The Washington union., 1858-03-23
WASHINGTON CITY.
rUEsDAY MORNING. MARCH "a. lsss.
THE ACT AND IT'S CONsEQUENCES-L us LOOK
AT THEM.


THE ACT AND IT'S CONSEQUENCES US LOOK
1t is conceded on all hands that the great contro-
versy which has arisen between the democratic party
on the one side, and the republican party, ON the
other, concerning the government of Kansas is
about drawing TO close 1t has been quite
four yeara since this struggle commenced. AT its
very beginning all effort was made by the "rcpob
cans to give it purely sectional character and it
must be confessed that, to great extent in mere
political sense, they hnve succeeded. caretd re-
view of the real matter involved in the dscoses
in reality no point of contact between the North and
the South When the Territory was organized in
1854, the republicans seized upon the act of Con-
gress providing for its government, and declared
everywhere that it contemplated the subjugaton Of
tho country to slavery. II was treated as delib-
crate purpose to create slavery by virtue OF the act
IL declared to be apoltical enterprise looking d
recy acontrol ofthe shareholders and to comforting
upon them all power necessary to shape the ;rsttu-
tions Of the future State they might desire. We
met these fraudulent and fasn accusations with the
positive declaration, which imbodied in the or
ganc law ITSELF that it the intention of Congress-
Ksnssz perfectly free to form and regulate their po-
litical institutions in their own way. We told
them again and again, thnt power earth
had ever created and sustained slavery in opposi
ton to the will Of the people where it was proposed
We poiated them to the past, which teaches uni
versal lesson on the subject and in all which
there is not instance in the history of any inde-
pendent State, that the people thereof have not
ercised for or against slavery, supreme control We
denied that it even possible to bring on a po-
cal controversy on the subject in Kansas, which
could have the least effect for or against the exist
ence Of that relation, in the future State Like every
other country Of the great West it was open to
emigration and settlement; and 80, quarrel as we
might about il in Congress, while we were speaking
protesting and eliminating, the pioneers who were
working their way to their new homes, in fact held
the solution Of the problem in their own hands.
The republicans knew this as well as we did. They
knew too that in the whole affair there was not one
shade Of politcs-that all their efforts prevent the
Iegalizaton Of slavery would be fruitless and una
vailng that while they talking, the people of
the new country were deciding the question accord
ing to their own notions ofpropriety and interest
What the republicans wanted, what they were
lighting for. what they expected and all they hoped
for to get the credit amongst the northern peo-
pie Of haring prercntsd The establishment Of arery IN
Kansas. Their effort was to get credit for doing what
alone the peopleof Kansas could do. BY this means
they would be able, by system of fraud and mis-
representation, to establish and maintain that they
had overthrown the southern States of the Union in
prcconcertcd effort political in its nature and
means, to create and bring into the Union another
slave State. Fixing this theory in the minds of the
northern people, it is easy to see that rivalry and
antagonism of sentiment and exertion between the
North and the South would follow There ,ras not an
earthly for any such antogonsm. TWAS purely
the work Of politicians and Office aspirants The
North was doubly imposed upon first, with the
idea that the South had combined politically to create
slavery in Kansas secondly that they the northern
peope) could prevent it by like political movements
There was no truth in either proposition The south
could not create slavery, and if they could, indie
pendent ofemgration and the Judgment Of emigrants,
they could not maintain it, The North equally
poweress to control it. They might, by crea-
ting excitement, control Congress- and by usurp-
ing power in that body exercise temporary
influence over the subject. Had the people of
Kansas preferred slavery, however, congressional
Intervention to prevent its legalization would have
been unavailng. In like manner, it was not in the
power Of Congress- to create or to sustain it when
created.
And how have events shaped the issue? Is slavery
now the question in dispute? No. Have the re-
publcans, whose theory has been exposed and whose
declarations have been falsifed by history aban-
doned their wicked efforts to array section against
section? Is there now really any point of contact in
this matter between the North and the South2 Is
not the effort now solely to destroy the democratic
partyf Is there battery planted whose guns are
not pointed to the citadel of the democracy? Seek
ing to forever the last pretext for estrange
ment between the sections, we are met by assault
from every quarter more fierce, relentless reck
less and mendacious than before. In the meas
ure before Congress there is nothing involving the
sensibility the just pride Of either the North or
the South. IL opposed by the republicans be-
cause their life is in agitation and their death is in
peace and harmonious union We repeat there is
not single point Of reol oon,uc in this question, be-
tween the North and the South.
Those democrats then, in this hour of trial, who
desert their party, and by their votes legslste into