Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1860-11-23

now passing through an ordeal that must
impress the people of this country aud all
other countries either for good or bad,
concerning our plan of government, and
either that. We will now disintegrate aud
fail, as Hamilton feared NO would, or that
VIC will, through the vitality of the demo-
cratic thcory-which is but another namo
for the re-actiye infallibility orthe popular
instincts-risc superior to the dangers of
the hour, and live and permanently estab-
lish the sway ofour system. 1.-THE goveru-
mentis notsuperiorto the contingencies ari-
siugout ofthe operations of its fundamental
idea, viz, that ofthe elective or self-perpet-
uating provision-then. indeed, is it an OBJ
vious and monstrous failure. An elective
government, depending on periodical exer-
else of the voting franchise, in order to
obtain the instramentalines, OF, perhaps
We should say the personalities, neces.
sary to keep tue government in exis-
tence, is simply apalpable dead failure
whenever from any cause the exercise
of the franchise Is nulli6ed. And for
the best reason in the world, that such
a notification makes clean, fnal and
irremediable overthrow of the elective
principle. Either the people must rule by
majorities or they mustresortto revolution
nudproclaim the end and failure of the popu-
rprincipleing government We defylivinE
man toconfute these alternatives. Well now,
the disturbances going on III parts of the
South make up case of this sort, and one
which is to try the worth of the federative
system of democratic compromises, which
we call the government. And it seems to
US, the more and more VIC look into the
matter, that General Jackson's heroic con-
illusions on epoints-therig of seces-
sion and nulIifcation-cau never be i'm
proved upon, but must now be either
adopted and enforced or else their anarch-
ical antipodes conceded. And, of course,
in concession of the kind, government
ends and revolution commences. For, as
Jackson well said,
To say that any State may at pleasure
secede from the Union, is to say that the
United States are not a nation; because it
would BET solecism to contend that any
part of nation might dissolve its connec-
ton with the other parts, to their injury
or ruin, without committing any offence.
Secession, like any other revolutionary act,
may be morally justified by the extremity
of oppression, but to callit a constitution
al right is confoundiug tile meaning OF
terms. and can only be done through gross
error, or to deceive those who are willing
to asserta right, but would pause before
they made revolution, OF incur the penal
ties consequent upon failure.
The question then is, as we said in the
outset, will the government, either by
choice or through the Deficiencies of its
Plan of organization, yield to faction, OF
will it prove strong enough to Pit down
that faction? This is the great problem
the greatest and most solemn of all polit-
ical problems ever tested-which is now
upon its trial before the world. The result
ocrdtIc pr1ncrpTe. 11uy uou, inns seconu
time, "turn the counsels of Ahithophel to
foolishness," and preserve to the human
race the possibility of people to be free