Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1858-10-23
WASHINGTON NEWS AND GOSSIP.

hat Stephen Arnold Douslss 'eafirms the
tight of Territorial Legislature to deny legal
to slave property, and rejects the !
that Congress may interpose for its |
protection" and under these circumstances"
1t is constrained to qualify its "aspiration
Tor his success, by remonstrance against the |
heresy Of his doctrine
Crediting the South with real devotion to
the preservation of the rights of the South un-
der the Constitution, We are glad to perceive
that even at this late moment the scales nave
been partially removed from its eyes, however
much injury to the cause of the South its con-
tinuance to have any preference for the cleo
ton of Douglas whatever, may continue to do
in inspiriting those at the North engaged in
hunting down such Democrats as j. CLANCY
Jones and Hughes of Indiana, because, for
sootb, they have been faithful defenders Of
Southern rights in the discharge Of their du-
ties as members of the House of Representa-
tives of the United States.
Now, the only real practical slavery ques-
ton likely to be in issue in the course Of the
next decade-we mean Of importance sufficient
to make it enter prominently into American
politics-is this question of the right Of Con-
gress and Territorial Legislatures to refuse to
legslate for the protection Of the rights Of slave
holders in Territories, as those rights have been
affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United
States. Tho fugitive-slave law, wherever the
population is abolitionized already, or is to
become so, will be dead letter; for any fifty
white men, by combining, can manage to de-
feat the execution of its provisions anywhere,
almost, in three-fourths of the nom slavehold-
ing States Nor is there any other of the
rights guaranteed by the Constitution to the
slaveholding States which can be set at naught
by the people in violation Of law, which are
more secure. The South claimed to have Sc
cured a standpoint of resistance to further
abolition aggression in the bred Scott decision
upon the point first above referred to, and
in the English act The anti-slavery North
through Emigrant Aid associations and abo-
lition demagogism combined, may send two
settlers into any new country territory to one
that the South can by any possible exertions
send into them. Where such Territories are
situated in latitudes suitable for slave labor
if Southern rights be duly protected by law,
time-a few years-wil defeat the Machine
tions ofthe abolition plotters to prevent the nat
ural and constitutional expansion of Southern
institutions; as tho Emlgrant Aid Societies
operations can continue nowhere very long
against the DEGREES Of nature, if the guaran-
tees Of Southern equality be rigidly enforced
by Congressional and Territorial legislation.
If, however, as Stephen Arnold Douglas main
tains-and on that point he proposes to inau-
gurate next winter his Presidential canvass -
the hordes of rufian and beggarly adventures
which new Emigrant Aid Societies may scatter
along our southwestern frontier, have the right
to exclude by Territorial legislation Southern
men from the enjoyment of such territory Of
the United States-a5 inttio-from the land
ing of the first such cargo or caravan in it, We
ask the South what is really left to the future
of our own section of the Confederacy, under the
Cons titutiOn?
The game Of abolitionism is to ou.-vote the
friends of the rights of the South under the
Constitution in the Senate of the United
States. This new doctrine of the great
Though at present disguised and therefore most
dangerous) abolition leader and schener of the
times-Douglas-if prevailing, involves per-
feet guarantee that no more slaveholding States
will be admitted into the Union; because un.
Ger its operation, it must be utterly impossible
that any Territory can hereafter apply for i'd
mission as q Stata with a slaveholding cOnsti-
tuition. The Emigrant Aid Societies will take
due care to operate sufic ienty long upon
each succeeding Territory, as its Territorial
government may be formed, to give such a
tone to its Territorial legislation, even though
situated in the latitude of the mouth Of the
Rio Grande, as will efectualIy prevent the
owners Of slave property from yenturing to
place it within the reach Of the tender
mercies of abolitionism there. Slave prop
erty-slaveholders struggling for the cons,itu-
tutional rights Of their section with the po-
litical energy and acumen which is incident,
usually, to the possession Of slave property
can alone make even a respectable defence of
Southern rights in such Territore.-not South
ern emigration of any other description.
The scheme Of Douglas, Forney Co. Is to
carry the North in 1860 by a whirwind of ex-
citement in favor Of the rights of squatters in
Territories to exclude Shareholders by legis-
lating against them. Though pretending to
admit the right of people of Territory on
becoming State to legalize the existence o
slavery among them, they thus propose to rem
der the exercise Of that right utterly impos.
sible in every case. Such is their policy for
the next winter and Presidential canvass, as is
well known to hundreds around US. knowing,
then, how hollow the present pretence of Ste-
phen Arnold Douglas that he is not a dire
enemy Of the South really is, and believing that
his triumph will be a death-blo to the posi-
biiity OF tho future ascopdancy of sound con-
stitutional views of Southern rights among the
Democracy of the non-slaveholding States, we
dsprecate his triumph as being likely to prove
. thou sand fold more disastrous to the future
Of the South than that Of his competitor, who
can demoralize no Northern Democrat, and
cannot make the Northern opposition a whit
more devoted to the abolition cause than it is
at this moment. II Douglas triumpbs, the
of the Northern Democracy will be
lrrevocably abolitionized in six months for he
wiii then control "power (of position) in the
oh L..