Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1859-08-13

nobIest American minds have striven to re-
pei the aggressions Of Slavery upon Free
dom in this Republic, and prevent its exi
tension on this continent During this
long period the political sky has deepened
in gloom, till in our immediate time, the
darkness, like that which enyeloped Egypt,
has been palpable to the sense of touch
The repeal of the Missouri Compromise
aroused to a clear conception Of the i'm
pending crisis many conservative men, who,
till then, had either averted their eyes from
the ominous signs in the heavens, or had
beheld them with seeming indifference
The subsequent attempt to force Slavery
upon Kansas, through border invasions,
fraudulent elections, bogus Legislatures,
and Federal bayonets, startled from repose
still more of the staid and quiet portions
of our people. These classes combined to
swell the volume OF that indignant remon-
STRANGE that echoed through the land in
1855, and awed for time the conspirators
into silence. Gathering courage from the
triumph of Mr.. Buchanan, secured under
the hypocritical cry of "Fair play for Kan
sas," and from the political prOnuaciamento
of the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott
case, enunciated under false pretenses, these
conspirators attempted to carry the Le-
compton Constitution through Congress by
corruption, and TO secure its adoption in
Kansas by bribery. This audacious effort
to subdue the representatives Of the people
to the Executive will, and to induce the
inhabitants of Territory to accept Con-
stitution which they despised, and q domes-
tic institution which they abhorred, aroused
still another portion of our sober citizens
from their lethargy. These rendered valu-
able aid in administering to the Admins
tration terrible rebuke in the last Con-
gressional elections in the Northern States;
aud recent indications show that its hold
upon the confidence of some portions of
the South even is seriously shaken. But,
not driven from their purpose by these re-
iterated exhibitions of the public abbor-
renee, the Pro-Slavery Democracy, should
they perpetuate their hold upon power for
another four years, will win conquestS for
the Negro Propaganda which the widest
Slavery extensionists never dreamed of ten
! years ago.
And this is the stage in the road to ruin
| "hiSu thO SOuubi1 hdo uliOduJ AOaSuSu'
How much further can it go without abaD
doning all hope of recovering the ground ii
shall have lost If Mr.. Buchanan is to
be followed by successor whose Admins
tration will, in respect to Slavery in the
Territories, and in regard to financial pro-
aigacy and corruption generally, be as much
worse than his as his is worse than Perce's,
then it will be difficult to measure the
depths of that degradation into which the
country will find itself on the 4th of March
1865 And if we are to have a series OF
Administrations, each of which WILL by q
sort of politico-geometrical progression, by
kind of sell. f.accelerating gravity, drag
the nation downward faster and lower than
its predecessor, who can fathom the abyss
of infamy and peril into which we are plung
ing
Unless we have wholly misconceived ant
grossly oVerstated the condition of th,
country, and the tendencies of Democratic
rule, in respect to Freedom, Public Virtue
and Official Integrity, is it not high tint
that patriotic men of whatever party-namt
banded together to wrest the reins OF gov
ernment from hands which are driving it to
perdtion Is not success in the next
Presidential election desirable Nay, more
is it not necessity