Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 17.djvu/203



ESTABLISHMENT OF PACIFIC COAST REPUBLIC 195

trol of the party machinery, supported the Dred Scott decision, while the followers of Bush clung to the doctrine of absolute non-intervention, popular sovereignty carried to the nth degree. It can readily be seen that even thus soon the bonds uniting Oregon Republicans and Douglas Democrats were closer than those connecting the latter with the Radical Democracy.

The elections of 1859 were pregnant with meaning. The machine Democrats were successful, but their candidate for Congressman was elected by a bare majority of 16 votes, and their majorities everywhere were dangerously cut down. Un- doubtedly many of the Douglas Democrats had cast their votes for Republican candidates. This was a grim presage of the end.

The time for choosing delegates to the national nominating conventions was now at hand. The Radical Democrats had secured control of the State Central Committee, from which was issued a call for a State Democratic convention to elect delegates to the National Democratic Convention which was to be held at Charleston in the ensuing year to select the presi- dential candidate of the party. 'Lane hoped to so arrange the representation in the state convention as to secure his own recommendation as a candidate for the presidency. His tactics were understood by the opposition. The result was a split in the convention which resulted in the withdrawal of the rep- resentatives of eight counties. After this withdrawal, Lane, Matthew P. Deady, and Lansing Stout, were chosen as dele- gates and instructed to do every thing in their power to secure the nomination of Lane for either the presidency or the vice- presidency by the Charleston convention. 3

This National Democratic Convention met at Charleston April 23, 1860. The story of the split in the Democratic Party which occurred there is well known. When the pro-slavery delegates withdrew at the adoption of the Douglas platform, Lane, who had not attended the convention, telegraphed the

1 Quarterly, XII, 260.

2 Statesman, Nov. 22, 1859.