New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1858-01-26

The Washington Union asserts that I" there Is not
county court in all this Union which s not called
% upon to decide questions from month to month
" of more practical Importance than that which IS
- involved IN the Territorial issue now before the
Z" country" This extraordinary assertion is based
upon the preliminary statement that there is in re-
atty in the Kansas question: as noc stands, not
" one element of the old Slavery quarrel" There
being nothing of the Slavery question left in refer
ence to Kansas, The Union regards all the other
questions that have originated there as below the
level of county court discussions.
Now we are not disposed to belttle the import
ance of the question whether or not Slavery should
be fixed upon the Territory and State Of Kansas;
yet at the same time we are far from conceding
that this question of Slave State or not has been
the only great issue, or even the main issue IN
vOlyed in the Kansas controversy. In fact, from
the course which things have taken in Kansas,
the question of Slave State or not has, from the
beginning, become entirely subordinate to another
and preliminary question of the highest interest
and importance question which still remains to
be disposed of. Decidedly as the people OF Kansas
have objected to the introduction of Slavery among
them they have all along objected, and we in their
behalf have objected not less decidedly, to the
means employed to bring about that result. The
J"iv~ s..-rt. that the project and the hope OF in.
Producing Slavery into Kansas have been abandoned;
yet at the very same time, in advocating the impo-
sition Of the LecomptOn Constitution upon the
people of that Territory it undertakes, and would
have the Administration and the Democratic party
undertake to ndOrse and uphold all the means and
procedures uDsuccessuly resOrted to for the accom-
plshment of that end. The people of Kansas have
complained not merely that if has been attempted
to force Slavery upon them, but that rs means
of accomplishing that object, they have had forced
upon them Territorial Legislature chosen for them
by Border Ruffian invaders, and have been COM
PEELED to submit to a code OF laws enacted by that
| intrusive Legislatures code of which some of
the more important provisions have been designed
to uphold and perpetuate the original usurpation,
and to deprive the majority of the inhabitants of
any control over the affairs of the Territory. The
people Of Kansas have not merely complained of
| the attempt to fix Slavery upon them. They have
complained not less loudly that they have been the
victims of conspiracy between the Federal Gov
eminent at Washington, the Slave interest and the
| Border Rufians TO impose upon them legislators
F! and laws without their consent and in spite Of
! their protests The Lecompton Constitution is the
| embodiment and final result of this conspiracy
| against the rights of the people of Kansas. The
| question whether Kansas shall be admitted under
| that Constitution is not as The Union would pre-
tend question Z" about the construction of laws"
/ -, "a ha ofhpr hand auastion a. IN yhat
makes law-whether the consent of the governed,
regularly expressed through the ballOt-box or the
acts of pretended Legislatures beginning in violence
and sustained by fraud. 1t is question whether,
in the future legislation of Territories and their
erection into States, the voice of the majority is to
count for anything, or whether outsiders shall be
encouraged to interfere and Federal officers shall
be not only encouraged but required to give their
countenance and support to violence and fraud.
| For Congress to admit Kansas into the Union
| under the Lecompton Constitution would be the
| contamination of that policy which successfully
| removed Reeder. Geary Wslker and Stanton from
J the Government of that Territory merely because
they refused to become instruments for keeping the
administration Of IFS affairs by of frauds, in
| the hands of minority. Shall it be adopted as
| principle, by the Democratic party that violence
| fraud and external aid can suffice to make up d
deficiency of votes, and to give TO small minority
the right 10 make laws and constitutions for the
| majority Such is the question involved in the
| admission of Kansas under the LecOmptOn COnst
tution-a question, it seems to us, whatever TAe
Union may think about il, Of rather more import.
apce than those which come ordinarily before
county courts-a question even of not less import
ance than that of Slavery itself.
On Tuesday last. in the Federal House OF Repre-.