The Hillsdale standard. [volume] (Hillsdale, Mich.) 1851-1909, 1856-08-12

} strain.
: We mean no attack and we make none up
on State rights. We don't believe in th
right of the people in one State to interfer
with slavery in another. We no more be
lieve in the right of New York to unmake
slave in Georgia than the right of Georgia t.
New York and of Georgia must equally de
termine the relations of all within their re
spective limits. But believing that the ter
ritories are under the jurisdiction and subject
to the legislation of the Union; confident
that there can be no peace in any Territory
bordering on a slave State, but by an act Of
Congress declaring tho personal relations Of
its inhabitants, without which civil war is in.
evitable; and believing, moreover, that as is
the Territory so will the State be, we arc
firmly and unalterably opposed to the intro.
duction of slavery into any Territory Of the
United States.
Such is the disordered state Of affairs, un-
der the control of the general government, as
to demand of every citizen the most vigilant
scrutiny and the greatest deliberation. Each
elector throughout the United States has an
important Office to perform at the coming
election; and any neglect to exercise that in
valuable right, or any indifference as to the
manner in which it shall be exercised at cri-
sis like this, is guilty not only of an ordinary
omission ola known duty, but of gross neglia
gence approaching criminaly.
How has it happened that the sham Legis-
lature Of Kansas, elected by the combined in
| fuence of fraud and force, has dared to do
any act bearing even the name oflaw? How
dare such body so abuse the civilization of
the age as to expcl some of the members for
no cause whatever, and pass Q code Of enact
ments which would disgrace q cotincil of saw
agesa Why has the property of tho peacea-
BILE citizens of the Territory been destroyed
their liberty invaded, and their lives wantonly
sacrificed? Why the gangs of marauders
from an adjoining State pervading this Terri
tory? Why the interruption of and abuse to
settlers on their way thither, and the tone of
arrogant defiance and abuse of Atchison,
Stringfellow and their associates, to the Free
State men of Kansas! All this has been
done under the pledge, express or implied Of
the National Administration, that every meas
ure tending to the establishment of slavery
there, and the exclusion of freedom, should
have the hearty cooperation of the Admins
tration- Many other pledges Of this Admin
istration have been broken, but that pledge has
been kept to the letter.
Why has Judge Kane held that slavery so
far exists in the Free States as to allow par
ties of pleasure and Others to invade the Free
States with their retinue of slaves, and there
to hold them in the yoke of servitude- ? Sure
ly, it must be to tutor the Free North into
o slavery WY 6s ice caas az h trade pHs
up in such alarming strength, and been car
ried on by traders residing in the city of New
York during the past year! Why have Mr..
Buchanan and his associates at the Ostend
Conference unblushingly claimed the right in
our Government to take Cuba by force, if it
could not be gained by purchaser Why has
rhe Cincinnati Convention followed up the
Ostend manifesto with the more startling an
nouncement of the duty of thia Government
to exercise protectorate over the whole coun
try bordering on the Gulf of Mexico? Why
have Douglas, Pierce and Buchanan, in sue
cession, become converts to the new doctrine
that the General Government has no power
to control the Territories
Why have the arms of the nation been
thrned to oppress our own citizens9 Why
the subject of slavery agitated by the Presi-
dent, contrary TO his express pledges, and the
treasure Of the nation poured out in profusion
on the supporters of that institution?
These are questions which electors will not |
fail to inquire and answer at the ballot box.
The abusive and indecent cpthets made
use ofby the chief supporters of Mr. Buchan-
an against the friends of Fremont; their d Is
of freedom and encouragement |
of slavery; their abandonment of every dem
ocratic principle, and their devotion to the
most odious Of all oligarchios, must shake the
confidence of the electors in that party, and
make the party itself as desperate in its for
tunes as it is corrupt in its meats for attaining
succoss.
If the spirit Of hostility to our free institu-
tons, manifested by the supporters of Mr..
Buchanan, had been as violent during the
days of Washington, Jefferson and Madison as
it now is, those patriots would have been driv-
en- from their native State from their love of
liberty, and compelled to seek protection
where sentiments in unison with their own
were held sacred.
The attempts of the Buchanan press gen.
orally to msrepreseht the true condition of
affairs in Kansas; their desire to make light
Of the depredatiohs committed by the Nation
Al Administration party against life, liberty
md property; the open applause or silent ac-
luiescence Of the same party in appeals to
brute force, exhibited at the Capitol of the
nation during the present session of Congress;
heir efforts to induce Congress to pass the
,ill concocted by Senators Toombs and Dou-
ylas, containing an ingenious but effective
guarantee of Slavery to Kansas, though per-
erued in with that clamorous assurance and
lictorial air strongly characteristic of gross
yrong-must and shall be thoroughly canvass
ID and exposed. The people will not fail to
tamp such duplicity with meritcd condemna-
ion.
The series of measures terminating in tho
epeal Of the Missouri COMPROMISE, has pro-
ed disastrous to the political prospects of the
and promoters of the scheme, and
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