Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1859-08-10

ecrlbing the doctrine OF " popular sovereignty
in the resolves of Democratic conventions.
And herein we find sufficient reason for dis
trusting the politicians who acanal drivers
solves If they had - ,rame such re-
would SPEAK IN Fessn honest meaning, they
Sonoesinen' e truth without equivocation or
one 1ulng wing 1T any rate, they would not say
.i"uu'ien' IIlle they mean another. Inns
P9sRldis as p node of describing the doctrine OF
s, f;asl.os sovereignty" is in common use
among the Douglas Democrat" throughout
the free States. We have good specimen OF
the style in a resolution adopted recently at
county meeting of Democrats in Indiana Ac-
cording to this resolution, the doctrine in ques
ton is !" that conservative doctrine which
denies to Congress the right to exclude slavery
from the territories or to protect it therein
believing it to be the true doctrine, in theory
and in practice, that the people of the terri
tories, like those of the States, should be left
perfectly free to regulate that and all questions
of domestic policy for themselves"
The intention of such resolves is to deceive.
According to Mr.. Douglas, as well as Mr.. Bu-
chanan and the Charleston Mercury, slavery
is already established in the territories,-the
federal constitution itself being described as
its authority and its safeguard. This latest
fashion of Democracy, (which outdoes the
boldest pretensions of Austrian or Russian
despotism,) teaches that the people of terri
tory have no more right to abolish or exclude
slavery, within their limits, than they have
OF
itself, has no such right; and, to speak all in
"a word, that the right to do so does not exist
anywhere below the sun,-for the right of
slavery is like amy other right in property
Mr.. Douglas, in his popular sovereignty speech,
delivered in the Senate, February %, 1859, in
reply to Mr.. Brown of Mississippi, took this
ground In describing the points of agree
ment between him and Mr. Brown, he said
eve agree that under the decision of the
Supreme Court of the United States, slaves
are property. standing on an equal footing
with all other property; and that, consequent
Iy, the owner of slave has the same right to
emigrate to territory, and carry his slave
property with him, as the owner of any other
species of property has to emigrate there and
carry his property with him." and "the
right of transit to and from the territories is
the same for one species of property as it is for
all others"
This doctrine that neither Congress nor a
territorial legislature can abolish slavery or
forbid il to enter the territories is the basis Of
his peculiar theory of popular sovereignty
He holds it in common with the most fanatica
of the Southern extremists. Therefore, this
constant representation of his followers, tina
his doctrine allows the people or Legislature Q
a territory to exclude slavery. is intended as
leaving the party If it does not mean this
what does it mean? Those who use the frau
can not be. trusted for they are capable {
anything else in the same line. There was
time when Mr.. Douglas himself spoke reyer
entity of the Missouri Compromise as "ss
cred compact which must never be di,
turbed. And yet he himself made that motto
to repeal the Missouri Compromise, whic
was carried successfully through Congress
AT present he maintains that Congress mus
not provide a slave code for the territories. AM
herein differs from the Southern extremists
but, he does not deny that Congress has power
to do so; and can he be relied on to maintain
his present position Is there anything in hi.
past history to warrant such reliance He
makes the federal constitution establish SLAYER,
IN the territories; and having done this, wha
he says or does in regard to the slave code, i
comparatively of little consequence.
The power of Congress to abolish slavery il
the territories was never questioned in thi
country, until the Missouri Compromise wa
repealed. And it is denied now, not in behal
OF popular rights and free institutions, but il
behalf of the slave power. If the power o
Congress over the territories had been grossly
abused, in time past, it is very likely that re
bellion against it would have come from the
people, and that it would have been made q
foremost question in our national politics. And
such an agitation might have resulted in es
tabishing that style of popular sovereignty
which really means something,-that style Of
the thing which Senator Douglas has never
advocated, and which would begin its work by
making forever impossible the basis on which
his doctrine is founded. The political agita
ton supposed might have established the RICH
of the people of q territory to elect their owr
governors, make their own laws, regulate theil
own institutions, and do everything else per
tanning to the business of self-government
without despotic or annoying interference from
any quarter.
But, not in the interest of the people comes
this war against the old doctrine and practice
Of the Republic. No, it was contrived by
conspirators against freedom, and is waged in
the interest of the slavery -propagandists-
And while it cries popular sovereignty" il
means despotism,-su despotism as the insti
tuition of slavery never fails to createwher
ever it is allowed to be supreme 1t add.
nothing to popular freedom in the territories
On the contrary, it authorizes slavery to &c
there in defiance of anything the people may
do to exclude it. and thus suppresses popular
freedom. This doctrine of popular sovereign
ty was JOY TO the slave power while repeal
ing the Missouri Compromise and preparing
to subjugate Kansas and Nebraska But, nov
the chiefs of slavery propagandism insist that
its beauty and force must be heightened by
the addition of Congressional slave code for
the territories. Mr. Douglas demurs Imme-
date compliance would have brought him no.
litical humiliation. lie does not mean IN bo
annihilated no. not even fol- the benefit of
the slavery extremists. Therefore he preach.
es that peculiar doctrine without the Con.
gressonal slave code. lie has always gone il,