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

|
ing proportion to the capital strength ofsthe
Democratic party, they necessarily dictate and
prescribe its policy. The inevitable caucus
system enables them to do so with a show Of
fairness and justice. fit were possible to con
| ceive for moment that the Democratic party
| should disobey the behests of the shareholders
we should then see withdrawal of the slave
holders, which would leave the party to perish
! The portion of the party which is found in the
free States is a mere appendage, convenient to
modify ats sectional character, without impair.
ing IFS sectional constitution, and is less effect
i've IL regulating Its movement than the nebu,
| lous tail OF the comet is in determining the ap-
pointed though apparently eccentric course OF
the fiery sphere from which it emanates.
| Te.expect the Democratic party TO resist Sla-
very, and favor Freedom is as unreasonable as
to lOpk for Protestant missionaries to the Cath
Ole propaganda of Rome. The history of the
| Democratic party commits it to the policy OF
Slavery. 1t has been the Democratic party,
and so other agency, which has carried that pol
icy up to its present alarming elimination.
Without stopping to ascertain, critically, the Or
| igin d the present Democratic party, we may
conetde its claim to date from the era of good
| feeling which occurred under the Administra-
ton 81 President Monroe. At that time in this
State and about that time in many others OF
| the % States, the Democratic party deliberate
ly dL ranchised the free colored or African cit
izen, and it has pertinaciously continued this
| disfr lchisement ever since. This was an eff
feeti aid to Slavery, for while the stakeholder
votei for his slaves against Freedom, the freed
slave in the free States is prohibited from vo-
ting against Slavery.
In 1924, the Democracy resisted the election
of John Quincy Adams himself before that
time an acceptable Democrat-and in 1928 it
expelled him from the Presidency and put a
STAKEHOLDER in his place, although the office had
been filled by shareholders thirty two out of forty
years,
In 1886, Martin Van Buren-the first non
slayebolding citizen of a free State to whose
election the Democratic party ever consented
sigma lied his Inauguration into the Presidency
by gratultous announcement that under no
circumstances would he ever approve bill for
the abolition of Slavery in the District of Co
lumbfa. From 1888 to 1884, the subject of
abolishing Slavery in the District of Columbia
and in the national dock yards and arsenals was
brought before Congress by repeated popular
appeals. The Democratic party thereupon
promptly denied the right of petition, and eff
fectually suppressed the freedom of speech in
Congress- so far as the institution of Slavery was
concerned
From 1910 to 1913, good and wise men coun-
SEIZED that Texas should remain outside of the
Union until she should consent to relinuuish
her selfinstituted Slavery; but the Democratic
party precipitated her admission into the I'm
ION, not only without that condition but even
with covenant that the State might be divided
and recognized so as to constitute four slave
States, instead of one.
In 1876, when the United States became in
volve1 in a war with Mexico, and it was appa-
rent chat the struggle would end in the dismem-
berment of that Republic, which was a non
slaveholding Power, the Democratic party re-
jected a declaration that Slavery should not be
estabs ished within the territory to be acquired
When, in 1850, Governments were to be insti-
tuted: in the Territories of California and New
Mexico, the fruits of that war, the Democratic
party refused to admit New Mexico as a free
State and only consented to admit California
as a tree State Oh the condition, as it has since
expl&ned the transaction, of leaving all of New
Mex, 70 and Utah open to Slavery, to which was
| also Sdded the concession of perpetual Slavery
| In the District of Columbia, and the passage of
an unconstitutional, cruel, and humilating law,
for the recapture of fugitive slaves, with a fur
stipulation that the subject of Slavery should
nevee again be agitated in either chamber of
Congress. When, in 1854, the shareholders
were contentedly reposlng on these great add
vantages, then so recently won, the Democratic
party unnecessarily Officiously, and with super
servieeable hberality, awaked them from their
slum ,er, to offer and force on their acceptance
the ,rogaton of the law which declared that
neitlxr Slavery nor Involuntary servitude should
ever exist within that part of the ancient terri
tory OF Louisiana which lay outside of the
State OF Missouri, and north of the parallel of
800 30 of north latitude law which, with
the exception OF one other, was the only statute
l-pfk al, l. 4
! In 1856, when the people of Kansas had Or
gained new State within the region thus
abandoned to Slavery, and applied to be add
mitted as free State into the Union, the Dem
Ocraiic party contemptuously rejected their Pc
titiOn, and drove them, with menaces and in
| Limitations, from the Halls of Congress, and
armed the President with military power to en-
force their submission to slave code, estab-
lished over them by fraud and usurpation. At
| every subsequent stage of the long contest
which has since ragged in Kansas, the Democratic
party has lent its sympathies, its aid, and all
the powers of the Government which it con-
trolled, to enforce Slavery upon that unwilling
and injured people. And now, even at this
day, while it mOcks us with the assurance that
Kansas is free, the Democratic party keeps the
State excluded from her Just and proper place
in the Union, under the hope that she may be
1 ~
| Ths Democratic party finally has procured
from a Supreme Judiciary, fixed in its inter
est a,hecree that Slavery exists by force of the
Constitution in every Territory of the United
StateS, paramount to all legislative authority
eitheswithn the Territory or residing in Con
gress8
| Sueh is the Democratic party 1t has no pol
| icy, State or Federal, for finance, or trade or
nusacture, or commerce, or education, or in
ternal improvements, or for the protection or
even Ahe security of civil religious liberty.
1t is BDsitive and incorporating in the inter
est Of Slavery negative, compromising, and
yacill ting, in regard to. everything else. 1t
boastsits love of equality, and wastes its strength
and esen its life in terrifying the only aristoc.
| racy Known in the land. 1t processes fraterni-
ty, aEd, so often as Slavery requires, allies
itself sith prescription. 1t magnifes itself for
conquests in foreign lands, but it sends the ma
honal eagle forth always with chains, and not
the ollse branch, in his fangs.
This dark record shows you, fellow citizens,
what was unwilling to announce at an earlier
stage OF this argument, that of the whole nefa-
rious schedule of slaveholdng designs which |
have submitted to you, the Democratic party
has left only one yet to be consummated- the
abrOgation of the law which forbids the African
| slave trade.
| Now, know very well that the Democratic
party has, at every stage of these proceedings,
dlsavowed the motive and the policy of fortify-
ing and extending Slavery, and has excused
them on entirely different and more plausible
grounds. But the inconsistency and frivolity
OF these pleas prove still more cOnclusively the
guilt | charge upon that party. 1t must indeed
necessarily excuse such guilt before mankind,
and even to the consciences Gifts own adherents.
There IS an instructive adherence of Slavery,
ana an Unborn and inhering love of Freedom.