The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-03-11

presence of the curious visters at the seat of
Government, whom the dullness of a judicial in
vestigation could not disgust. The Court did not
hesitate to please the incoming President, by
Selling this extraneous and idle forensic discus
sion, and converting it into an occasion for pro-
nouncing an opinion that the Missouri prohibi-
ton was void, and that by force of the Consti-
tuition, Slavery existed with ali the elements OF
property in man over man, in all the Territories
of the United States, paramount to any popular
sovereignty within the Territories, and even to
the authority of Congress ITSELF
In this i'll omened act, the Supreme Court for
got its own dignity, which had always been
maintained with just judicial jealousy. They for
got that the province of a court is simply "j,4s
deere" and not at all "jus dare" They forgot,
also, that one foul sentence does more harm than
many foul examples for the last do but corrupt
the stream, while the former corrupteth the foun-
tain" And they and the President alike forgot
that judicial usurpation is more odious and
intolerable than any other am0ng the manifold
practices of tyranny.
The day of Inauguration came-the first one
among all the celebrations of that great national
pageant that was to be desecrated by a coalition
between the Executive and Judicial departments,
to undermine the National Legislature and the
liberties of the people. The President, attended
by the usual heightened procession, arrived and
attended him there, In robes which yet exacted
public reverence. The people, unaware of the i'm
port of the whisperings carried on between the
President and the Chief Justice, and imbued with
veneration for both, filled the avenues and gar
dens far away as the eye could reach. The Pres
ident addressed them in words as bland as those
which the worst of all the Roman Emperors pro-
nounced when he assumed the purple. He an
nounced vaguely, indeed, but with self-satisfac-
tom the forthcoming extra judicial exposition of
the Constitution, and pledged his submission to it
as authoritative and final. The Chief Justice and
his Associates remained silent. The Senate, too,
were INSTRUMENTATION witnesses of the trans
fer of administration. They too were silent,
although the promised usurpatOn was to subvert
the authority over more than half of the empire
which Congress had assumed contemporaneously
with the birth Of the nation, and had exercised
without interruption for near seventy years. 1t
cost the President, under the circumstances little
exercise of magnanimity now to promise to the
people of Kansas, on whose neck he had, with
the aid of the Supreme Court, hung the milestone
of Slavery, fair trial in their attempt to cast it
off, and hurl it to the earth, when they should
come to organize State Government Alas
that even this cheap promise, uttered under such
great solemnities, was only made to be broken !!
The pageant ended. On the 9TH of March, the
Judges, without even exchanging their silken
robes for courtiers' gowns, paid their salutatiors
to the President, in the Executive Palace Doub =
lessy the President received them as graciously
as Charles the First did the Judges who had at
his instance subverted the statutes of English
Liberty On the 9th of March, the Supreme Court
dismissed the negro sutton, bred Scott, to return
to his bondage and having thus disposed of that
private action for an alleged private wrong, on
the ground of want of jurisdiction in the case
they proceeded with amusing Solemnity to pro-
nounce the opinion, that if they had had such
jurisdiction, still the unfortunate negro would
have had to remain in bondage, unrelieved, be-
cause the Missouri prohibition violates rights of
general property involved in Slavery, paramount
to the authority of Congress. A few days later
copies of this opinion were multiplied by the
Senate's press, and scattered in the name of the
Senate broadcast over the land, and their publ
cation has not yet been disowned by the Senate
Simultaneously, bred Scott, who had played the
hand of dummy in this interesting political game,
unwittingly, yet to the complete satisfaction of
his adversary, was voluntarily emancipated and
thus received from his MASTER as a reward, the
freedom which the Court had denied him as
right.
The new President of the United States, hav-
ing organized this formidable judicial BATTERY at
the Capitol, was now ready to begin his active
demonstrations of intervention in the Territory
Here occurred, not new want, but old one
revived-a Governor for Kansas. Robert J. Walk
er, born and reared in Pennsylvania, a free State
but long citizen and resident of Mississippi, a
slave State, eminent for talent and industry, de-
voted TO the President and his party, plausible
and persevering, untiring and efficient, seemed
just the man to conduct the fraudulent inchoate
proceedings of the projected Lecompton Conven-
ton to a conclusion, by dividing the friends of
Free Labor in the Territory, or by casting upon
them the responsibility of defeating their own
favorite policy by impracticabiity and contu-
macy. He wanted for this purpose only an army
and full command of the Executive excheauer of
promises of favor and of threats of punishment.
Frederick P. Stanton, of Tennessee, honorable
and capable, of persuasive address, but honest
ambition, was appointed his Secretary The new
agents soon found they had assumed task that
would tax all their energies and require all their
adroitness. On the one side, the Slave Labor
party were determined to circumvent the people,
and secure, through the Lecompton Convention,
a slave State On the other, the people were
and determined not to be circumvented,
and in no case to submit Elections for dele
gates to that body were at hand. The Legisla-
ture had required census and registry of voters
to be made by authorities designated by itself,
and this duty had been only partially performed in
fifteen of the thirty-four counties, and altogether
omitted in the other nineteen. The party OF Slave
Labor insisted on payment of taxes as a cond-
ton Of suffrage The Free Labor party deemed
the whole proceeding void by reason of the usurp-
alton practiced, and of the defective arrange
ments for the election. They discovered design
to surprise in the refusal of any guaranty that the
Constitution, when framed, should be submitted
to the people, for their acceptance or rejection,
preparatory to application under it for the ad-
mission of Kansas into the Union. The Govern
dra WIN frop, no Of tbo
ecutive at his command, made due exhibitions
of the army and threatened the people with
an acceptance of the Lecompton Constitution,
however obnoxious to them, if they should
refuse to vote. With these menaces he Judi
cously mingled promises of fabulous quantities
of land for the endowment of roads and educa-
ton. He dispensed with the test oaths and taxes,
lamented the defects of census and registry, and
promised the rejection of the Constitution, by him
self, by the President, and by Congress, if full,
fair, and complete submission of the Constitution
should not be made by the Convention and he
obtained and published pledges of such submits
sion by the party conventions which nominated
the candidates for delegates, and even by an i'm
posing number of those candidates themselves.
The people stood aloof, and refused to vote The
army protected the polls. The Slave Labor party
alone voted, and voted without legal restraint,
and so achieved an easy formal success by cast
ing some two thousand ballots.
Just in this conjuncture, however, the term of
three years service which the usurping Legisla-
ture had fixed for its own members expired,
and elections, authorized by itself, were to be
held, for the choice, not only of new members,
but of Delegate to Congress. While the Lee
compton Convention was assembling, the Free
Labor party determined to attend these Terri
torlal elections, and contest, through them, for
self-government within the Territory They mt
candidates in nomination, on the express ground
OF reputation of the whole Lecompton proceed
ing. The Lecompton Convention prudently ad-
iOurned to a day beyond the elections The