The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-12-28

Editorial Opinions Of the Leading Journals
upon Current Topios-CompiIed Every
Day for the Evening Telegraph.
SAN DOMINGO AND CUBA.

Cuba by means of Joint resolution, intro
duced into the Senate by John Slidell, appro-
priating thirty millions of dollars to enable
the President to open negotiations for the
purchase of that island.
1t was we'll understood that this measure
was brought forward in the interests of the
slavery propagandists, and was to be made a
test of fidelity to the Democratic party.
Aside from the main OBJ ect, the resolution OF
Slidell was intended to drive Stephen A.
Douglas from the leadership of the party,
where he was exhibiting too lofty spirit of
independence, and was intoxicating the heresy
that genuine Democracy had higher mis-
sion to perform than to enlarge the dominion
and perpetuate the sway of negro slavery.
Buchanan, Slidell, and their confederates OF
the old 9egtme further determined that if they
could not reduce the Hotspur of the North
west to the ranks, they would, by means of
their Cuban annexation scheme, put him
under the party ban as a factionist and
hereto.
The debate in the Senate opened by an
effort on the part of MIR. Doolittle to lay aside
she Cuban resolution and take up in its stead
the Homestead bill; and it was on this mere
question of preference in the order of busi-
ness that the main debate took place. All
the great chiefs bore part in the conflict,
which ragged through the day and far into the
night Slidell, Toombs, and Mason led the
pro-slavery wing of the Democracy; Douglas,
with some assistance from sturdy Charles
Stuart of Michigan, held aloft the indepen-
dent banner of the old-fashioned Democracy
of the school of Jackson and Wright; while
Seward, Wade, and other Republican Sena-
tors ever and anon kept thrusting into the
controversy the proposition started by Doo-
little at the opening of the debate, that it was
wiser to give the unoccupied territory we now
had to our landless poor than to expend mil
lions in the purchase of new territory to be
cultivated by slaves.
This adroit flank movement, which en-
bodied just enough of the popular element to
give Douglas an opportunity to attack the
main question from Democratic standpoint
greatly annoyed Slidel and especially Toombs
who bore the brunt of the contest near the
close of the debate. Toombs fought shy of
Douglas, whom he admired and sometimes
feared; but he assailed Seward and Wade
ridiculing them as the advocates of the 'sans-
cuotte lacklanders,' whom he denounced as
mere trespassers who ought to be kicked off
the public domain. He shook his fist at Se-
ward, who happened a. that moment to be
quietly smoking a cigar in the doorway of the
cloak-room, and arraigned him as destitute of
all statesmanlike ideas, and only equal to
playing the slippery arts of a small dema-
gogue. Then turning to Wade, whose seat
was right by the side of his own Toombs,
his knotted locks bristling with excitement,
sneered at Wade, who till then he had
always supposed was a man of moderate
courage, for being afraid of the lacklanders
and for skulking from the real question at
issue.
This personal sally brought Wade to his
feet, his eye flashing defiance. Stepping
close up to Toombs, and bringing his fist
heavily on his desk. he said in tones that
made the chamber ring, "Afraid. am not
aware that ever saw anything or anybody
L. ;o1,A r
afraid Of Toombs drew his chair back a
little ''Skulk the issue? No" thundered
Wade; 81 am ready to go to the people upon
it-Land for tie landless versus niggers for
the niggerless.' The packed galleries could
stand it no longer, and broke out with loud
applause, which, in spite of Vice-President
Breckinridges gavel, rose, as Douglas shook
hands with Wade, into three cheers for cold
Ben and the Little Giant"
The marrow of the controversy was touched
when Mason declared that no Democrat hold
ing the doctrines of the Senator from Illinois
could get single electoral vote from the
South in the next Presidential campaign,
which Douglas instantly checkmated by the
vehement assertion that no Democrat who
held the sentiments OF the Senator from Vir-
ginia could carry single Congressional dis
trict in the North. The prophecy of each
was fulfilled in 1860, when Breckinridge and
their respective sections
This debate sounded the death-knell of the
Buchanan -Slidell plot for the purchase of
Cuba. After lying while on the table of the
Senate, the resolution was quietly withdrawn.
But, though the Cuban conspirators were
able to strike down Douglas, the blow re-
coiled, and ruined the Democratic party, thus
preparing the way for the success Of Lincoln
in the next Presidential election.
Do General Grant and his hackers in the
San Domingo job read and inwardly digest
political history? If they ever open and
ponder its instructive volumes, do they not
perceive that they are to-day in this discredi-
table plot playing the perilous game which
Buchanan, Slidell, Toombs, and their asso-
ciates played in their Cuban job; while Sum-
ner, Schurz, Morrill,, and their supporters
stand, in respect to the real sentiments of
the Republican party, precisely where Doug
las and his friends stood as the representa-
tives of the time-honored traditions of the
Democratic party! Grant may, by means
of his patronage, be able to place Sua-
ner temporarily under the ban of the
Executive displeasure; and by the aid of his
retainers he may even succeed in consum-
mating his San Domingo scheme, though this
we seriously doubt. In any event, he has
already destroyed the harmony of the Repub-
lican party and if he persist in driving home
this wedge, he will rend it asunder, and leave
it to fall an easy prey to its opponents in the
Presidential struggle upon which the country
Is now entering.
Is General Grant, without any Republican
record behind him, so blind, or so vain, or so
obstinate as not to see that he cannot win in
contest with men who founded the Repub-
icanlparty, and spent the best years of their
lives IN impressing its principles upon the
h. l. a.