rs, Slavery
Extension, Free-soil, Abolitionist, Annexationist, and Heaven alone
knows how many more parties, on the question of Slavery alone, into
which the Democratic or dominant party is divided, independent of those
other general political divisions which must necessarily exist in so
large and varied a community. From the foregoing you will observe that,
to say a man is a Democrat conveys no distinct idea of his politics
except that he is not a Whig; and the Whigs also have their divisions on
the Slave question.

But there is a party lately come into the field, and called the
Know-nothings, which requires a special notice. Their ostensible
principles have been published in the leading journals of this country,
and carry a certain degree of reason upon the face of them, the leading
features being that they are a secret society banded together for the
purpose of opposing the priestly influence of the Humanists in political
matters: for prolonging the period requisite to obtain the rights of
citizenship; and for the support of the native-born American in
opposition to all other candidates for any public situation that may be
contested. Such is the substance of their manifesto. Their opponents say
that they are sheer humbugs, and brought into life by a few old
political hacks for their own selfish ends. Owing to the factions in
the old Whig and Democratic parties, their opponents believe they may
succeed for a year or two, but they prophesy their speedy and total
disruption. Time will show--I am no prophet. There is one point in their
charter, however, that I cannot believe will ever succeed--viz.,
naturalization or citizenship. Congress would be loth to pass any law
that might tend to turn the stream of emigration into another channel,
such as Australia or Canada; and individual States would be equally loth
to pass such a local law for the same reason, inasmuch as if they did,
the emigrants would move on to those States where they obtained most
speedily the rights of citizens. The crusade against the Romanists is
also so opposed to the spirit of a constitution which professes the
principle of the equal rights of man, that it is more than probable they
may ere long divide upon the unsolvable question of how to draw the line
of demarcation between the influence of the priest and the opinion of
his flock. As far, therefore, as I am capable of judging, I do not
believe they have a sufficiently broad and distinct basis to s