Holmes County Republican. [volume] (Millersburg, Holmes County, Ohio) 1856-1865, 1858-02-25

GU III the IdSb picSiucutiai Soh'eSo, ~ w.
sound principle upon which our, Terrific
ries were thenceforth to be organized and
governed-which was declared as giving
all power into the hands of the people
is to be sweated down to the very moder-
ate dimensions ola privilege to say wheth-
er they will hold a negro in bonds or not? |?
No opinion can be expressed as to the Or
ganization of the legislative, executive, or
judicial branches Of the government; none
of the constitutional safeguards offered TO
life and liberty are of any Importance to
the citizen. He may not speak as TO them
his whole voice is to be kept for his yea
or nay on negro slavery. This is Tom
Thumb sovereignty, or sovereignty in a nut
shell.
The case is even worse than I have ex-
hibited it. Nothing has been submitted
for popular determination. Slavery could
not be voted down by voting the "consti-
tuition with no slavery" when the instru-
ment expressly declares that, under such
vote, "the right of property in slaves now
in the Territory shall in DO manner be in
terfered with" The right of property car
ries with it the increase of those slaves as
completely as if born in South Carolina
and if that right "shaH not be sntertered
with," slavery must continue. l have new
er before been taught that that is free
State in which the negro and his issue are
to be holden as slaves, and where the prop
ertv in slaves 1shall not be interfered with. "
The right of the people 'to form and regu-
late their domestic institutions in their own
way" now means simply "to form and
regulate" slavery, provided they Storm"
it in State, and do not REGULATE" it out.
This 1 would designate as sovereignty in
visible.
This solemn mockery CT guaranteed
right is to be tolerated; not only tolerated,
but encouraged and confirmed by the ac-
ton of the present Congress, because the
convention which prepetrated the enormity,
represented, as I am told, the sovereignty
of the people. No such reason exists. |
would as soon recognize bastard as law
full heir, as the Lecompton convention to
be the offspring of the people of Kansas
The fact that others may have recognized
it is legal body, imposes no obligation
upon me to force myself to the same un-
wise conclusion. 1t is one of the fruits Of
well-digested fraud concocted in the fall
of 1854, and persevered in until the pres
ent moment; fraud by which slavery
was 10 be forced into the State when form
ed, without respect to the sentiment of the
people. The very purpose of the fraud was
to override the will of the people; to sub
stitute the action of a minority for the rule
of the majority. In organizing the Terri
tory under the Nebraska-Kansas act, the
first thing manifested was an anti-republi-
can movement, subversive of the principles
of the act, and those concerned in it took
as much trouble to hide the facts as Peri
ander did to conceal his grave, and COM
mitted as many crimes in doing so. The
ballot-box gave no response to the resolves
or wishes of the residents; it pointed only
to treasonale acts striking at the very foun-
dation of our institutions. Rufianism has
held uninterrupted sway there. 1t made
legislators, who made convention, which
made constitution. The great grand
child bears most unmistakable evidence Of
its parentage,a and it would indeed be strange
if it did not subvert the principle that the
people are free "to form and regulate their
| domestic institutions in their own way"
| "For he that once hath missed the right way,
The further he doth go the further he doth stray"
I am unwilling to marshal proofs to sup
port the position here assumed, as the
whole living history of Kansas -attests its
strength.
Sir, how does it happen that no man has
yet been found with Democracy sound
enough to bear up against the air of Kan
sas? Four Governors have been appoint
ed. in the space of about thirty months,
from among the wisest and best of oul
party, and now the Office is again vacant.
How comes this? 1t finds its solution in
the fact that democracy is morality" and
unable to countenance so gross and palpa-
BILE usurpation as has always existed
there. Those four high officers have all
returned to us, speaking the same language
uttering the same words-that sovereignty
is crushed out there. And what answer is
made to this? A southern paper gives it
in declaring they are to be marked-theil
ears cut and tails split; they are to be read
out. Take care, sir, that you do not read
out the whole North. In the great polit-
ical contest of 1856, how our energies were
taxed to the utmost! Every vote was OF
importance-of vast importance-no to
the North merely, but to the South, ,-ay,
to the South! How they trembled there
aSectionalism" they thought would prevail.
Looking back upon that fearful struggle,
may we well not pause long enough to in
quire what will probably be the result Of
future battles, when soldiers are so uncer-
enormously shot, at time when they can
be SO lily spareds
| have not forgotten the almost impene-
trable gloom which overhung my own State
and consequently the whole country, during
the fierce conflict to which l have alluded.
1t was then that the persuasive voice of one
who now fills place near the person of
the President was head in our midst, pro-
claiming the right of Kansas to be selfgov-
erned, and expressing his determination, as
a son of the South, to carry out the will Of
her people. His present high position was
bestowed upon him, doubtless, in conse-
quence of the influence it was his fortune
then to exercise. l fear his friends who, at
that time, listened to him with so much
true pleasure, were not prepared for the in
telligence which Just before our meeting
flashed along the telegraph wires, that the
President and his Cabinet were unit in
favor of the admission Of Kansas into the