Year: 1860

[ Jefferson county on the 9th of August next for the purpose of approving the nomlna- ton of JOIN c. BRECKENRIDGE and JosEPH LANE.

 It is not in my power to be present; but courtesy requires, and confess inclination prompts me, to acknowledge and reply to your invitation.

 I, four years ago, determined to with draw for all the future from any active par ticipation in political affairs and contro- versies in Arkansas; and from that deter mination, deli oerately and as 1 think wisely taken, it is not my purpose now or ever hereafter to depart.

 may perhaps be permitted to add. not as matter of any possible interest to any other human being, but only to repel in advance the supposition that ambition ln- Auences me. that twenty years ago l set tied it with myself that l would never ask or accept from any quarter any political offire whatever.

 Still 1 am not nsensible to the duties which every private citizen owes to h's country; and 1 know that. one of those du- ties is frankly to declare his opinions upon grave political questions, and the reasons upon which those opinions are founded, whenever it peases his fellow-citizens to demand that he should do so.

 It seems to me that such a question has now arisen, before which all others must for time pale their fires; since 1t IS one that deals, as I regard it, with the fundamental bases of the compact between the States of the Union; even with what underlles the Constitutions; and since on It's solution In one or the other manner, depends, as l cannot but think, the permanence of the Union itself.

 You are at no loss to know to what ques- ton alude. It is, in it's present aspect, that of the rights of fifteen of these States that now with their Peers are joined to- gether in unity, in the common territory, purchased with the money or won by the blood of all. It is at bottom the question of the nature of the general government, of who are the parties to the compact ot union, and of the equality in rights and dignity of all the States.

 1t is evident that these are not questions to be dealt with as they should be, ln the compass of single letter. Nor is it the best time in which to discuss them, when the people are called upon to decide be- tween the claims of several candidates for the Presidency, zealously pressed upon them by their respective partizans, and in which controversy so much that is personal inevitably mingles.

 These grave questions will not be settled now. One great and patriotic party de- clines to entertain them; and personal ad' miration for the character of gallant chief tain on the part of his enthusiastic adhe- rents will help to prevent even the South at present, from announcing with a single voice. what seems to me to be the only true constitutional doctrine.

 But the time will come, l hope, after the bitterness, the angers, the recriminations and the injustices of this contest are over, and there is no longer any question of men, when in all the southern States there will be but one opinion on these questions.- Who shall sucreed or who shall be defeated now, is of comparatively little moment. I hardly bestow thought on that. That the South shall offer no divided front and be distracted by no conflicting counsels on the great issue that will no longer be de nied solution-this is of an importance so grave that all else of controversy when set by it's side dwindles into meagre insig- nficance.

 I have no right to assume that my opin- ions will be of any weight with any living creature; ans if I were to consult only v my own taste and inclinations. l should con- tinue, as heretofore, to print my thoughts for the perusal of only few indulgent friends, and publish nothing. l am sorry I do not now feel at liberty to do so

 There are three principal opinions upon the subject of slavery in the common ter. ritory of these States.

 One is that on which the republican par. ty firmly plants itself; that the Congress of the United States has the power in its pleasure, without question from any quar- ter, to prohibit or abolish slavery in any part of that territory.

 The second is, that the States, so assem- bled in Congress, have not that power; but that when they have organized provincla government, the people of that province have, through their legislature, the power without question from any quarter, to dc what Congress cannot. And this right and power are attempted to be deduced from what is termed the inherent right O. the people to govern themselves and con trol their own domestic institutions, to which right the term popular sovereign ty' has been applied; while others, less reverent, characterize it by the name oi 'squatter sovereignty

 E The third is, that neither the Congress nor the people of the territories, or theil | Legislatures, possess any such power; which can only be exercised in the creation of 2 new State and the adoption of its consti tution: that this conclusion is simple corollary from the proposition that the right of the emigrant from southern State to the common territory, to continue tc hold his slaves there, is constitutiona right; from which it results, as Mir. DoUG LAS once said it necessarily would, Mot nt pover on earM can lamfully deprive him 9 that riyAt-and, as another and equally ne cessarv corollary from the same proposi