The Chicago Nominations.
We expressed our opinion upon the result of any nomination to be made at Chicago so fully and freely ten days in advance of the actual nomination that we need hardly repeat it at this time. We then declared the belief that Lincoln was determined to be the next President of the United States; that he would accomplish his purpose by fair means if he possibly could — that is, would leave it to the decision of an election in the ordinary forms — but that, should he be left out by the popular vote, he would not hesitate to resort to force. This is still our opinion, nor do we see any reason to change it in the undoubted popularity of the candidate whose strength he will be compelled to test before the people.--There is everything in the world to indicate the near approach of a crisis which will be decided by military force. An unscrupulous ruler, with half a million of soldiers at his back, commanded by unscrupulous officers, and devoted to the will of the sovereign, (for such Lincoln is in reality,) never yet neglected the opportunity to overthrow entirely the Constitution of any country in which the military had already become the paramount authority. No despot, with whose history we are acquainted, ever felt a keener relish for the exercise of irresponsible power than Lincoln has done, or would resign it with greater reluctance. If, therefore, he should be beaten in the canvass, he will find it easy to set aside the election as wanting in formality, and retain the power of which he is already in possession.--Even now he is making preparations for the essay. A discovered plot has, in all ages,--from Pisistratus to Napoleon III.--been the engine, by means of which an ambitious aspirant always seeks to destroy his most formidable opponents and to free himself from all opposition in future. Such a plot Lincoln has already discovered, or his emissaries have discovered it for him; and, with that plot in his hands, we hesitate not to say that, in our opinion, he will not hesitate to crush every man who stands between him and absolute power. We should not be surprised at any moment to hear that he had arrested every member of the Chicago Convention, and that McClellan himself was an inmate of Fort Warren of Fort Delaware. Many months ago the Mephistopheles, who is ever whispering at Lincoln's ear, asserted that he had never enjoyed his right, which was to rule over the whole Union, and not a fragment of it; and that this right of his would be asserted and pushed to the uttermost when other expedients failed. We have never doubted so for a moment.Taking it for granted, however, that the election is to decide the question, it must be admitted that McClellan is the most formidable candidate that the Convention could have selected to defeat Lincoln. That he can successfully contend, popular as he undoubtedly is, with the army and the masses, with the drilled and organized forces of Lincoln, supported by so many and such enormous appliances of corruption and intimidation, we do not for a moment believe. Still, he is a formidable competitor — a very formidable competitor. And now the question for every Southern man to consider is, what good will his election do us? He is a war man — a decided war man — and is run as a war candidate. He is proclaimed by his friends to be a State-rights man. But what sort of a State-rights man? He was the man, as Mr. Harris, of Maryland, justly said, who initiated that policy by which the rights of the States in Lincolndom were completely prostrated. He ordered the arrest of the whole Legislature of Maryland. A very singular sort of State-rights man this, to be sure. He is also accused by Greeley of being a friend to the slave power. We take it some of our farmers on the Peninsula could tell a very different tale from that. He is, however, at any rate, determined to restore the Union as it was, and that, under the circumstances, means that he will continue the war if elected. How, then, he can be considered any better for our purposes than Lincoln himself (whose unscrupulous tool he was while he commanded the army) we are unable to see.
One of the means by which the "Platform." proposes to restore the Union peaceably is a convention of all the States. That, we took occasion lately to show, is an impossibility. The preservation of the Union is the prevailing idea throughout. It nowhere admits that it has been destroyed; and not admitting it, it of course ignores our government altogether. It professes a regard for State rights; and the men who adopt it, put upon it, as their candidate, a general who ordered the arrest of a State Legislature. What have we to expect from such a platform and such a candidate? Nothing.
We can expect nothing from anybody but our armies and our generals. If we triumph in this campaign the Yankee mind will be disposed to peace upon any terms. If we fail, the whole North will roar for blood like a famished tiger. Our armies are our best peacemakers, and we expect far more from them than from McClellan and Pendleton.
