New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1858-02-26

yention, have found the means to expre" OF an
election, the regularity Of which the most rabld L.
comptonites do not venture 20 question, their deci
ded Iepugnance to this instrument, how absurd 70
argue that Mr.. Stanton is estopped from insisting
that this popular expression of repugnance ana
rejection ought to be Listened to and respected
The Committee would represent that Dir. STAN
ton, beside having been inveigled into aiding TO
pas of this spurious offspring of the bogus Legs
lature as the lawful issue Of the people Of Kansas
had gone still further, and had at the came time
helped to straDgle the alleged mother, as part
ola plot for thustrg this suppcsititious monster
into the possession IS lawful heir, Of all her rights
and property But so far from doing any such
thing, Mr. Stanton, while aiding 10 gire birth 10
this intrusive thing, expressly recognized the
continued existence Of the people Of Kansas, their
continued possession Of their political inheri-
lance and their full and free consent a, absolutely
necessary to give validity to anything which the
Convention might propose.
Still more disingenuous is it, if possible, to rep
resent the citizens Of Kansas estopped BY their
negectto vote under the apportionment made by Mr..
Stanton, and by having failed or neglected to secure
a majority in that Convention, as having cut them
selves of from any right to object to the COnstitu-
ton framed by it. In the first place, BY the con-
fession of this very report very considerable
number Of the voters including the inhabitants Of
entire counties, were totally cut off from the power
of voting; while according to the reasoning Of the
report, Acting. Governor Stanton, by assigning the
whole number of sixty delegates to the counties for
which census was returned, actually disabled the
Convention from admitting TO seats the delegates
who had been elected from some of the dsfran-
chistd counties. In the second place, in the very
&C. Of making the appOrtOnment Acting Governor
Stanton expressly reserved and assured to the III
habtants of Kansas the right of ultimately accepting
or rejecting any Constitution that the Convention
might frame. Nor did he do this on his own re.
.pOnsibility alone. The instructions of Governor
Walker fully authorized these assurances. They
were renewed over and over again by Gov
error Walker himself, after his arrival in the
Territory; ard they have been more than
once publicly indorsed and recognized by the
President himself What, then is the reasonable
conclusion from the fact that under these circum-
stances the great majority of the people of Kansas
abstaned from voting for members of the Conyen-
tom Must they be understood as consenting be-
foreband to all that the Convention might do
Must they be taken TO have voluntarily renowned
their natural and original liberty; having given
to this Convention power Of attorney rrevOcable,
TO act in their name and behalf as having signed
away their sovereignty and as having substituted
the Convention az sovereign in their place. Must
it necessarily be concluded that they estopped
them selves from any further voice in the matter
Is it not more reasonable to suppose-could
democratic tribunal do otherwise than suppose
would not decent degree of respect for the rights
of the people lead inevitably to the suppostion
that, relying upon the reiterated assurances made
to them in the Presidents name and by his author
ity, that the work of the Convention should be
submitted to fair, free and full vote of the people,
they declined TO take any part in pre- lminary
election which, in their view of it. greatly lacked
all these qualities, and to take part in which might
seem like sanctionpg the very unfarness and irreg
ularity Of which they cOmplained'
Does this Senatorial Committee wish to place
President Buchanan before the world i'll the light
of having tricked Acting -Governor Stanton and
Governor Walker by ambiguous instructions into
giving to the people Of Kansas unfounded AS
surances-of having stood by and allowed those
assurances to be given, and over again in his
having himself seemed publicly to in
dorse them, and Of having thus entrapped the
people of Kansas into the humiliation of having
a Constitution made for them and thrust upon
them not only without their consent but against
their vehement protest and even resolved resist
snce If the legal notion of an estOppel is to be
brought into this controversy, We should say the
estoppel is with Mr. Buchanan and the Democratic
party, whose President and spokesman he is, and
not with Mr.. Stanton, and still less with the peo.
pie of Kansas.