The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1861-02-16

WEAKNESS OF THE CHIEF PLANK IN TIT en-
cAGo PLATfoRH.-The leading feature Of the
republican platform is an unjust exclu-
sion of slave labor from the common
territory. Now why, we ask, should noS
the Southern States, with their beneHcent insta
tuition, have an expansion into the Territories
west and south of them? Every foot Of the
public territory has either been coded BIZ
those States, or acquired by the party with
winch they have always been identified, while
tne snti-slsvery party has ever resisted the ~.
qEisition Of tho territory, in which they new
claim monopoly, to the exclusion Of Southern
labor and enterprise.
The first successful assault on slavery in Con-
gress resulted m the Missouri Comuromise !.
1920, prohibiting involuntary servitude in the
territories north of SO deg. 80 min, but admit.
ting Missouri as slave State, though north Of
that line. This was an unconstitutional conpro-
mise, being violation ofthe treaty with France,
which coded the Louisiana territory on condi,
ton that the inhabitants should retain the pr,,
vileges and rights which they then enjoyed Cnr
Guiding slaveholding); for q treaty is made
by the constitution the supreme law Of tho
land 1t was unconstitutional on the attn
broader ground of the right Of property in
slaves and the equality Of the States, and It han
been so pronounced by the Supreme Court In
the bred Scott decision. To make the Missouri
compromise binding, it ought to have been
adopted as an amendment to the constitution;
but the antislavery party were not then strong
enough to accomplish so much. Now the same
party are so strong that the friends Of the Union
cannot obtain from them the very compromise
they then forced on the South. The Northern
aggressors did not really regard the Missouri
Compromise as binding fnality but pursued
their agitation and their denunciations of sla-
very just as if it had never been made. The
Missouri restriction was substantially repealed
by the compromise measures of 1850, and more
formally by the Kansas-N Nebraska act in 1864
The consequence of this repeal was that the
powerless anti-slavery faction rapidly grew
into the powerful republican party, carrying
the war into Africa" and making it the funda-
mental article of their creed that neither north
of the line SO deg 80 min., nor south of il
could slavery have any legal existence in the
Territories, nor would they ever admit another
slave State into the Union. Upon this issue
they have succeeded, by combination Of cir
cumstances, in electing their candidate for Pre-
sident by minority of the popular vote, an
event which has resulted in revolution and the
breaking up of the confederacy.
This alone, probably would not have suficed
to produce such an effect, were it not for tho
overwhelming accession Of power to the North
ern States, arising from the new apportion-
ment of representation in Congress, to be
founded on the census of 1860. The Southern
States fear that the Northern power is now
grown sufficiently strong and sufficiently un-
scrupulous to introduce an amendment into
the constitution abolishing slavery in every
part of the United States. The loss OF Con-
gressionAl equilibrium, closely following the
election of the anti slavery candidate for Pre-
sident, has confirmed the South in its resolu-
ton to overthrow the present arrangement and
obtain satisfactory reconstruction, or erect
separate confederacy, to develop its own dss-
tiny, and hence the result accomplished in
Montgomery on Saturday last.