Year: 1871




JUDGE NICHOLSON, of Tennessee, Mr..
Jacob Thompson, Of Buchanan's cabinet,
and other Southern Democrats, advise
] their party friends in the Southern States
| not to elect delegates to the next Demo
cratic Convention, but to allow the nomi-
nations to be made and the platform to be
prepared by Northern Democrats, with
the understanding that the Southern wing
will support every thing that the conven-
ton does. The reason proposed for this
| policy is that the chances of party success
would be increased by making it impossi-
BILE to declare the party action to have
been controlled by the Southern element.
This is ingenious, but the result would be
that the Southern ascendency in the party
| would be stronger than ever. For If the
convention of the Northern wing should
| declare for the new departure, and its
candidates be elected, two things would
happen: the Southern wing, which has
| always ruled the party, and which has
certain convictions and purposes, would
resume its supremacy; and once IN power,
it would decline to be governed by the
declarations of convention in which it
was not represented, and in whose action
it would insist that it only ac9uiesced
without necessarily justifyisg or approv-
ing it.


Mr.. Nicholson and Mr.. Thompson un-
doubtedly see that their party is radically
divided. They know, what is very evident,
that the mass OF the Southern Democrats
suppose tnat the new departure mesns
unquestioning submission to the negro
vote and to the Ku-Klux legislation, and
that it is, by implication, condemnation
of the lost cause They know also that
there is no such submission, and no in
tention of it; that the Southern wing OF
the party means, if it can only get into
power, "to be even" with the Re-
publican. These gentlemen, there
fore, justly apprehend danger in the
convention. The wing of the party which
has principles for which it has fought, and
which it still cherishes, will not eat the
platform of the last Convention, maze by
| itself, without protest. If in the Ohio
author of the new departure, there was
very positive and resolute minority in op-
position, how much more serious will be
the hostility in the National Convention.
Moreover, the experience Of the last Con
vention, like the whole history of the
party, shows that the Southern element
is still the really controlling force OF the
party, and would prevail in the next Con-
vention or breed fatal discord. Either re-
suit would be disastrous, and therefore
that element think Mr.. Thompson and
Judge Nicholson had better stay at home
Nor will the shallow Interpretation of the
new departure as a mere declaration of ac-
complisned facts probably affect the
it is alleged by the Northern advocates of
the new policy, "have been declared by
the proper authority parts of the Constitu-
ton. It is idle, therefore, to dispute it.
We must make our fight upon their ad-
ministrai.n, upon the way in which they
are to be enforced This is the true
Democratic ground" But the Southern
rejoinder is conclusive, that according to
the Democratic theory the declaration of
the amendments is part OF the usurpation
that they have never been properly
adopted; that they are therefore totally
invalid; and that the true Democratic
ground is the authorized declaration of The
whole party that the entire system of re-
construction, of which the amendments
are the security, is a usurpation, uncon.
stitutional and void.


The subterfuge of the method of en-.
forcement does not deceive the Southern
Democrats. "Since we have declared the
thing to be enforced unconstitutional and
void" they say, "why do you try to cozen
us with rhetoric about the methods of en-
forcement? They are not wise, and they
do not comprehend the situation, but they
are consistent. The Northern Democrats
do understand the situation, and perceive
that it requires them to be inconsistent


They know that the people mean to sus


tain the Republican reconstruction. That


cannot be disturbed, and therefore any


psrty which hopes for success must profes;


acquiescence. The fatal difficulty of tine


new departure is that the Southern Dem


ocrats don't understand it, and the North


ern Democrats don't believe it. A few


persons in that party have at last discov


cred that the legitimate ground of party


difference in free government is admin
istration. But difference as to the nature
of the government itself is revolutionary
When the question is, who rightfully hold
the purse and the sword, not how shall
they be used, there are breakers ahead
English history shows it, and our own his
tory proves it. The Virginia and Ken
lucky resolutions of 1898 were the politi


cal dogmas of the Democratic party, anC


they led, logically, to the war. The New
York Tammany resolutions of 1868, de
claring part of the Constitution void, ar
no less revolutionary.


If, therefore, the Democratic party
would return within the legitimate con
stitutional sphere of difference, it must re


scind these resolutions. 1t may, if i


chooses, declare that in case of success i
would propose other amendments nullify
ing them but if it proposes to contest the
j validity of the Constitutions it may spare
itself trouble and expense, for 1t is already
| defeated. This is what the Southern
| wing neither SEES nor believes, and there
fore its leaders advise its absence from thu
Convention, that the revolutionary ele
| ment which it represents may bide it
time But if this advice should be disre
garded-as it undoubtedly will be-if tn,
t Southern Democrats come to the Conven


ton and quietly follow the lead of thei
t Northern associates, will it be politica
: combination to which the government anC
? welfare of country recently saved from
| the same hands can be safely intrusted p
; Harpsr's Weekly.