Daily national Democrat., 1860-08-24
The Positions sl the BrecIsinridge Party.

the doctrine Of non Intervention, the present
houndering in fearful hesitation whether still
to proclaim their adherence TO that doctrine
or deny it, by many, and the openly avowed
disunion sentiments Of others Of those leaders,
must be painfully perplexng to men who
have proclaimed their adhesion to that party
and yet retain sentiments Of love and hdelity
to the Union-still think that the psrpetua-
tion of the Union is the best and only mode
Of preserving the peace, prosperity, and the
rights. of every portion of the country-it IN
deed there be any such persons still remain
ing in that party.
That the doctrine of these leaders Of the
secession, or Breckenridge, party, who had
not until recently, by joining it, identified
themselves with the avowed disunionists,
was non Intervention as now maintained by
Douglas and the Democratic party, is over
whelmingly proved by their speeches deliv.
cred, and printed and distributed all over the
country, during the Presinential campaign of
1856. The shameful absurdity of the pre-
tence in which some of them now try to hide
their inconsistency and bad faith, namely -
That they did not then understand the doc
trine as Douglas now interprets it, becomes
most glaringly apparent upon comparison
Of the speeches, letters, etc, then put forth
by those leaders, as well as by Douglas, and
cast far and wide over the land by the Ma
tonal Democratic Committee, as the text
books of Democratic doctrine, with the
avowals by Douglas of this same principle of
non Intervention made in the present cam
paign.
We defy any one to show by fair and
impartial exhibition of his record that Doug
las now maintains this principle in any
broader, more unqualified, or essentially diff
ferent sense than he did during the campaign
of 1856 Breckenridge and Lane, themselves,
have, again and again, given this doctrine as
broad an Interpretation and unreserved au
endorsement as Douglas ever demanded for
it. This principle they, as we'll as Douglas,
sdvOcsted from the stump in the campaign of
IS. They did not affect to misunderstood
him then. They cordially agreed with him,
and in common with all the Democratic ora
tors gave him loud and hearty plaudits for
his noble service in aiding to establish the
doctrine of Non-intervention, as well by SOL
emn enactments of Congress ASA no less Diff
cult task-in the hearts and Judgment of the
people.
But in their perplexity others of this delec-
table party urge. in utter inconsistency with
and refutation of the plea that the doctrine
itself of Non-intervention was not understood
by them as it is now held by Douglas and
those who support him; "that the adoption
of the principle in 1854 by the Democratic
members of Congress, in their solemn councils
and by solemn enactment of Congress" /"
settlement of question and a contest
endangering the peace of the country and
the existence of the Union, its subsequent
ratification by the national conventions of the
Democratic and "Whig parties, its deliberate
sanction by party Conventions and State
Legislatures from end to end of the Union
all amounted to nothing more than a mere
temporary expedient, intended to serve only
until the Supreme Court should in
some case which should arise before
it, liable to be presented at any time,
the next week, or the next month, decide the
question of the right to hold slaves in the
Territories and there to be abandoned. Could
greater farce be conceived than all the bit,
ter strife and the protracted deliberation
which proceeded the adoption of this princi-
pie in the Kaesas~N ebraska Act, and the
solemn sanctions and joyous peans which
hailed and greeted its adoption, over mere
temporary expedient liable to be abandoned
in month after its adoption? ? For the ben
eft of any who may be liable to be deceived
by this trick of the Interventionists, we insert
the following extracts from letter of Alex
ander II. Stephens, of Georgia, written in
reply to interrogatories of his fellow citizens
upon the propriety of Southern Democrats
seeding from the Charleston and Baltimore
Conventions
In the first place, then, assume, as an un>
questioned and unquestionable fact, that non
interve ntion. as stated, has been for MANY
years received, recognized, and acted upon.
as the settled doctrine of the South. By nom
Intervention | mean the principle that Con.
gress shall pass no law upon the subject of
slavery in the territories, either for or against
1t, in any way-that they shall not interfere
or act upon 1t at all-or, in the express words
OF Mr. Calhoun, the great Southern leader.
that Congress shall 'leave the whole subject
where the Constitution and the great princi-
pie OF self'goveFnment places it," This has
been eminently Southern doctrine.
1t was announced by Mr.. Calhoun, in his
speech in the Senate, on the 9th of June
l64s; and, after two year Of discussion. was
adopted as basis of the adjustment finally
made in 1880 1t was the demand of the
South, put forth by the South, and since its
establishment has been again and again af
irmed and reaffirmed as the settled policy of
the South, by party conventions and State
Legislatures, in every form that people can
give authoritative expression to their will
and wishes. This cannot now be matter of
doubt. 1t is history, as indeibly fixed upon
the record as the fact that the colony of
Georgia was settled under the auspices of
Oglethorpe, or that the war of the American
revolution was fought in resistance to the
unjust claim OF power on the part of the
British Parliament
The only cause Of ofcomplaint have heard
10, that non Intervention, as established in
1850. and carried out in 1854, is understood
- the North as it is at the South; that while
we hold that, in leaving "the whole subject
where the Constitution and the great pfin-
ciples OF self-government place it," the com
mon Territories are to remain open for settle
ment by southern people, with their slaves.
until otherwise provided by a State Consti-
tuition. the friends and supporters of the
same doctrine at the North maintrin that.