right of the States to control their own domestic institutions in their own way, have been violations of the Constitution and the true principles on which our Government is founded, and subversive of the peace and good order thereof.

That the President has no power to admit new States, in peace or war, nor is it given to him, by any authority of the Constitution, to impose restrictions on States, by way of punishment or pardon; and every attempt by the Executive in the conducting of the present civil war so to act upon citizens, by force or by pardon, as to induce or compel a change of the Constitution of the State to which citizens belong, is as clearly the exercise of despotic power as any unconstitutional act can be such acts, if carried out, are as much punishment upon the innocent as upon the guilty.

That, if secession or revolution is put down by the power of the Government, the States, whose people attempted to secede, must remain precisely in all political power, the same as before the attempt was made, and if secession should be recognized as a principle, or be accepted as a fact, such States should thus be out of the Union could only be readmitted, under the Constitution, into the Union, upon the same principle of State rights, as if they were new States, and for the first time admitted therein.

We declare that Congress has no power under the Constitution to suspend, or prepare for suspending the writ of habeas corpus, except when in the case of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it; and any and every enactment which attempts to continue the suspension after the

cause for it has ceased, is a violation of the Constitution.

That any and every arrest of citi zens, or other persons, by the Presi dent, or any other officer, or agent of the United States, civil or military, while the writ of habeas corpus is sus pended, is properly the subject of inquiry by the civil tribunals of the country, and the just subject of punishment; and no power exists any where to deprive a citizen, or other person, whose person or property has been so violated, from seeking and ob taining full redress in the courts of justice.

That any and every attempt by Congress to exonerate public officers, or agents from responsibility for the wrongs they wantonly inflict on the people, is a violation of the Constitution of the United States, as well as an outrage upon human rights.

That the true and only test of loy alty is obedience to the Constitution and laws made in pursuance thereof. That as the Constitution has given no power anywhere, but has expressly forbidden Congress to pass any laws to abridge the freedom of speech and the press, or prevent the people from assembling together to consider and petition the Government for a redress of grievances; those officers and agents of the United States who have been arresting citizens for exercising these plain Constitutional rights, and imprisoning them for disloyalty by reason thereof, are themselves disloy al and traitors to the Constitution they were sworn to support.

That we never can consent to the absurd idea that the President of the United States, or any of his subordinates, military or civil, can by declar

ing martial law, suspend or set aside the Constitution and laws of the land in places where there are no hostile obstructions to the full enforcement of the laws. And every effort by the military to hinder or obstruct the enforcement of the civil authority where it can be enforced, is the exercise of despotic power.

For the safety of human liberty, we prefer to trust the civil, rather than any military rule.

We further declare that the Constitution of the United States provides peaceable remedies for correcting such abuses as the agents and officers of the United States may commit against the States or people, and for correcting wrongs which may be done or attempted by the officers and agents of the States against the United States, or against the people of the States.

Some may be corrected by the Executives of the States, or Executive of the United States, some by Congress or by the Legislatures, some by the Courts of Justice, and all by refusing to re-elect or appoint to offices those who have done the wrongs or those having the power, and refusing to correct the abuses, and by putting better agents in their places. There are also the remedies by appeals to the Congress and Legislatures, and also to the people to make amendments to the Constitution of the United States.

Should all these peaceful remedies fail after fair trials, owing to the power of a usurping and oppressive ma. jority, then we hold the rights reserved to the States and people thereof by the Constitution of the United States, can and ought to be used for the protection of the States.

Amongst these rights is that of self

preservation; of self-defence. Just as broad as the rights of self-defence to an individual, which no power on earth can justly take away, or individual surrender to the government or any part thereof. Under this right the State may protect its sovereignty, its property, and its people, against the United States or any other power attempting to enslave or destroy the people, their property, or the State.

We here declare that as lovers of the Union, made by the fathers, we will never consent to yield to the government of the United States any further power to control or regulate persons or property within the States, than such as was given by the Constitution as it is.

We deem the powers granted to the government of the United States, ample if faithfully carried out, for all the necessary purposes for which the Union was formed; and we are not willing to alter them by enlarging or abridg ing them.

We declare that the people of the so-called Southern Confederacy, did themselves, and their friends in the other States, great and grievous wrong in attempting to dissolve the Union. Had their Congressmen remained at their posts, they, with the aid of those opposed to the party in power, might have preserved the Union, and the mischief this sectional party has done, and all the horrors of a civil war of over three years duration might have been prevented.

We declare it as the judgment of the Democratic party, as it appears to be the judgment of the civilized world, that the present war ought never to have been begun; that its continuance is destructive not only to the in

terests of the people of both sections of the United States, but to the christianity and civilization of the day; and endangers the peace of other nations, whose business relations have been and are closely connected with those of the people of all the American States.

The continuance of the war, in our judgment, can work out but one of two conclusions, separation or subjugation. To both of those we are opposed. We prefer any and all compromises which will bring us back to the government made by our fathers, and the faithful performance of all duties under it.

We were a great and prosperous people, a mighty nation, the pride and glory of the lovers of Constitutional liberty every where on the face of the earth. We were made such under the guidance of statesmen and patriots, who, while members of parties, always loved their country, their Constitution and the Union, better than they loved their party.

The Democratic party was mainly instrumental in conducting the nation to the high position it had attained, before the party now in power obtained the ascendant, by adhering to a strict construction of the Constitution of the United States, and by obeying its requirements, regardless of the clamors of the bigots and fanatics, and by enforcing obedience to the laws made to protect the persons and pro

perty of the citizens of one State, when in the limits or jurisdiction of another State.

