Lynchburg daily Virginian. [volume] (Lynchburg [Va.]) 1852-1861, 1855-04-12
The Democratic leaders and the Know Moth
ings

The Democratic leaders and the Know Moth
ings.
The outcry raised by the leaders of the De
mocracy is intended and calculated to draw q
way the minds of the people from fact in th'
history of the American Party, which is wei
worth bearing in mind, by all who favor the yiew'
of that party, and especially those members of il
who are Of Democratic antecedents. This fact
is that while the American Party is now and for
the purposes of the present canvass IN direct an
tagonism with the Democratic phalan1' 1t is So
not because it was Designed in It's institutions 10
be so not because there is anything IN ats broad
assertion Of great truths OF free government and
national policy to make it So, nor yet. because
of il, being composed OF persons hostile to Dem
ooratic faith-but for another reason. 1t is be-
cause the leaders of that party, The wire pullers'
have made it SO. The American Order was a
blow aimed. not at any set of political principles
formerly held. as sueh--but al party leaders and
party tactics.
We undertake to speak of the Order only as
we understand it. To us its seminal principles
seems to BE-. en- franehistmtnt Of the PEOPLE from
the stern dictatorship of caucus. The national
mind is deeply imbued with the great idea OF self
government, and cannot long allow itself to be
dispossessed of that lofty franchise. For years
it has been practically in allegiance Demagog-
uism the prolific parent Of the whole brood of
isms. has been too much master. Intrigue,
and cabal have forestalled public judgment, ond
the cards have been stocked upon all occasions
Did any ten men in America dream of Mr.. Polk
for the presidency down to the day of his nomi-
a.. - IL ,,lr
General Pierce the httest person for that Office
month before the Convention met. which virtually
elected him. Was Mr.. Wise ever or is he now
the preference of one tenth part Of the Virginia
Democracy for the nomination he has obtained!
The in strumentaties through which this rule of
wire-workers was obtained, were as various as
the Proean forms of prejudice and lntesest-Rs
diverse as human passions. Against these IN
strumentalities and those who use them, the ma
tiona heart has begun to beat with indignant pull
ses-and the American Party is The expression
of that mighty indignation.
Among the most conspicuous means which
have long been used for making the FREQ aenh-
ments of the people, subserYicnt 10 the purposes
of interested schemes. have been those great an
settled masses of political wcight-the foreign
vote and the Catholic vote. That they havoheen
courted by politicians Of all parties, aud have
been able often to turn the scale IS undcnablc;
and this fact was enough to arouse that indignant
rebuke TO those who used them, and ~ the means
themselves, which VIC arc behoding with wonder.
The American feeling being Il form of pure pa,r
otsm uninhuenced by disturbing forces, and
tending, first in the direction of the greatest ahu
4 L. q.
of party issues, and the order is maintained by
men of all parties alike. Of chose who have stood
aoof. some have disapproved the form given 10 an
expression of national feeling in which they cor
dially concurred- some have looked upon it as
submcrging questions which they considered of
higher import, some have been influenced 10y the
sentiment of party fidelity, some have dlsscntcd
from mistaken conceptions of the thing itself;
and others neither few nor backward, from SELF
interest
The origin of the American teelng is to be
found away down, deeper in tive national heart
than the party questions of former times. 1t is
discoyerable among, and comminglcd with those
axioms of self government promulgated as the
Basis Principles Of the new party. Axioms which
certain Democratic politicians are pleased to-
style 'unmeaninE eeneraities.' Cnmeaning
they may be 10 the comprehension OF those,
whose purpose il suits to call them so-but the
sudden and far reaching popularity of the order
demonstrates. Us with n tongue of fire. TINT 10 tho
hearts and mind, of the peef'e, they have deep
signifcancy. How else shall be explained the
prodigious cc,cri,y which ha> chorae teriLed its
rise, and progress rs
"witbeye AZ Iyns ami car n sag,
And 80, rlaU like t,e sosw-"
il has traycrsed the continent signing to the
shades of reluctant privacy many a ranung
Cleon.
The American party being thus, by the philos-
ophy of its existence, remedial, all who were