New-York daily tribune., 1855-08-29
DOUGHFACEs, OR DOE-FACEs

DOUGHFACEs. OR DOE-FACEsi
mmediately after the adoption in the House
of Representatives at Washington of the Mis-.
ouri Compromise, reported by committee Of
conference to whom the disagreeug action Of
the House and Senate as to the admission Of
Maine and Missouri had been referred, John
Randolph rose in his place aud denounced that
compromise as dirty bargain, and the eighteen
men by whose votes it had been carried as
doughfaces," or doe faces. Randolph held to
the doctrine, first started on occasion of the
Missouri question, that Congress has no power
to restrict the spread of Slavery. He was too
henest and honorable to foresee, or to oppose if
he had foreseen, the reputation of the fraud
so naturally fallen upon by such men as Pierce,
Cass and Douglas He was therefore anxious
to keep the case open and to prevent its settle
ment by any such compromise as was actually
sdopted-a compromise by which the slsvehold-
ers got Missouri, to be sure, but were excluded,
in express terms and by solemn engagement,
to which their Representatives in Congress con-
sented by voting for 1t, from all the territory
north and west of that new State-that IL to say
from Kansas and Nebraska.
Speaking Of the eighteen Northera men by
whose votes that Compromise was carried
against the resolution of the great body of the
Northern Representatives that Missouri should
not be admitted except as a Free State" They
" got scared, he said; "they saw their dough
" faces (or doe faces, were frightened and voted
"against restriction" What was the epithet
really used by Randolph on this OCCASION and in
what precise sense he used it, soon became
matter of newspaper discussion, as will appear
by the following extract from The Boston DAILY
AdrtrttSr of June ~, 1920 date wi:hia less
than three months from SIR. RaudOphs first use
of the epithet in question. Judging by tho
present state Of the case, the authority of The
Boston Adrertisr would seem to be very weighty
as to the term employed and the sense In which
it was used. At that time, however, il could not
speak experimentaly, not having yet joined the
party, nor indeed did it do more than merely
tate the question:
"Doughfaces orDoe.f fdces.-The appellation applied
by Mr.. Randolph to the gentlemen who we're fright
,ned into the vote which they gave 0n the Mlssodn
question who looked in the glass and we're scared az
their own doughfaces,' has been the subject Of a
variety of commentaries. A Baltimore writer will
have il that he alluded to prank common amoag
children of making by the aid OF the cook-maid Q
doughface by which their features are concealed
10 frighten their comfades and which is sometimes
made 80 hdeous that when they look IN the glass
they are themselves frightened. Others maintain that
he merely alluded to the property of dough OF being
capable of being nodded into any shape OF feature
that one would wish, without any resistance on the
part Of the material wrought upon; Others that no
alluded 10 the psllid hue of unbaked psstry IN dis-
tincton from the beautiful brown of that which Is ht
for use Others again, with more plausiby thaI the
aluson was to q very common figure OF speech oy
which pepon Of dull intellect is designated come.
times ia direct terms, such one is dough-head!
and sometimes by penpbias as such one oas
half baked, or was set too near tue mouth VI
the oven. Others again, with some sloS ot reason,
contend that the orhOgaphy OF the expression quoted
is not correct. They saw their oyn doe faces and
were scared is in allusion TO the tnidity Of the
doe, which shrinks alarmed from us own lnase IS
fected in the water. Which OF the various nterpre'
tations is the true is most generally received,
we will not venture to determine. We only add re-
mark of writer in The Connecticut Journal, when
seems to be not entirely inappropriate; Dough 1as
been before the subject OF allusion though III al-
ferent manner, in Christening very great proni5acy
and delinquency. "Ephraim," says the propne'
Hosea, sis a cake not turned The old commen-
tator Matthew Henry thus explains the passage
." Ephraim is cake not turned, and so Is burned on
oie side and dough on the other, but gcod ioI
"nothng on either side" Now this seems not
bad picture Of representative who could make
speech to the beat ot his aDllty hedinot pia,Gy.
and then vote to admit Missouri as slayeholdnS
State"
We are not aware that Mr.. Randolph hlmsen
ever gave any explanation Of the true orsaog-
raphy of the term which he employed, or OF the
precise sense in which no used il. Probably no
was willing to allow it to be taken in oil 'ho
enses suggested, according to the difference
umors and f.ncies; trusting, like a good rheto'
, ician as he was, chat each person would under
tand it in the sense that seemed to him mos'
forcibly coptemptuous. Backed up, however
by quotation from Hosea, as explained Oy
Matthew Henry's Commentary upon H. 'o'
spelling doughface" and the idea Of " dough
"hcad have pretty generally prevailed a''n9
true orthOgrapby and real meaning ofan ePlIne'
so essential at the present moment to our PO'
litical vocabulary.