CHAPTER XIV THE BALTIMORE NOMINATIONS. HOUGH the compact voting body of the South CHAP. XIV. had retired from the Charleston Convention, her animating spirit yet remained in the numbers and determination of the anti-Douglas delegates. When on Tuesday morning, May 1, the eighth day, the convention once more met, the Douglas men, with a view to making the most of the dilemma, resolved to force the nomination of their favorite. But there was a lion in the path. Usage and tradition had consecrated the two-thirds rule. Charles E. Stuart, of Michigan, tried vainly to obtain the liberal interpretation, that this meant "two-thirds of the votes given," but Chairman Cushing ruled remorselessly against him, and at the instance of John R. Howard, of Tennessee, the convention voted (141 to 112) that no person should be declared nominated who did not receive twothirds of all the votes the full convention was entitled to cast. This sealed the fate of Douglas. The Electoral College numbered 303; 202 votes therefore were necessary to a choice. Voting for candidates was begun, and continued throughout all the next day (Wednesday, May 2). Fifty-seven ballots were taken in all; Douglas received 145 on the first, CHAP. XIV. and on several subsequent ballots his strength rose to 1521. The other votes were scattered among eight different candidates with no near approach to agreement." The dead-lock having become unmistakable and irremediable, and the nomination of Douglas under existing conditions impossible, all parties finally consented to an adjournment, especially as it was evident that unless this were done the sessions would come to an end by mere disintegration. Therefore, on the tenth day (May 3), the Charleston Convention formally adjourned, having previously resolved to reassemble on the 18th of June, in the city of Baltimore, with a recommendation that the several States make provision to fill the vacancies in their delegations. ་ Mr. Yancey and his seceders had meanwhile organized another convention in St. Andrew's Hall. Their business was of course to report substantially the platform rejected by the Douglas men, and for the rejection of which they had retired. Mr. Yancey then explained to them that the adoption of this platform was all the action they proposed to take until the "rump democracy" should make their nomination, when, he said, "it may be our privilege to indorse the nominee, or our duty to proceed to make a nomination." Other seceders were more impatient, and desired that something be done forthwith; but as the sessions were 1 The first ballot stood: Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, 145; James Guthrie, of Kentucky, 352; Daniel S. Dickinson, of New York, 7; R. M. T. Hunter, of Virginia, 42; Andrew John son, of Tennessee, 12; Joseph Lane, of Oregon, 6; Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, 11⁄2; Isaac Toucey, of Connecticut, 2%1⁄2; Franklin Pierce, of New Hampshire, 1. continued to the second and third day, their over- CHAP. XIV. flowing zeal found a safety-valve in their speeches. Mr. Yancey's programme prevailed, and they also adjourned to meet again in Richmond on the 11th of June. At the time of the disruption, rumors were current in Charleston that the movement, if not prompted, was at least encouraged and sustained by telegrams from leading Senators and Representatives then at their Congressional duties in Washington. As the day for reassembling in Baltimore drew near, the main fact was abundantly proved by the publication of an address, signed by Jefferson Davis, Toombs, Iverson, Slidell, Benjamin, Mason, and some fourteen others, in which they undertook to point out a path to union and harmony in the Democratic party. They recited the withdrawal of eight States at Charleston, and indorsed the step without qualification. แ "We cannot refrain," said the address, "from expressing our admiration and approval of this lofty manifestation of adherence to principle, rising superior to all considerations of expediency, to all trammels of party, and looking with an eye single to the defense of the constitutional rights of the States." They then alleged that the other Democratic States remained in the convention only to make a further effort to secure "some satisfactory recognition of sound principles," declaring, however, their determination also to withdraw if their just expectation should be disappointed. The address then urged that the seceders should defer their meeting at Richmond, but that they should come to Baltimore and en - CHAP. XIV. deavor to effect "a reconciliation of differences on a basis of principle." If the Baltimore Convention should adopt "a satisfactory platform of principles,❞— and their votes might help secure it, then cause of dissension would have ceased. "On the other hand," continued the address, "if the convention, on reassembling at Baltimore, shall disappoint the just expectations of the remaining Democratic States, their delegations cannot fail to withdraw and unite with the eight States which have adjourned to Richmond." The address, in another paragraph, explained that the seventeen Democratic States which had voted at Charleston for the seceders' platform, "united with Pennsylvania alone, comprise a majority of the entire electoral vote of the United States, able to elect the Democratic nominees against the combined opposition of all the remaining States." This was a shrewd and crafty appeal. Under an apparent plea for harmony lurked an insidious invitation to Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, California, Oregon, and Pennsylvania to join the seceders, reconstruct the Democratic party, cut off all the "popular sovereignty" recusants, and secure perpetual ascendency in national politics through the consolidated South. The signers of this address, forgetting their own constant accusation of "sectionalism" against the Republicans, pretended to see no impropriety in proposing this purely selfish and sectional alliance. If it succeeded, their triumph in the Union was irresistible and permanent; if it failed, it served to unite the South for secession and a slave confederacy. If any Democrat harbored a doubt that the pro- CHAP. XIV. posed reconciliation meant simply a reunion on the Davis-Yancey platform, the doubt was soon removed. In the Senate of the United States, Jefferson Davis was pressing to a vote his caucus resolutions, submitted in February, to serve as a model for the Charleston platform; and this brought on a final discussion between himself and Douglas. Davis had begun the debate on the 7th of May by a savage onslaught on "Squatter Sovereignty " - a fallacy, he said, fraught with mischief more deadly than the fatal upas, because it spread its poison over the whole Union. Douglas took up the gauntlet, and, replying on May 15 and 16, said he could not recognize the right of a caucus of the Senate or the House to prescribe new tests for the Democratic party. Senators were not chosen for the purpose of making platforms. That was the duty of the Charleston Convention, and it had decided in his favor, platform, organization, and least of all the individual, by giving him a majority of fifty votes over all the other candidates combined. He reprobated the Yancey movement as leading to dissolution and a Southern confederacy. The party rejected this caucus platform. Should the majority, he asked, surrender to the minority? Davis, replying on the 17th, contended that Douglas had, on the Kansas policy of the Administration, put himself outside the Democratic organization. He desired no divided flag for the party. He preferred that the Senator's banner should lie in its silken folds to feed the moth; "but if it impatiently rustles to be unfurled in opposi "Globe," May 7, 1860, p. 1940. Appendix, May 15 and PP. 312, 313, Globe," 16, 1860. and 316. |