The election of 1860 resulted in a victory for the Republican party, whose candidates, Abra ham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin, ran upon a platform denouncing °threats of disunion?" and saying that °the new dogma, that the Constitu tion, of its own force, carries slavery into any or all of the Territories of the United States,° was a °dangerous political heresy.° The plat form did not tall for the abolition of slavery in the States where it existed, but asserted °that the normal condition of all the territory of the United States is that of freedom; that as our Republican fathers, when they had abolished slavery in all our national territory, ordained that 'no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law,' it be comes our duty by legislation, whenever such legislation is necessary, to maintain this pro vision of the Constitution against all attempts to violate it; and we deny the authority of Con gress, of a territorial legislature, or any indi viduals, to give legal existence to slavery in any Territory of the United States.° Lincoln received a popular plurality of nearly 500,000 and a plurality of 108 in the Electoral College. Douglas came second in the popular vote, but fell behind both the Breckinridge ticket and Bell and Everett ticket in the Electoral Col lege. This was due to the fact that the Douglas vote was large in the States which Lincoln carried.
In the war between the States the supporters of Douglas enlisted side by side with the sup porters of Lincoln, Douglas himself having urged the support of Lincoln in the war for the maintenance of the Union. During the war, however, many things were done which aroused criticism from the Democratic leaders, and by the Democrats generally. Among the things complained of were arrests and courts-martial in States not in insurrection and where the civil authority was undisturbed.
The Democratic platform of 1864 announced fidelity to the Union under the Constitution, as the only solid foundation of our strength, security and happiness as a people, and as a framework of government equally con ducive to the welfare and prosperity of all the States, both Northern and Southern ;° and then declared as the sense of the American people, that after four years of failure to restore the Union by the experiment of war, during which, under the pretense of a military necessity of a war power higher than the Constitution, the Consti tution itself has been disregarded in every part and public liberty and private right alike trodden down, and the -rIal prosperity of the country essentially impaired, ' liberty, and the public welfare demand efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities, I"imate convention of all the States, or 'n the end that, at the earliest • ‘• be restored on the basis Gem George B. McClellan of New Jersey was nominated by the Democratic party for President and George H. Pendleton of Ohio for Vice-President. The election resulted in a popular majority of 408,000 for the Republican ticket and in an electoral majority of 191— Kentucky, New Jersey and Delaware being the only three of the 24 States giving their electoral vote to the Democratic ticket. It will be seen
that the Republican plurality was less than it was in 1860.
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the inauguration of Vice-President Andrew Johnson (q.v.) as President precipitated a struggle in which most of the Republican sen ators and members of Congress were arrayed against the President. The Democrats took the side of the President, and with the aid of a few Republicans prevented the adoption of the articles of impeachment presented by the House.
During the reconstruction period that fol lowed, the Democrats insisted that the States which were held in the Union should be given the rights and privileges of other States.
The campaign of 1868 was fought under the leadership of Horatio Seymour of New York and Francis P. Blair of Missouri, and the plat form demanded: I. Immediate restoration of all the States to their rights in the Union under the Constitution, and of civil government to the American people.
2. Amnesty (or all past political offenses, and the regula tion of the elective franchise in the States by their citizen& 3. Payment of all the public debt of the United States as rapidly as practicable — all money drawn from the people by taxation, except so much as is requisite for the necessities of the government, economically administered, being honestly applied to such payment; and when the obligations of the government do not expressly state Vat their face, or the law under which they were issued does not provide that they shall be paid in coin, they ought, in right tes. and justice, to be paid in the lawful money of the UnitedSta 4. Equal taxation of every species of property according to its real value, including government bonds and other public securities.
S. One currency for the government and the people, the laborer and the office-holder, the pensioner, and the soldier the producer and the bondholder.
6. Economy in the administration of the government; the reduction of the standing army and navy; the abolition of the Freedman's Bureau and all political instrumentalities designed to secure negro supremacy; simplification of the system and discontinuance of inquisitorial modes of assessing and collecting internal revenue; that the burden of taxation may be equalized and lessened, and the credit of the govern ment and the currency made good; the repeal of all enact ments for enrolling the State militia into national forces in time of peace; and a tariff for revenue upon foreign imports, and such equal taxation under the internal-revenue laws as will afford incidental protection to domestic manu factures, and as will, without impairing the revenue, impose the least burden upon, and best promote and encourage the great industrial interests of the country. • .