The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1860-07-26

Cotton and the ConstitutIen-The Rela-
tioas OF Politics, Industry and Trade.
The programme of the present political cam.
paign is being rapidly narrowed down to the
single issue between the parties and the poll
icians perceive more clearly every day the
futility of endeavoring to range the people
upon abstract questions of distant and doubt
full results, when the very existence Of cotton
and the constitution is at stake.
Herein lies the mistake OF the political mana
gers and wirepullers. They believed that the
masses could be bound to party allegiance and
party man9uvres the sole object Of which is to
obtain or secure possession Of the spoils by sen
timental appeals and nice abstract distinctions
They forget the intimate relation that exists be-
tween the material interests of the country and
the stability of its principles Of government
the electric chain that binds the principles
and the pockets of voters. Nowhere has a
government or party ever been able
to obtain o permanent establishment when
the policy which animated it has been in direct
antagonism with the interests of production and
trade. Before these all ideas and theories
must recede, for political, moral and religious
theories depend alike upon the material welfare
OF the people for their observance. The hungry
man will attend to the needs Of the body before
those Of the soul and he who is pressed by
poverty will provide for himself in preference
to alleviating his neighbor.
1t is upon these immutable principles that the
intimate relations between cotton and the con-
stitution stand. During the present year the
Southern States have produced and exported,
in round numbers, four and half millions
bales Of cotton, valued at two hundred and
twenty-five millions Of dollars while yet in its
crude state, and before the merchant, the ma
riner, or the manufacturer had put hand to it
to double, triple and quadruple its value to
men. From this fountain flows an immense
stream Of employment and profit, which creates
and quiokens innumerable branches of in
dustry in all parts of the country. The
shipowners and the manufacturers of New
England, the merchants and mechanics Of
New York, and the manufacturers aud
miners of Pennsylvania and New Jersey,
all draw no small portion Of their daily wages
and profits from the stream that rises in the
cotton fields Of the South. II the constitution
should be interpreted and administered by
zealots or fanatics in sense adverse to cotton,
it would be the constitution, and not the cotton,
that would be in danger. In this cotton is only
symbolical Of thousand other interests, and
oil Of these would naturally rouse themselves
to the effort Of selfpreservation.
This is the operation that is now going on in
the commercial, manufacturing and mininr
States The political contest is being stripped
OF all the distractions, humbugs and fallscies
that professional politicians have so long ham,
pered party organizations with, and we are
coming down to the great substratum Of prin-
oiple that underlies all parties All the hungry
spoilsmen that switched Of from the true line
OF constitutional Interpretation with Douglas
and the anti-Lecompton men IRE pouring. into
the black republican camp to assist in the re-
evolutionary and destructive abolition assault
upon the constitution, while, on the other
hand, the thousands Of merchants, mauufactu-
Iers, miners and mechanics. freed from the dead
issues Of whiggery, Know Nothingism and abo-
lition, are coming up TO the support Of Breck-
inridge and the Interpretation Of the constitu-
ton in a manner Just and protective to the
equal interests Of all. These are the only live
principles that exist in the present contest and
before November every man will find himself
impelled by the increasing impulse Of the day
to declare for one or other Of the only two
representative men-Breckinridge or Lincoln.
The same working is visible in oil ether parts
Of the country, though not yet with the same
intensity as where the quick pulses of COM
mcrce and industry run. In every State in the
Union, government as well as people have felt
themselves compelled to pause and see where
we are going to. This has broken up all the
old parties, for in them much was found to con-
denim. The democratic party organizations
broke down under the weight Of their corrup-
ton and rascality; the Know Nothing leaders
have lost their power TO trade away their fol-
lowers, and the black republicans have been
compelled to lower their tone and reeede from
their ultra positions by the very fear Of deser.
ton BY their followers. Stewards position as a
party leader was strong and marked in his
brutal and bloody speech in ISIS; in 1859 he
fell back to much more conservative position;
and where he will stand in 1850 il not yet
known. 1t was cotton and the constitution
tina, forced him and his party to partial re-
treat, and which is to-day operating everywhere
among the people to the overthrow of the black
designs Of the abolnionist and their republican
allies and abettors.
MI. DorGLAs IN THE SorTu.-Itis very evident
that from day TO day the little party in the
South devoted to the interests Of Mr. Douglas is