After all, then, the great political question to be decided by the people of the country is, will the election of Scott, or the election of Pierce, contribute most to maintain the finality of the Compromise and the peace and harmony of the Union?
Scott’s Northern supporters spit upon and execrate the platform erected by the Whig National Convention. They support General Scott, not because of their adherence to this platform, but in spite of it. They have loudly expressed their determination to agitate the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Law, and thus bring back upon the country the dangerous excitement which preceded its passage. They will not suffer the country to enjoy peace and repose, nor permit the Southern States to manage their own domestic affairs, in their own way, without foreign interference.
Who can doubt that these dangerous men will participate largely in the counsels of General Scott, and influence the measures of his administration? To them he owes his election, should he be elected. He is bound to them by the ties of gratitude. He is placed in a position where he would be more or less than a man, if he could withdraw himself from their influence. Indeed, he has informed us in advance, in the very act of accepting the nomination, that he would seek to cultivate harmony and fraternal sentiment throughout the Whig party, without attempting to reduce its numbers by proscription to exact conformity to his own views. What does this mean, if not to declare that the Free Soil Whigs of the North, and the Compromise Whigs of the South, shall share equally in the honors and offices of the Administration? In the North, where by far the greatest danger of agitation exists, the offices will be bestowed upon those Whigs who detest the Compromise, and who will exert all the influence which office confers, to abolish the Fugitive Slave Law. To this sad dilemma has General Scott been reduced.
On the other hand, what will be our condition should General Pierce be elected? He will owe his election to the great Democratic party of the country,—a party truly national, which knows no North, no South, no East, and no West. They are everywhere devoted to the Constitution and the Union. They everywhere speak the same language. The finality of the Compromise, in all its parts, is everywhere an article of their political faith. Their candidate, General Pierce, has always openly avowed his sentiments on this subject.
He could proudly declare, in accepting the nomination, that there has been no word nor act of his life in conflict with the platform adopted by the Democratic National Convention. Should he be elected, all the power and influence of his administration will be exerted to allay the dangerous spirit of fanaticism, and to render the Union and the Constitution immortal. Judge ye, then, between the two candidates, and decide for yourselves.
And now, fellow-citizens, what a glorious party the Democratic party has ever been! Man is but the being of a summer’s day, whilst principles are eternal. The generations of mortals, one after the other, rise and sink and are forgotten; but the principles of Democracy, which we have inherited from our revolutionary fathers, will endure to bless mankind throughout all generations. Is there any Democrat within the sound of my voice—is there any Democrat throughout the broad limits of good and great old Democratic Pennsylvania, who will abandon these sacred principles for the sake of following in the train of a military conqueror, and shouting for the hero of Lundy’s Lane, Cerro Gordo, and Chapultepec?
“Remember, O my friends! the laws, the rights,
The gen’rous plan of power deliver’d down,
From age to age, by your renown’d forefathers,
So dearly bought, the price of so much blood;