The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1856-09-13
Slavery and Democracy.

his party must be either Indifferent to or I'M
we suspect will his partizans North or South,
admit to be true; and therefore the statement
was time subservient declaration to delude
men with free State sympsthies 1t was
gross peryersion of a fact, unworthy Of a candi-
date for the Vice Presidency of the United
States The Buchanan party is not only pro
slavery, bat slave propagandism is its leading
feature, it's distinguishing doctrine. What
distinguishes it from either of the other par
ties but its ultra pro-slavery doctrines-its un-
scrupulous devotion to the interests of slavery?
Not content to admit it to be, as all former
patriots have-an unfortunate, irremediabe
evil, inflicted by former age upon the coun-
try, which must be dealt with according to
the remedies and provisions of the Constitu-
ton, and left to time and the progress OF events
to eradicate,-but they outrage all our moral
conFictions-all our sentiments Of human
rights-all the recognized principles of civil
government, and insult our common sense, not
only in the fippant speeches Of stump canvass
ers, and the crude, unconsidered paragraphs
of newspapers, but in formal essays, deliberate
discussions, and in the solemn lectures and
sermons of their partzans notice of one of
which from Virginia Professor we copy upon
our outside page. We commend it to the at
tentive consideration of all free laboring men
in slave or free States. IF the doctrines of the
Professor as reported and so earnestly approx
ed by the leading organ Of the Buchanan par
ty, from which we take it, be true, freedom
is curse and slavery blessing to laboring
men. The principles, as laid down, make no
discrimination between white and black labor;
and will justify the slavery of one as well as
the other. Are these the doctrines to be sus-
tanned by the free, unterrifed Democracy Of
Indiana? Can these be the sentiments OF the
rank and. file of the Old Line Democracy, that
has through all it's mutations had the interests
of the laboring man so much at heart, and
professed to fight for his rights in all the con-
tests, in the political forum, between capital and
labor?
AS this psuedo Democracy processes to rely
on the labogiHg masses for its strength, and is
appealing to the honest Irish and German
emigrants whose only capital is in the strength
of their brawny arms and an honest name, =
we propose to improve the present chance to
say few words, for the benefit of those who
live by the sweat of their brow, on the nfu-
ence Of slavery on free labor, treating it merely
as a question of economics, without partizan
bias, or partizan allusion.
What is slavery? 1t is the subjugaton and
possession Of human labor by capital-it is
property in human labor, and the right to con-
troll and direct it, and take its products or re-
wards What is the natural relations Of free
labor and capital? They are antagonstic;
each is struggling for the possession and con-
troll Of the other. Providence in balancing the
moral and physical forces in the universe, has
placed labor and capital in opposite scales;-
labor needs capital for its support and capital
can't make any profits without human labor
to help it reproduce itseG A dollar will re-
main dollar, till it is invested IN labor and is
reproduced in new form Of greater value
Without labor capital is dead and worthless
to the owner it is burthen; for the amount
which each man can use himself is very small;
man may cultivate twenty acres Of land with
his own hands; he may tend one loom and a
spinning jenny-he may employ $4,000 in
merchandise, and perhaps be his own clerk,
buyer, salesman and porter, but not more; and
If he could command no more labor than his
own hands. all lis other lands, machinery, or
money would be useless and improbable to
him. Capital therefore to be of value must be
used by labor; but as il has the means Of sup
plying all human wants it possesses vast
powers Free labor is its only opponent and
rival; the free and more Independent labor is
the greater its power to keep its antagonist in
check and under control. The faster capital
is increased and distributed the more indepen-
dent liz labor rendered, and the power of capi-
tai diminished But let capital subjugate la
bor-take labor as its property-make it its
slave, and it becomes at once an unlimited
unchecked, irresponsible power, that nothing
on eaz4A can control. 1t is tyranny that
grows on what 1t feeds. Absorbing to itself
all the creations Of labor, gaining new power
and strength by every victim its subjugates, it
VIII roonOpOlise the eonntry, and reduce it to