Weekly Clarksville chronicle. [volume] (Clarksville, Tenn.) 185?-1857, 1857-10-02

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table from DeBows Review, showing the
great disparity bes=esn themorslso fnatives
and foreigners, In 1850. However lightly
such an expose may be regarded by tina.
party which encourages foreign inmigra-
ton, no good man, Of good sense, can look
gravely at the subject and not see and feel
the necessity for stricter guards around
the ballot.box to restore and preserve its
purity. Unfortunately for the country,
the land marks Of rational liberty have
been broken down by the licencious spirit
of mock democracy, and nowhere else, in
the civilized world, is the power to control
the government taken from those who
have the deepest stake in its stability and
wise administration, and given to those
who have no Fixed interest nothing to
loose by the EXTREMIST radicalism. The
spirit of our institutions, grievously mis-
taken by the million, has been construed
into liccncc bordering upon anarchy,
and the conservatism designed by the
trainers of the government to protect the
solid interests of the country has been
crushed out by the phrenzied lawfessness
of unbridlcd party.
The wisdom that shaped the federal
government, was, in the beginning, stamp
cd upon our State institutions, and whilst
that wisdom marked their progress, the
whole governmental system moved in har-
mony, and law and order and morality
governed our people. But the spirit Of
party gradually diffused itself through the
country, and crept into the administration
Of the government. Demagoguism seized
upon the debasing sentiment as a means
Of working its own vile purposes, and
under the specious, but false, pretext Of
bringing the government nearer to the
people, introduced one innovation after
another until fixed principles are lost sight
Of party is dominant and the people are
its slaves. To reach this point Of political
and moral degradation, has been the work
of more than twenty-five years, and COM
plete, as it is. it could never have been
effected had the ballot-box been guarded
with that jealous vigilance due to it as the
life-spring of republican liberty. Bar
rier after barrier, originally erected for the
preservation of temperate liberty, and the
security of the general welfare, has been
broken down, until the ballot box is open
to all Of every cline and color, and all the
greatintcrcsts of the country--even liberty
itself-are at the mercy of an ignorant,
corrupt and lawless rabblc And, at the
risk of being denounced with all the bit
terness of locofoco wrath, we proclaim the
obvious truth, that popular corruption and
mal-administration have kept evenpace
with the expansion of the right of suf-
frage; and cheerfully would we surrender
that right, to-day, could it be the means
of restricting it to those who have some
thing more than a Migrants interest in the
welfare of the country.
The doctrine was asserted here. during
the canvass for the railroad tax, that the
minority have rights which the majority
should not infringe, and that they who
have the tax to pay, alone have the right
to impose it. Agreed And if the doc
trine be true, of county, it is equally
SO of State, of the Union-the more ex-
tended application of the doctrine work
ing no change in the principle upon which
it is based. And although the theory of
our government allows contrary practice,
there is still a conservative element in
natural, as well as political justice which
proclaims that those who own no property
have no inherent right to tax those who
do. This doctrine was once recognized by
all the States, and so long as twas adhered
to, ruinous State debts and oppressive taxa
ton were unknown. . ae.
But burdensomc taxes are among the
least of tn evils growing out of the practice
of giving 10 an irresponsible rabble the
power t, th'Sart the wishes and defeat the
policy of those whose especial interest it
is so to shape the government as to secure
the greatest good to the greatest number,
The same needless and unenlightencd mass
who have no interest in the protection of
property, have as little interest in the selec-
ton of officers competent and willing to
foster all the branches of industry, and to
preserve, intact, those rights and princi-
pies which underlie our system of govern
ment. This mistaken policy is the hot