scott, because he he's knuckled to
the South. If it is but trick, they say he is dis
honest; and if he is in earnest in his en-
dorsemcnt, be is still but traitor to human
freedom. Hence the various movements in the
North for grand rally of a third party, a third
platform, and third ticket, at the appointed
Pittsburg Convention. There others of the whig
faith who believe that upon the broad ground of
principle, superior qualifications and exalted states
manship, Mr. Webster unjustly and insultingly
set aside for the clap.trap availability of the
fife and drum; and that he was thus set aside by
men who have been among the most brawling dema-
gogues against the "wholesale butcheries Of war;
and in favor Of universal peace; SO hostile to the
taking Of human life that they continue to plead to
this very day, the inhumanity of hanging the most
atrocious murderers. Hence the various indigna-
tion meetings. having for their object the indepen-
dent nomination of Daniel Webster.
In view Of all these difficulties drawbacks, and
ugly proyocations to discord and mutiny is it any
wonder that all the "fuss and feathers" all the
guns, drums, aud bombsbes OF hundred battles
should SO utterly fail TO revive the carnival Of $780,
or the Rough and Ready enthusiasm OF l84S No;
the only wonder is that matters not worse. The
prospect is bad enough, and God only knows what
can be done to mend it, but il might be worse and,
thank God, it may improve. Perhaps the Philadel-
! phia Webster Convention, and the Pittsburg omni-
an gcthGum Convention, may both givea lift to the
wing ticket Georgia, too, may possibly come
right, ind the Boston wings by and by. The soup
may have been a little too hasty-things going
badly, we know, but they may get better Who
| knows Who can tell
TuF CABINET OF Mn. FILLMORE Many rumors
have been circulated touching the pornanency Of