The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1859-02-18


Maki"g-M Movements Among the New York
Democracy.
Among the profound European abstractionists
Of the Middle Ages, the Nominalists and the
Realists held very prominent position-the
former contending that nothing exists except the
spirit or thinking principle, and the latter that
nothing exists except those things which can be
proved to exist by the evidence of one or more
of our five natural senses. Upon this broadly
defined issue these aforesaid learned schoolmen
of the Dark Ages kept themselves and society
in hot water for some five hundred years. In
our day the question has been settled that things
intellectual or spiritual and things physical, do
an ertiat; but another question still remains
subject to discussion, to wit, whether the public
acts or secret in,rigues Of our governing agents
and politicians should be accepted as affording
the true key to their present movements and flu
ture designs.
We take the side Of their secret intrigues; for
thus we shall find all the great political troubles
which have agitated the world, and all the great
political achievements which have contributed
to the moral advancement of mankind, reduced
to some individual disappointment or rascality
or enterprise, or to some quarrel or some happy
agreement in which the voice of one or two men or
women has settled the question. Take, for ex-
ample, on the other side, the public proceedings
of our President making politicians of the
present Congress. From the discords and
divisions among the democracy on the Nor
mon question, the Kansas question, the fibus-
ter question, the Oregon BILL the tariff question,
and every other question, we should be COM
PEELED to conclude that there is no democratic
party-that it is all adrift, without recognized
head or a visible tail-and that any aspiring
leader of party thus broken up and dispersed
who dreams of being elected as a democratic
candidate for the next Presidency, is a great fool
But when we come to look into the secret in
trigues and movements of our democratic Pre-
sidential aspirants and President makers. we dis
cover that these apparent discords divisions and
dslocations of the rank and file of the party
are superficial, and that Sir Isaac Newton's
sublime theory of universal gravitation is not
magnificent political discovery of the cohesive
power Of the public plumber" And so it hap
pens that, while confusion worse COMPOUNDED"
prevails among the public proceedings of all
parties in Congress, the democratic managers.
the republican managers, and the managers of
the rump Of tie American party and the loose
remnants Of the old wing party, are all actively
plotting and working for this or that party Ma
tional Convention, from which their party ticket
for 1860 is to come.
In this connection the late and current move
ments of Fernando Wood, for instance, rise into
higher Importance than any of the late demo-
cratic Congressional caucuses or legislative
experiments on the tariff question. According
to our information from Washington, of
some days ago, Mr.. Wood, in reference to
the Charleston Convention and the dele
gates to be elected thereto, has secured
powerful ally in Kentucky, and another in
Tennessee, and the formidable alliance Of Go
vernon Wise in Virginia, from which il is very
likely be will be able to command those three
important State delegations in the Convention
Next, we understand that Mr.. Wood il not idle
in regard to Pennsylvania nor Indifferent in re-
BuIu W liuOir; Dut dDoFt all, JudL nc 1S re-
solved to give the Tammapy faction of New
York q Roland at Charleston for the Oliver
which they played him at Syracuse last scptem-
Der.
The only formidable competitor of Mr.. Wood
in this matter is Ex-Governor Horatio Seymour.
AS for Mr.. Dickinson, he belongs to an age that
has gone by, and he is out of the way. The
strength Of Mr.. Seymour lies in that powerful
clique of the Central Railroad and canal jobbers.
and in the prestige Of Tammany Hall. But this
prestige of Tammany was substantially de-
molished 10 our last November and December
elections, and the railroad and canal clique hold
but limited field Of occupation. AS between
the two men--Wood and Seynour-the contrast
is remarkable. Wood is keen, sagacious active,
fesolute, perscvering, viglant, and capable Of
handling the most difficult party combinations.
seymour is quiet, easy, amiablc, philosophical,
and altogether disposed to take things comfort
ably and trust 70 luck. AS Presidential aspi-