the
other, by the diminished value of articles of export, which was so much
withheld from the pockets of the agriculturist. In like manner the power
of the majority section was employed to appropriate to itself an unequal
share of the public disbursements. These combined causes--the possession
of more territory, more money, and a wider field for the employment of
special labor--all served to attract immigration; and, with increasing
population, the greed grew by what it fed on.

This became distinctly manifest when the so-called "Republican"
Convention assembled in Chicago, on May 16, 1860, to nominate a
candidate for the Presidency. It was a purely sectional body. There were
a few delegates present, representing an insignificant minority in the
"border States," Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri;
but not one from any State south of the celebrated political line of
thirty-six degrees thirty minutes. It had been the invariable usage with
nominating conventions of all parties to select candidates for the
Presidency and Vice-Presidency, one from the North and the other from
the South; but this assemblage nominated Mr. Lincoln, of Illinois, for
the first office, and for the second, Mr. Hamlin, of Maine--both
Northerners. Mr. Lincoln, its nominee for the Presidency, had publicly
announced that the Union "could not permanently endure, half slave and
half free." The resolutions adopted contained some carefully worded
declarations, well adapted to deceive the credulous who were opposed to
hostile aggressions upon the rights of the States. In order to
accomplish this purpose, they were compelled to create a fictitious
issue, in denouncing what they described as "the new dogma that the
Constitution, of its own force, carries slavery into any or all of the
Territories of the United States"--a "dogma" which had never been held
or declared by anybody, and which had no existence outside of their own
assertion. There was enough in connection with the nomination to assure
the most fanatical foes of the Constitution that their ideas would be
the rule and guide of the party.

Meantime, the Democratic party had held a convention, composed as usual
of delegates from all the States. They met in Charleston, South
Carolina, on April 23d, but an unfortunate disagreement with regard to
the declaration of principles to be set forth rendered a nomination
impracticable. Both divisions of the Convention adjourned, and met again