the political
talent which afterwards gave him a leading position. The Indiana
delegation was led by Joseph E. McDonald, and the Kentucky delegation
by Governor Powell, James Guthrie, and by Ex-Governor Wickliffe who
had been driven by Mr. Lincoln's anti-slavery policy into the ranks
of his most bitter opponents. In ability and leadership the
Convention fairly represented the great party whose principles and
policy it had met to declare. Besides the accredited delegates,
it brought together a large number of the active and ruling members
of the Democratic organization. The opposition to the war was
stronger in the West than in the East, and the presence of the
Convention in the heart of the region where disloyal societies were
rife, gathered about it a large and positive representation of the
Peace party, which manifested itself in public meetings and in
inflammatory utterances.

DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION, 1864.

The representatives inside and outside of the Convention were united
in opposing the War and in demanding Peace. But there were different
shades of the Peace sentiment. One portion of the Convention, led
chiefly by the adroit New-York managers, arraigned the whole conduct
and policy of the Administration, and insisted upon a cessation of
hostilities, but at the same time modified the force and effect of
this attitude by urging the nomination of General McClellan for
President. They concurred in the demand for an armistice, but made
a reservation in favor of continuing the war in case the rebels
refused to accept it. Another portion sought to make the declaration
against the war so broad and emphatic that neither General McClellan
nor any man who had been identified with the struggle for the Union
could become the candidate. Both divisions agreed in denouncing
the war measures of the Administration, in resisting emancipation,
in calling for immediate cessation of military movements, and in
opposing the requirement of any conditions from the Southern States.
They differed only in the degree of their hostility to the war.
The faction peculiarly distinguished as the Peace party was led by
Mr. Vallandigham of Ohio, who was the central figure of the
Convention. He had been conspicuous in Congress as the most vehement
and violent opponent of every measure for the prosecution of the
war. Subsequent events had increased his notoriety, and given
explicit significa