The true Democrat., 1855-10-30

stitution cannot be politically criminal, and cannot but think that all political organizations that have for their object the political proscrp- tion ofmen for the conscientious discharge of religious duties, wholly disconnected with po- litics, are wrong in principle and tend to the subversion of the government.
 The hope and the expectancy, nay, the very safety of the government is in the separation of the political from the religious power, and so sensible were the framers of the constitu- tion that this should be done, that they exprss- ly declared that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or pro- hlbiting the free exercise thereof, and that no religious test shall ever be required as qualii- cation to any office of public trust under the United States. If this principle, as declared in the constitution, is correct, 1t ought not to be lost sight of any more by the people than by their Representatives ill Congress, and should be held as sacred and be as strictly observed by the voters, at the ballot-box, as by those whom they select to make their laws Unless this be the case, the people at the polls might de- clare that religious test should be required as qualification for office, while their Repre- sentatives in Congress would feel themselves restrained from carrying out their will by the the above provisions Surely it cannot he de- sirable-it cannot be wse-it is not patriotic in any political organization to stimulate action so opposite in it's character between the Repre- sentative and his constituents, and especially when the security of our religious as we'll as our civil rights are endangered by the con- tict.
 But why was 1t that the framers of the con- stitution inserted these provisions? Was itnot that they foresaw that religious strife would unite itself with political, and that sooner or later one of the contending factions would get the control of the government and use it to the utter destruction of all who opposed them or differed with them on questions of religion? They knew the pronencss of men, however en- lightened when stimulated by sectaran zeal,
 10 press their peculiar tenets to the utmost ex- tremes, and to hold as enemies deserving even death itself such as opposed their views or stood in the way of the accomplishment of their sec taran purposes. The bloody statutes of Hen- ry VIII. and of Mary were familiar to them and they saw, without the protection which the organic law would afford them, their own fate foreshadowed in the death of thousand martyrs who freely gave up their lives for their religion, and who preferred to suffer the most cruel punishment rather than surrender the right of worshipping God according to the dic-
 
 which seeks now to prescribe men for religious opinions is the same which then dragged them victims to the altar and would now as then break them upon the rack or burn them at the stake but for the protection which the consttu- tion affords them.
 This spirit, in his judgment, should not be en- couraged, and it is the duty 1t is the interest of all patriots and good men not only not to encourage it, but to use their utmost efforts to suppress 1t; for it cannot be forgotten that in the mutations of all human affairs, those who are III power and the prosecutors of the weak to-day may themselves be weak and persecut- ed tomorrow. For in these cases,
 '' We have judgment here; that We but teach
 Bloody instructions, which being tpugh; return
 To plague the inventor: This even handed Justice Commands the ingredients of our poisoned vhtlice To our own lips"
 But without elaborating these questions, lie would return to the great question between the north and south. He had shown that the Ame- rican party north had adopted the freesoil and abolition platform, and that the American par ty south, although sound on the subject of sla- very, had no power to help the country or to prevent the governments falling into the hands of its worst enemies the .abolitionists No par ty cou save the county who could not take from the heesol and abolition party some of the northern or free Staes-lor if, as he had before shown, all the free States vote together. they not only exceed the slave States in num- ber but have majority of from forty to fifty over them in the electoral college That the American party south can get none of the free States unless it abandons its pro-slaverv plat form, none will contend. That it can or ever will abandon this platform none can believe. What can the democratic party do? has it a na- tInp ,lntf T T lIr- reaching from Maine to California and a party standing on that platform from one end of the Union to the other? If any one doubts she points exultingly to the recent election in Maine and says, behold the triumph of national men standing on the democratic platform over abolitionists, freesoiers, and all the other vile factlonists that have lifted up their infamous hands In opposition to the constitution and of the Union. She points you to the national plat form put forth by the democratic State conven- ton of Massachusetts, to that adopted by the democratic Hard Shells of New York-to the able and patriotic address of the democratic central committee of Pennsylvania, to the re- solutions of the democratic State convention of lndiana-and then she points to her Cass of Mich., to her Douglass, of H., to her Bright, of Indiana, to her Toucey, of Conn.,, to her Jones and her Dodge, of Iowa, to her Thomp- son of New Jersey, her Broadhcad, of Penn sylvania, and to her Gwynn and her Weller of California, and says these are the men who in the Senate of the United States risked all for the Kansas and Nebraska bill the Union and national principles, and now stand at the gate that opens to the temple of freedom as faith full sentlnels with flaming swords to hew in pieces the northern vandals that would destroy the Union. She may not be able to unite suf- ctr int tb., cr,n Ctoto abolition and freesol candidates for President of the United States, but she has platform on which to stand, and men of stout hearts and stalwart arms to wield the falchion in defense of the constitution and of national principles. The American party south has no such plat form in the free States and no such men to de- fend it.
 And now, said he, it could not be disguised from the most common observer that the coun- try was rapidly approaching a most fearful crisis. l he contest must be between the aboiitiOniSts freesoilers and Know Nothings of the north, and the national men of all parties and of all the States. What the result will be none can tell. It may be the involving the country in all the horrors of civil war, the dissolution of the Union of the States and the extinguish- ment of the fires which our ancestors kindled on the altar of freedom and which they fondly hoped would burn there in unextnguishable glory forever. At such a time the country re- Juires every man to do his duty and it will re- quire the united efforts of every national man to save her. Her voice comes, borne upon eve- ry wind in mingled accents of sorrow and de- spair, crying help, help me, my children, ere perish beneath the dark wave of faction and fa- naticism which is threatening to engulf me- She calls on the freesolers and aboltionists of the north, and their response is borne on the gales of faction, Perish, we owe you noth- ing!" She calls upon the Know Nothing par ty in the free States, and they but echo the re- spone of their twin sisters, abolitonsm and freesoilism, and cry, Perish, perish, or give up the institution of slavery"
 She calls upon the American party south, but alas!' they cry, i've are too weak to help