Clarksville chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1857-1865, 1859-09-02
ForiPresident in 1860.
HON. JOHN BELL
OF TENNESSEE

rtS" Our friend, the Nashville Banner in com
mentng upon the article we wrote, ON hosting the
name Of John Bell for the Presidency, says our
platform--the Constitution and TIC Union--can be
amended by adding to it-oppostion to the slavery
agitation. We accept the amendment, provided it
be deemed necessary, by the Convention, to 90 into
IN enumeration Of the principles which govern the
action of the Opposition party; but in suggesting
the Constitution and the Union as the platform,
intended to be understood us rather opposed to the
construction Of any platform at ALL A rigid ad-
herence to the letter and spirit of the Constitution
is the best guarantee for the safety of the Union
and perfect security against sectional agitation,
and it is resistance of its provisions that has en-
gendered the strife, 50 much to be deplored.
One Of the encouraging signs of the times is the
growing popular disgust with platforms, which are
too often artul contriyauce to delude the people
into the support Of measures not set forth in those
platforms, and of men placed upon them who are
utterly unworthy of public confidence, They are
the machinery for hosting small men into high
places and, intentionally, complicated that the
masses can not understand the mechanism; and as
honest plain dealing would prove fatal to false
measures and dwar6sh aspirants, it is studiously
avoided by every democratic Convention. To
remedy this crying evil and save the country from
its runous effects. should return TO the practice
Of those better days of the Republic when men
were nominated for high places because their talents
integrity and public services had proven their fit
ness, and won the conf lence of the enlightened
and patriotic Such men can not be made more
Trustworthy by the mos, elaborate setting forth Of
principles; nor can the most comprehensive and
judicious platform make great and good man Of q
scant pattern of humanity made to stand upon it
business man, in selecting an agent for an i'm.
porant trust would be guided not by the principle,
the applicant might profess, but by his patss acts
A may believe the Ten Commandments to bC
of divine Origin, and yet be a rogue; but the poll
tican who swears by the Cincinnati platform car
hardly be anything else because in itself pnten
fraud, he who stands upon it, knowing it to lie such
proclaims his motives to be dishonest and his pur
pose to defraud IT, then, the wise man of bust
ness will not rely upon profcssionsiu the absence
of acts--in the choice of an agent, why should al
intelligent people select as political agent a MAI
whose past is a blank, and has no security to ofie
a string of resolutions conceived in fraud, an,
promulgated by convocaton Of dcmagogucs eacl
one of whom has some selfish end to subserve ?
The best way, in opinion, to silence the slavery
agitation, is to ignore it in Convention on III,
stump, and in the newspapers and the wiscst polio,
for the Opposition, is TO nominate a man for tn
Presidency who needs no scalfoldng which he h0
not erected for himscr-who acknowledges tin
Constitution as his political chart aud the Union,-
harmonious and prospcrous--the point of his dcs
tnaon. The country needs n man at the head O
the government, not an automatOn that derives it
motion from the machinery of a Convention
man whose history proves him ready and able t.
maintain all the constitutional rights of the Suutl
without being unjust to the North and whose broa
nationality precludcs the supposition Of any un
reasonable sectional hils. Convention ma
nominate such man, but platform can't Great
him.