The Nevada journal., 1858-01-29
Gbe Vebaaa yourual.
FRIDAY MORNING. JAN. 90, 1858

SPEECH -oP SENATOR GREEN OF Mis-
seUKI.-His.quite clearto us that SEN
atersGseaa-ef~ Missouri, more than Sen
ator Douglas abandons in his late great
sneech the entire. principles of popular
sdYereignty. The doctrine he sets forth
diSers'ia nothing from that held by the
statesman of the country before the
ngw-fangled notions embraced, or sup
pesed.to <be embraced, in the Kansas
and Nebraska AIT agitated the Union
fraHaseentre,to circumference. Senator
Green holds that no act of Congress is
necessary before the assembling of a
Constitutional Convention in Kansas to
make. the proceedings of such a body
legal, and produces precedents from the
past to prove his position sound and ra-
tienal. He maintains it is not requisite
to submit the Lecompton Constitution
to. the people, the question of slavery or
freedom alone being sufficient for sub
mission to comply with the requirements
f.the Nebraska Act. AS Senator
Green is a stickler for precedents we
cannot see if the precedents cited are
partly good for proof why they are not
admissible as evidence to their fullest
extent. 1t is, we believe, plain rule
Flaw that if a portion of the testimo-
ny'qf Awitness be taken, the whole is
presumptively good. Senator Green
shows in his speech that some States
have been admitted into the Union
whose Constitutions had not been previ-
ously submitted to the people. He ar
CUES from precedent, therefore, that,
contrary to the opinion of Douglas, no
enabling act Of Congress is necessary or
even preferable. The precedents go
farther and prove that more than one
State has been admitted into the Union
the slavery clause of whose Constitu-
tions had received the sanction of the
people. Had the Lecompton Conven-
tioE made no provision for submitting
even the slavery clause of the Constitu-
tioA framed by them to the people, the
precedents cited by Senator Green
would have been more fully applicable
as they are now but partially so. But,
if we understand the position of the
Senator from Missouri, the submission of
the slavery section to the people, is the
only essential requisite to conform to the
doctrine of popular sovereignty in 9TH
er words, all the hue and cry which has
been raised throughout the land for
years Iast, amounts, when traced TO a
tangible point. to nothing but concern
ing the. temporal welfare of few mis-
orable negroes. Popular sovereignty
is figured down to these contracted linn
its at last. At most then, the great
principles so untiringly extolled by the
Democracy, the right of a people to
form and regulate their domestic institu-
tions in their own way, are, that the
people may vote upon one question alone
in adopting their organic law, and if pre-
cedent, good for me part of the argu-
ment, is to be taken in accordance with
rules of evidence, not even this privi-
lege is vouchsafed to the people, and the
great and so much lauded doctrines of
squatter SOY ereignty have come wholly
TO naught.
Senator Green's argument is, that the
people of Kansas, form their own insti-
tutions in their own way through the
Lecofnpton Convention. They have
chosen not the direct way of vote of
themselves upon the Constitution but
the delegated way as other States have
done. We suppose then, if the Le-
compton Convention had decided not to
submit any. portion of their Constitution
to the people, not even the slavery
clause, it would have been forming the
institutions of Kansas by the people in
their own way within the meaning of
the Nebraska Act, if the position as
sumed by Senator Green be correct.
What then, Judging by Democratic ar
gument do the doctrines of popular SOW
ereignty amount to practicallyl Moth
ing but the repeal of the compromise
line and the. opening up of the terrific
ries north Of it to slavery. The right
of the people in the Territories south OF
thatline to establish or prohibit slavery
was acknowledged before the abolish
ment of the line of compromise, and
therefore nothing has been gained in
that quarter by the passage of the Ne.
braska Act-no,hing at all and it is