When the Democratic party are put into power again, there will be peace in the whole land, an honorable peace between the people of all the States.

We bere declare that we are for peace, and want all the people of the earth to know it; we want no more shedding of fraternal blood, no more destruction of property; no more sacking of cities, towns and villages; no more rapine and plunder; these fiendish practices can make no peace, restore no fraternal ties, restore no Union.

We want no more widows and or phans, no more maimed, halt and blind; no more assessors, taxes, and tax gatherers; no more greenbacks, 5-20's or 10-40's.

We want bread and meat, raiment and apparel, at the old Democratie peace prices; we want free speech, the right to read such newspapers as we please, and not to be restricted by men made great only by shoulder straps and bayonets.

We want respect by the military to the civil power. We want no more "running of the churches" by the military; and both in and out of church we want to hear the voices of all good men, everywhere, crying: "peace on earth and good will to all mankind."

WHICH shall we have? It is needless to say that neither was our choice 'for the nomination. Our objections to General McClellan's nomination were plainly stated in the August number of THE OLD GUARD. We see no occasion to modify or change the opinions there uttered. As a man, as a citizen, and as a General, we entertain the highest respect for General McClellan. We have no doubt of the entire sincerity of his opinions; nor do we less doubt that these opinions are not at all in agreement with the principles entertained by the Democracy from the days of Jefferson and Madison to the present time. On the questions involved in the issues before the country, the Democratic party has a clean and unbroken record. It has ever, in all campaigns, stood firmly upon the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of 1798. Indeed the party was organized, in the first place, by Jefferson and Madison, on the basis of those rcsolutions, to beat back the accumulating despotism involved in the centralization schemes of the Federalists under the administration of John Adams.

The third clause of the Virginia Resolutions, which were drawn by Mr. Madison, who is justly called the father of the Constitution, reads as follows:

"This Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it views the powers of the Federal Government as resulting from the compact to which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting that compact,

as no farther valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact; and that in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers not granted by the said compact, the States who are parties thereto have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose, for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining, within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them."

This resolution has a thousand times been affirmed and re-affirmed as the

creed of Democracy. Indeed never, from 1798 to 1861, had there been any dispute on this question. No man, calling himself a Democrat, ever denied it. No Convention, calling itself Democratic, ever occupied any other ground It has been as much the creed of the Democracy as the New Testament has been the creed of Christians. Indeed to deny the sentiments of this resolution was, and is to renounce Democracy; for, as we have said, the party was formed for the very purpose of establishing these sentiments in opposition to the centralizing despotism of Federalism.

In Mr. Madison's report to the Virginia House of Delegates, at the session of 1800, he said:

"The States, then, being the parties to the Constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity that there can be no tribunal above their authority, to decide, in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated; and consequently, that as the parties to it, they must themselves decide, in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition."

Mr. Madison's reasoning is conclusive. The Federal Government is not even a party to the compact. It is the dependent recipient of certain defined powers resulting from the compact, and "granted" by the States. The States alone, as so many distinct sovereignties, are the parties to the compact of Union. These alone are sovereign-just as sovereign after the compact as before the compact was made. This, we repeat, is and has been the creed of Democracy ever since the foundation of the party by those immortal statesmen, one of whom was the author of the Declaration of Independence, and the other the father of the Constitution.

Gen. McClellan's address at West Point, and his letter of acceptance, are proofs that he entertains a very different theory of our government. Unless he is very unfortunate in the use of language to express his ideas, he adopts the delusive theory of the old "Federalists," that the States are subjects of the Federal Government, and to be held in subjection by the force of federal bayonets, just as an Austrian or a Russian colony is held in subjection; or just as England at tempted to hold these colonies in subjection. This theory divests the States of every attribute of sovereignty, and renders every one of the State Constitutions a ridiculous farce or a pernicious fraud. This is Lincoln's theory. Only on this monstrous ground can this war be continued an hour. Adopt the doctrines of the fathers who formed the Federal Constitution, or of the Democracy, which ever stood upon the principles of that Constitution, and you can no more mix in this war upon sovereign States than you can imbrue

your hands in the blood of your neighbors. Stand upon these principles of our fathers, and your quarrel is not with the manner of conducting the war, but with the war itself. That is the great crime which is to be arrested and punished, as something contraband, not only of justice, but of the fundamental principles of our government. On these cardinal points it is certain that Gen. McClellan does not stand with Democracy. He differs with Mr. Lincoln only as to the manner of conducting the war. The kernel of their principles is the same. It is that of old Federalism, which true Democracy ever repudiates.

But, nevertheless, it is true that McClellan is not to be confounded with Lincoln in this war. Though they both adopt essentially the same theory of our government, they differ as widely as heaven and hell from each other in their moral and military modes of supporting that theory. McClellan is for adhering scrupulously to the rules of civilized warfare. Lincoln is for practicing to the extremest limits the brutal customs of savage warfare. McClellan is a Christian and a gentleman. Lincoln is a barbarian and a buffoon. McClellan is humane and tolerant in all his instincts and rules of action. Lincolu is infernal and implacable in every feeling and purpose. The difference between them may be defined to be precisely that between a human being and a fiend; for Lincoln is an infernal. His face is a faithful chart of his soul; and his face is that of a demon, cunning, obscene, treacherous, lying and devilish. Gen. McClellan is the reverse of all this. Not the reverse from any subtle and studied policy, but from natural instinct