Rensselaer Gazette, Volume 3, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 August 1859 — The Douglas Programme. [ARTICLE]

The Douglas Programme.

The mos conspicuous quality of Mr. Senator Douglas is an untiring and unparalleled audacity. In a woman, it would be called effrontery; in a common man, impudence; in a soldier, heroic valor; but, in a politician, who has neither the qualities of a woman or a soldier, audacity is its proper name—bold, shameless, and persevering. It is not a quality to be despised; for audacity has often won a battle when skill would have lost it. It imposes spon shallew men for talent, upon brave men for courage, and upon timid men with the assumption of success. It has a certain sort of popularity with the multitude, V/ho rather like a man, who, without the taw.” 1 to bl ‘ a £T nera, > yet boldly assumes to be a tedder. i . l .'“ r e is a sort of claim upon the smiles of foridPe, in C. n e who has the impudence to ask her favor, without one earthly virtue to deserve.it. Mr. Douglas develops his own talent with a perfectly admirable perseverance. He has now formed his programme for the performances at Charleston, and it is attended with all his usual modesty and discretion. In the columns of tho Cincinnati Enquirer, (in.a recent elaborate article,) his heralds proclaim war upon the Administration—defy the South and assert in advance the triumph of the Douglas Democracy. In his private caucusses in New York, he claims the lead of the party, considers his nomination certain, asserts success, and has the impi dence to tell his fellows he can get the North-west. All this has a definite meaning, which has at last emerged from the obscurity in which it was long hid, and reveals to the public the plan of the campaign. After ton affair, there was much billing and cooing between Douglas and the Administration; he almost swallowed himself whole, but us that was a thing not q .ite possible, he did not succeed, and he was obliged to leave Buchanan, humiliated but unsuccessful. He next made his tour to the South, and conciliated a portion of tho Democracy there with unmeaning explanations of hie grand pana-

cea, Squatter Sovereignty. He was compelled o be satisfied with a few crumbs, and I returned to the North to arrange a coup de main. This is nothing less than to carry | the Charleston Convention. How is that to be done! It is not impossible. First, the tree States have a majority of the delegates, and in most of these the political machinery is in the hands of the Douglas men. In the next place, a few scattered Douglas delegates, to give coloring to the affair, are expected in the South; arid lastly the main instrument is to impose upon the timid of his party, the idea that he alone can be successful. It is in this that his great talent and audacity is available. Certainly he never had more need of it. The obstacles seem almost insuperable. The first great obstacle is the hostility of the Administration, and as that is not to be got over the Enquirer article takes ground that it is weak and powerless. Douglas is the great oracle of the North. Such weak things as the Constitution, (the President’s organ.) Bigler,(his right hand Senator,) Cook, (his postmaster at Chicago,) et id omngenus— comprising the whole Administration party, are nobodies, froth and scum, to be put aside by one move of the hand from the mighty Douglas! There is much thunder, and some little heat of lightning, in this proclamation from the clouds, but no storm worth fearing. Not only has Douglas to fig ,t the Administration, but he has to brave nearly the whole South, and face another body of men whom, pet haps, he has thought little of. In halt the States voting for Buchanan, there would have been no majority, without a large body of old Whigs. Such was the case in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee. No scheme .of politics can be more abhorrent to these men than that of Douglas, for it presents no feature but that of a bare-faced demagogue. The programme of Douglas, then, is nothing more nor less than this: Having almost destroyed the Administration, he asks its help; having reduced the Democratic party to a Southern party, he asks the South not to be South; as timing Squatter Sovereignty, (the very antipodes of anything conservative,) he expects conservatives to support him; and, in fine, having opposed every element of his party in succession, he expects them all to combine to favor his pretensions. If this be the hight of audacity,it is also the hight of absurdity. The truth is theie is nothing in this assumption, but assumption. His followers talk of the cabinet apprentice, about to be cabinet-maker, and of the little ] giant about to achieve great events. This i was the cry of his partisans in 1852, sucI ceeded by the nomination of Pierce. Is this ! prestige any better now than then! Is he not the main cause of the events which have shattered and scattered his party! Let us see. The Nebraska-Kansas Act was emphatically the act ol Douglas. It contained the Squatter Sovereignty principle, and this act was deliberately prepared as a great measure to settle the slavery question, and give peace to the country.. What followed. . the world knq‘vs. series of most unprecei uented acts of wrong and violence —a civil ' commotion —nay, even a civil war, contin- ’ ued agitation, the usurpation of the govern--1 ment. the continuance of the slavery agitaj tion with no prospect of its settlement. Such are the fruits of this one measure ot Mr. Senator Douglas, and this is the presI tige of his statesmanship. But, was his ' leadership any more successful! What I was, and what is, the Democratic, party of ; the North! Let old Democrats answer. In i the sixteen free States of 1852, the Demo--1 cratic party had a majority in fourteen — giving 164 electorial votes. In 1856, The Democratic party had in these States, five States—giving 62 electoral votes. Looking to the Senate, we find, when the Nebraska Act was passed, the Democratic party had twenty-one Senators from the free States, to eleven Opposition. Now, that party has in tire same States, seven, to twenty-five Republicans. Looking a little farther, the Democratic party has no majority in any free States but Indiana and California. All this was the legitimate consequence of the Kan-sas-Nebraska Act, which overturned old principles, and opened up the slavery question to continued agitation. Five years have p issed, and neither the President, the Supreme Court, nor political parties, have been able to construe the act. in any permanent way, or conciliate the adverse elements which it called into existence. What then, is Mr. Douglas’ prestige, but that of lailure? He failed to get the nomination of his party, when that party could have given him a victorious result. He failed to get anything but agitation and defeat, from what he supposed a great peace measure of his own. He fails to anounce any system of policy which may benefit the country : r reform abuses. He is successful only in the narrow field of State or party controversy, where tl’-e art and audacity of a demagogue is more vailable than the talents of a statesman.— Cincinnati Gazette. Errors in Raising Stock.—Prof. James McCall, a distinguished veterinarian of Ed in burg, strongly condemns some practices which are common in every country. He says breeding in and in, or keeping one bull more than one year upon a farm, predisposes any herd to disease and deterioration. Preventing calves from sucking their mothers when quite young, or feeding them only twice a day, weakens both stomach and constitution. Crossing the herd of one farmer at a distance with another, letting calves suck when young, and feeding them sparingly from three to six times a day, are ways of promoting health and saving the expense of a veterinarian. r Connersville Times tells the following story: “We learn that the wife of Josiah Harris, living in the south-west part of this county, gave birth to three fine, large and healthy children a few days ago—two girls and one boy. The three weighed twenty-one pounds. Curiosity has induced many persons to call and see the trio, several of the visitors esteeming it a privilege to pay for the sight in clothing for them. The parents, we presume, do not seriously object to accept the presents, considering the hard times. (K?’A contract has been let in Toledo, 0., and the work has commenced, for the boring of twenty artesian wells, to he located at the corners of the streets in various parts of the city, for the accommodation of the public.