Daily American organ., 1856-03-05
WHOLE NO. 412.
From the Louisville Journal.
The American Platform.

June last. We repubish it to-day. OF course all
our readers will give it their best attention.
We are anxious to learn from Washington whe-
ther the delegates to the Council from all sections
of the country are willing TO stand upon this plat
form. Our own opinion from the partial conside-
ration have been able to give to the subject is
that they can do SO with perfect propriety and
without any abandonment Of principle. We should
have preferred the platform Of last June but We
are well aware that the Americans of the North
felt themselves constrained ii not by their own
convictions, by knowledge Of the public scnti
ment Of their section, to insist on n modification
Of it. The present platform Is unquestonaby as
great concession on the part of the North as our
Northern friends could possibly make and maintain
themselves at home.
1t is as said yesterday, identical in substance
with platform which very distinguished Soutk-
ern man proposed in June, and which the great
mass of the Northern delegates were at that time
unwilling TO accept. IL constitutes, in our opin-
ion, a fair compromise, good and sound basis for
the naturalization OF the American party Of the
whole country. Slill if the Americans of the South
choose TO fight the battle upon the old platform,
We shall be with them heart and soul rejoicing at
the same time that the Northern Americans have
conceded so much more than they have been vii.
ling TO concede hitherto. The new platform yields
far very far more to the South than was yielded
by our staunch New York friends in their Bing-
and yet we were all disposed to regard those reso.
lutions as NATIONAL aud We all exulted in the grand
victory that was won under the banner upon which
they were inscribed .....
The fifth and tenth sections Of the new platform
as follows g.sr @
" 9Th. No person should be selected forpoIiticaI
station (whether OF native or foreign birth who
recognises any allegiance or obligation Of any de-
scnption to any foreign prince, potenate, or power
or who refuses to recognise the Federal and State
Constitu ions (each within its sphere) as paramount
to all other laws, as rules of political action I,
10th. Opposition to any union between Church
aud State, no interference with religious faith or
worship, and no test oaths for Office, except those
indicated in the 9Th section OF this platforms"
We regard this change as entirely judicious and
right. provision precisely similar was proposed
at the Philadelphia Council in June, and we, MS an
outsider were warmly in favor of it, and it was
supported by the whole of the Kentucky delega-
tion, and by large majority of all the delegates
from the South. 1t would have been adopted be-
yond all question but for the jealous and vehement
opposition of prominent delegate from North
Carolina.
The fifth and tenth sections of the new platform
express in our opinion all that il is necessary to
express. Roman Catholics are not named, but it
is proposed whilst abstaning from all interference
with religious faith or worship, and opposing any
union OF Church and State, to support no man for
political station who recognises any allegiance or
obligation of any description whatever to any for
eign prince, potentutc, or power. We all know
that the members Of the Roman Catholic Church,
almost universally, whether they acknowledge it
or not, recognise allegiance and obligation to the
Pope of Rome. Under the operation of this Sec
tion of the platform the members of the American
party WILL as rule oppose the election of Roman
Catholics TO Office; and yet, if at any time or in
any place they, or any portion of them shall be
convinced in regard to any particular member Of
the Catholic Church that he recognises no allegi-
TO the Pope, they win be left at perfect Kber
ty to nominate and support linn. The whole cry
of religious intolerance will Of course be sienced
by the new platform, for no man will dare to say
that the fifth and tenth sections are unjust or
wrong. #l ...#nm
The 18th section Of the new platform is in these
words:
"l2th. The maintenance and enforcement of all
laws until said laws shall be repeale /, or shall be
declared null and void by competent judicial au-
thority."
Here direct ground is taken against the action of
Massachusetts and Connecticut in opposition tothe
execution ofthe Fugitive Slave law The Democratic
organs of the South have charged increasingly that
the American party Of Massachusetts, and Connect
cut passed the laws to annul the Fugitive Slave act
yet hero we find the American party of the North
endorsing the declaration that all the laws of the
General Governments must be maintained ard cn.
forced until either repealed or declared null and
void by competent judicial authority. The Amer
leans of the North boldly array themselves against
the Nulifiers i'll their section, and concede what
the South has right TO demand. This is we'll
The sixth and seventh sections of the new plat
form as follows:
18th. The unqualified recognition and mainte.
nance OF the reserved rights of the several States,
and the cultivation of harmony and fraternal good
al 4
to this end, non-interference by Congress with
questions appertaining solely to the individual
States, and non-intervention by each State with
the affairs of any other State. EE
"7th. The recognition of the right Of the ma
tive-born citizens of the United States permanently
residing in any Territory thereof, to frame their
constitution and laws and TO regulate their demes-
tic and social affairs in their own mode subject
only To the provisions Of the Federal Constitulou
with the right Of admission into the Union when.
ever they have the requisite population for one
Representative in Congress. ProVidsd aitcays that
none but those who citizens OF the United
States under the constitution and laws thereof and
who have fixed residence III any such Territory,
ought TO participate in the formation Of consti-
tution or in the enactment of laws for said Terri
tory or State" #
The whole country should be gratiiied to find
in this clear, distinct and msquivocal recogni.
| ton of the great principle which for nearly tw1
years has been the main and almost exclusive mat
ter Of discussion between the North and the South
the great principle that the nativeborn and natu.
rallied citizens of the United States, residing per-
manently in any Territory, have right to frame
their constitution and laws, and to regnlate their
domestic and social affairs in their mode, sub
ject only to the requirements Of the Federal Con-
stitution, and that they have right Of admission
into the Union, whenever their numbers arc sufli-
cient, with just such constitution as they may
have chosen to frame. No form Of words could be
devised repudiating more clearly the doctrines Of