Daily national Democrat., 1859-04-14
National 1rmotrat.
The Express and the Niger Question.


Enron DEMocRAr-Is it not highly anus
;,g 70 see the efforts of the Express to show
that STEPHEN A. DoueLAs was unsound OF
the niger question as long ago as 1850, anc
TINT because he wos absent when the tugi-
tive Slave Law passed the U. S. Senate, he
therefore lodged the question Why the
great South itself never doubted Mr. Douglas
until he asked for fair play in Kansas. The
Free Soilers charged that the Little Giant
was a slavery propagandist in 1854, 5, 6, and
Z. Some Democratic papers wedkened on Mr.
Douglas in 1854, because he advocated the
Kansas Nebraska bill, repeating the Missouri
Compromise and thereby consented to per
nit slavery north of SO deg. 80 min. if the
People desired it, and among those papers
was the CALIFORNIA EXPRESS That intense
ly chivalric concern, was then exultant when
the Kansas Nebraska bill was tabled on one
occasion. and expressed the hope that it
might there sleep the sleep of death," saying
that such an end of the measure would be n
warning to all who sought to make capital
by broaching the slavery question. The Ex-
press was then anti Nebraska, a title after
wards deemed nearly synonymous with Re
publicanism. 1t comes with a bad grace
from paper with such antecedents, to charge
Mr.. Douglas with lodging the Fugitive Slave
Law, when he did not dodge it at ALL viii
the Express say in reply that tits not respon-
sible for what was said in its columns in
1854 2 The editor who then controlled its
columns is now as good an Administration
Democrat as is the present editor, and if he
could think that Mr.. Douglas was going too
far in giving slave owners an equal chance in
the Territory north of So deg. 80 min, he is
a good witness to prove that Mr. Douglas
was sound on the wooly question. Was the
Express ever edited by Free Soiler? 1t
certainly was once edited by a man, now an
Administration Democrat, who would not.
at first, sustain Mr.. Douglas in his course up
on the Kansas Nebraska bill. If Douglas was
unsound in 1850, he has never changed since,
and was in 1852 much more favorable to the
South, than the Express could conveniently
agree to be.
With regard to Mr.. Douglas position in
1850, if he was unsound because he was not
present to vote for all of the five acts of Con
gress, which composed the famous compro-
mise measures of that year, we have Senator
Houstons uncontradcted assertion. made on
the floor of the u S. Senate. Dec. %, S5l,
to show that only two U. S. Senators were
any better off
Mr. HousroN. al may say that occupy no
equivoca position in relation to the matter of the
Compromise, for believe the records Of the Sen
ate will prove that am the only Senator up
this hoor that voted for eUery measure of the
Compromise. An honorable Senator from Penn
sylvana, (Mr. STURGEoN) also voted for all the
provisions of the Compromise, but be is no longer
a member of this body"
Mr.. Douglas was fully committed in sup
port of the Fugitive Slave Law. If his not
voting for it was " dodging," then all have
to say is that the above language of Mr.
Houston proves that the compromise meas
ures of 1850 were lodged by all the U. s
Senate but two Non INTERVENTION.