New-York daily tribune., 1858-02-06

nave uOut tuO ouLc tnihS-NVhP"AN' NV NNA"NN
of the people Of Kansas, in declining to acknowl-
edge the lawful authority Of the bogus Territorial
Legislatures and of the Lecompton Convention. to
| the Dorr insurrectOn in Rhode Island. But this
| comparison, when the cases come to be looked at,
totally fails The complaint in Rhode Island was
not that the existing State Government had orgi-
mated either in fraud or force, or both combined;
not of cheating at the polls or an invasion of those
polls by intrusive voters from abroad; but against
the charter Of Charles H., which served at that
time as Constitution for the State, under which
charter nobody but frecholder or the son Of q
freeholder was allowed to vote.
As the State Legislature refused to enlarge the
right of suffrage, or to call Convention to frame
new Constitution, the non-freeholders and the oppo
nents of the freehold qualification, claiming to be
decided majority of the people, called Convention,
framed Constitution and submitted it to popular
vote, which, as they alleged, showed small major
ity of the people in its favor. When, however, it
came to the point Of setting up the new State Gov
ernment, under which Dorr had been chosen Gov
ernor, the old State Government refused to give
way In this position Of things, the supporters of
GOV. DOTT utCHutu W stdnu nun Ia oustaiiii"b
his authority by force. They did not feel themselves
strong enough for that Whereupon Dorr took the
foolish course of resorting to this city, where he
collected body of volunteer Democrats, with
whom he returned to Rhode Island, with the de-
sign, by means of the foreign aid, to overturn the
existing State Government, and to set up himself
in the place Of it. This invasion, which ended
ingorousy, was the treason of which Gov.
Dorr was convicted and for which he was long held
prisoner In Kansas, on the other hand, there was
no complaint against the organic act of the Terri
tory, or desire to supersede it. The people OF
Kansas would have been perfectly satisfied to live
under that act which was defeated overturned and
set aside, not by thee but by an invasive force of
Border Rufians from Missouri. If any parallel
for Governor Dorr is to be sought in Kansas, it
should not be among those whom q majority Of the
people of Kansas were ready to sustain at all
hazards, but among those who, conscious of their
weakness at home first brought in host OF Border
RutIiaps to oyerpower and Outyote the actual in
habitants, and then appealed to the Federal Gov
ernment and its merceDary bayonets to sustain them
in this usurpaton.
After all the great difficulty in Gov. DORIS case
was that the people of Rhode Island we're not pre-
pared to sustain him. Had the people Of that
State been as preponderaDtly in favor of the Dorr
Constitution as the people of Kansas were and are
in favor of the Topeka Constitution, and as ready
to risk their lives in its support there would have
been no difficulty in substituting the Dorr COnsti-
tuition in the place of the Charter Government.
But when il came to the test-howeyer it might
have been in point of numbers-in point of courage
resolution and readiness to act, the supporters Of
| Dorr found themselves in decided minority
| There was no harm in Don and his friends trying
| the experiment of offering new Constitution to
the acceptance of the people of Rhode Island; but
when they found that onehalf the people, with the
| organized and lawful State Government at its head
was decidedly opposed to this innovation, and the
other half without the spirit courage to insist
its adoption, they might surely have let the matter
drop, or waited for some change in popular feeling
The folly and crime of Governor Dorr consisted in
his enlistment in this city of body of men, and
carrying them back with him to Rhode Island to
take farcbe possession BY their aid, of the govern
ment of the State. 1t would be doing great injus-
| tce to Governor Dorr to compare him for moment
with the Kansas Border-Ruffan leaders. Though
mised BY modification and perhaps by ambition, he
no doubt acted with view to sustain the right of
the majority of the people Of Rhode Island to shape
| the government of that State. His idea no doubt
was that the actual majority on his side, though
kept down by the threats and the violence of the
minority, who had the State organization in their
hands. STILL if parallel il to be sought in Kansas
10 the criminal part Of Governor DORIS proceed
pgs it is to be found and found only in the conduct
| Of those who brought force of Missouri intruders
into the Territory to drive the legal voters from
the polls, and to seize by force and fraud on the
| Territorial government. But the criminality OF
this conduct was infinitely beyond anything OF
which Governor Dorr was guilty. These men
were not acting under any misconception OF
the true state Of the case. They did not sup
pose themselves to be acting in the interest
of the majority of the people of Kansas. They did
not deceive themselves by the idea that they pos
sessed deputation from the majority of the people
| of Kansas to act in their behalf. They did not
act with any view to carry out the wishes Of the
msjOrity of the people as they believed already
expressed. On the other hand, the avowe ed object
of their introduction into the Territory of foreign
power was to prevent the msjority from making
itself manifest and exercising its rights at the polls,
10 snatch the Territorial administration and the
enactment of body Of laws for the Territory out
of the hands Of the majority, and to enable q
minority to govern. Consistency would require
l that those who condemn Governor Dorr should