Daily national Democrat., 1859-07-01
ShOrt-Sighted.

Opposition to squatter sovereignty itself-as
a mere matter of poliey-would be equally
shortsighted Practically, indeed, squatter
sovereignty and non-intervention by Con-
gress will work out the same results that Is
to say, the effect of either will be to carry
out the will of the majority in the Terrific
ries. BY the operation of the doctrine Of
squatter sovereignty, if the people Of a Terri
tory desire slavery they win at once have it
by legislative enactment, and, if they do not
desire it, they will pass laws to exclude it
BY Congressional non.intervention, if the
people desire slavery, it will be protected by
the Territorial law; if they do not desire it
it will be left unprotected, aud the result i:
the same.
But the Douglas doctrine of noninteryen-
tion is the doctrine for which we are contend
ing, and it seems to us perfectly demonstra-
bic that it is a very unwise policy for the
South to oppose it. Should she succeed in
oyerthrowing 1t, she will simply be intro
ducing in its place system of legislation
which VIII forever initiate against her own
growth and expansion. All barriers against
Congressional interference with slavery be-
ing removed, it would be an easy transition
from protecting slavery in the Territories to
lcgislate against it if not in one shape then
in another. True, Congress has not the pow
cr to prohibit the introduction of slave prop
erty in Territory, but it does have power
if it assumes to legislate in place of the Ter
litorial Government, to so restrict and regu-
late the ownership of such property, to so
institute the mode and manner of recovering
it if lost or runaway, and to SO lcgslate upon
the subject generally as to make it hardly
worth mans while to own negro at all.
Aud this it could do when the Territorial
Legislature was fully disposed to give com
plcte protection 10 that species of property
1t is altogether dangerous to take from the
Territorial Government the power that it
may eonstitutionally possess over the ques-
/ tion and transfer or restore it to Congress -
The rights Of the people directly to be affec-
ted are safer in the hands of the Territorial
Legislature than in the hands of body
which may be governed by a thousand other
motives than those which look to the inter
csts or the desires of the people inhabiting
the Territory. Suppose a majority of the
people were in favor Of slavery, and their
representatives in a Territorial Legislature
were ready to pass laws for the full and per-
feet protection of slave property. The North
would step in and say, "No. You have in
sisted on taking this question out of the hands
Of the Territorial Legislatures and placing it
in the hands of Congress. Now, Congress
will attend to this matter, and you shall have
just that amount of protection which Con
gress sees fit to give you and no more" 1t
wont do to talk about Congress not having
the right to do thus and go. There are va
rious methods of getting around constitution
al questions, vested rights, and all these
things when party spirit runs high in legis--
lative bodies as witness, for instance, the
/ technical dodging and summersaulting of the
Buchanan eonstructionists in the Senate of
the United States over the Lecompton fraud
and iniquity.
The only safety of the South is in the in
tegrity of the Democratic party, and that in
tegrity can alone be preserved 10y strict ad-
hercnce TO the doctrine Of non intervention.
Remove all power over the question of sla-
very iom Congress and leave it to the Terri
] forioI / yislntur,s a 4 tLo Count, T., a.,
long run the South will be the gamer, if she
is ever TO gain anything at all by any process
Of expansion whatever. She needs nothing
but expansion to make her the great CONTROL
ing power Of the commercial world. The
opposition of England to the peculiar insti-
tuition is not so much from n moral adherence
of slavery as from consciousness that she
cannot compete with the Southern States of
this Union-in the growth of those great sta
pies of the warm climates, sugar and cotton.
Her tropical colonies, worked 10y white labor,
which is unified for the task, cannot, by any
possibility, produce the articles desired-and
particularly cotton, that king of commerce
to the extent to which they can most readily
be produced by the slave labor of the South.
The greater the expansion of the South,
therefore, by the acquisition of new regions
adapted to her labor, the more are England
and other commercial nations thrown into
the shade, The Northern States are accused
of being actuated by something of the same
spirit, and of being opposed to the cxpan
sion of the South because their interests lie in
the direction of free labor and in not having
it competed with by slave labor However,
that may be, certain it is that the North is
opposed to the spread of the institution, and
| just as certain as the doctrine Of non inter
/ ycntion is stricken from the Democratic creed
just SO certain will northern force and senti-
ment in the halls Of the National Legislature
restrict slavery to its present limits, by some
process or other A system of Governmental
policy will gradually be substituted in the
place of non-interyention, which will oblit.
crate the last vestigc Of hope for the South
in the contest for Territorial acquisition or
the growth and success of her institutions.
The Democratic party, as we have said can
alone preserve her, and the Democratic par
ty must stand on the doctrines Of non.inter.
ycntion or perish.
The IRIsH.-That wonderfully acute sheet,
the Express, says that the Democratic papers
are down on Downey, the Lecompton nomi.
nee for Lieut. Governor. because he is an
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