The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1858-03-22

demagoguc free State leaders Of Kansas aud
their outside confederstes, that there would
have been very little trouble in the business of
framing their State goveRnment
Only about two-thirds Of the free State party
participated in the election of this organic State
Legislature, the remainder having been per
s,.adcd 10y the rsbid anti Leco,npton fanatics to
itt this election 90 by default, like the Others
70 that they might have something tangible for
a fierce and protracted anti-slavery agitation
inside and outside of Kansas. 1t must be ad-
mitted, too, that regularly organized slave
holding system, even by default, in the midst of
an overwhelming and ultra anti-slavery COM
munity, would have been something.very well
adapted for political agitation for many years
to come; but this trick of the reckless Kansas
abolition vagabonds failed them. A sufficient
number Of fhe law and order class of the free
State party, disgustcd with their fanatics be-
you'd further forbearance, resolved to take a
hand in this legislative election. although it
was under the Lecompton schedule; and look
at the results. In that single act they have made
Kansas free State under the Lecompton pro-
grsmme, absolutely and permanently, and have
secured the most decisive triumph of law and
order.
On the other hand, as it has been asserted that
some Southern men have entertained the dclu-
sive idea that Kansas could, and perhaps would,
in reality, be made slave State under the Le-
compton schedule, we shall now discover the
truth or the falsty of this accusation. Our opinion
has been, and continues to be, that the vital
question with the South in this matter is the alb
straction of slavery. Let this Lecompton con-
stitution prevail, and the abstraction involved
will establish the principle that no new State
hereafter shall Ike excluded from the Union be-
cause Of the recognition of slavery in its Or
ganic law. The platform of the republican par
ty is mo more slave Territories-no more slave
ton abstraction will be the defeat of this Sec
tionsl policy, the failure of Lecompton will he
tantanount to mo more slave Territories" and
mo more slave States"
While. then, the last plausible pretext Of
Northern hostility to the Lecompton constitu-
ton is taken away by Caihoun's proclamation,
the principle indicated still remains to the South
in all its force. And yet if this constitution is
to be defeated in Congress, it will be by South
EN- men and Southern treachery. 1t is given
out that there is more in the late anti-Southern
speeches of Mr., Crittenden and Mr.. Bell in the
Senate than appears upon the surface, and that
We may now anticipate in the House coalition
between Southern and Northern men which will
certainly put Lecompton under the table The
game is said to be well understood by certain
disaffected individuals from Maryland Virginia,
North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee. Let
us watch the developement Of the plot; for if, at
a crisis like this, Southern men can he found
ready to barter the Southern cause for Congress
sioual plumber or for Northern Presidential
votes, We may truly say that the day of South
ern humiliation and Northern dictation is close
nj hand.