Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1857-1858, 1858-01-12
TUESDAY, JANUARY 70, 1853.
The Kansas Complications aud ISSUES
drawing a cIGse.-ShaIl the South
Surrender at Discretion9

has been reached. She has framed and
adopted State Constitution, and is about
to present herself with it to Congress for
admission as a sovereign member of the
Union. The question is simple and plump:
Shall she be admitted? Unfortunately,
the course of bad men and imprudent men
acting in violent antagonism heretofore,
has thrown some embarrassment around
the question. But this does not relieve
Congress Of the responsibility and duty of
What, then, shall be the answer?
Let us recur briefly to the political his
tory of the Territory. The first election
for territorial Legislature, under the or
ganic Act of 31st May, 1854, resulted in
returning nearly the whole number, from
men who were in favor of eventually making
Kansas a slave State. The validity OF this
election was never impeached But fac
tiOus minority of anti-slavery men then
proposed in advance, to set at defiance all
laws enacted 10y that Legislature, without
elected by their votes Gov. Reeder, q
violent anti-slavery man, convened the
Legislature at Pawnee. 1t met at that
point, but adjourned to the Shawnee Mis-
sion-and there held the remainder of the
session. The Governor and his abolition
friends seized this removal as a pretext of
the one for vetoing all laws passed by the
Legislature, and of the Others to denounce
them as bogus" The Legislature, how
ever, proceeded to enact laws, and pass
them over the executive veto. This was
the origin of the free-soil opposition to the
regularly authorized laws and government
of the Territory. To assist this faction
and swell the opposition, Emigrant Aid
Societies were established at the North,
and men and money and arms and amuni-
ton were sent out to Kansas for the avow-
ed purpose Of defying the legal authorities
and revolutiOnizing the government of the
Territory. An unreenting and bitter war
fare was kept up against the legal govern
ment, extending even to the Judges of the
Courts, whose crimes were, holding the
validity and enforcing the laws passed at
the Shawnee Mission. This resulted in
actual war and bloodshed. The regular
territorial authorities were sustained by
the President; and the factionists, failing
i n their experiment with Sharpes rifles, de-
termined upon a different course. They
called convention to organize an indie
That convention met ot Topeka and
framed, adopted, and proclaimed a State
Constitution, which provided for an cleo
ton of State officers and State Legisla-
ture, and for the presentation of the Con-
stitution to Congress, with an application
for admission into the Union as q State.
The Topeka constitution was presented
to Congress, and was promptly rejected
Yet elections were or had been held under
it, and a governor (Charles Robinson) and
Legislature chosen This body met, re-
ceived the message of Robinson, and. we
believe, passed what they termed laws. OF
course, these proceedings were disregarded
and spurned, both by the regular local and
Federal Governments. But the factious
adherents of the Topeka government, con-
stantly swelling in numbers through the aid
of the emigrant societies formed at the
North, and by reason of the excitement
created and nurtured by fanatical men
throughout that section, declared their in
tention never to recognize, in any way, the
regular government, or participate in any
elections held under or by its authority
How well they have observed this determi-
nation, up to the last election for Terri
torial Legislature, the country knows
There was an effort in the Congress Of
1867 to pass an act enabling the people
of the Territory to form State constitu-
ton. The bill passed the Senate, but a
Black Republican House of Representa-
tives refused to pass it-thus participating
IN the outrageous and reasonable course
of their friends in Kansas. The regular
and only legal and recognized Legislature
of the Territory, was, in the meantime,
holding its regular session and finding
that Congress had or would not pass an
enabling Act, such as seemed desirable and
was loudly called for, proceeded, on the
10Th of February, 1851, to pass law, pro-
viding for convention of the people for
the purpose of framing constitution. This
law also prescribed the qualifications of
voters for delegates, and for registration
of all the legal voters of the territory, pre-
paratory to a fair and peaceful election.
But the free State mem, the factionists, de-
dared thar purpose neither topeymit themselves
to be registered nor 10 rote at the election, which
was fixed for the 18th June. The officers
under this law obeyed its provisions. so far
as they were able, and obtained the regis.
tration of a number, which has been put
down at two thirds of the legal voters of
the territory-at any rate, a large majority
of the law abiding citizens at that date,
the LIST of March, 1857.
Thus matters stood at the Inauguration
of Mr.. Buchanan. He, as Congress had
done before, by appropriations forII the ex-
penses of the Territorial government by
the prompt rejection of the Topeka consti-
tuition, the admission Of the regularly elect