Forgetting how much they owed him in the past, and how much they might still gain through him in the future, they saw only that he was now their stumbling-block, the present obstacle to their full and final success.
It was the Douglas doctrine, squatter sovereignty, and "unfriendly legislation," rather than the _man_, which they had come to oppose, and were determined to put down.

Any other individual holding these heresies would have been equally obnoxious.

They had no candidate of their own; they worshiped no single leader; but they followed a principle with unfaltering devotion.

They clung unswervingly not only to the property theory, but advanced boldly to its logical sequence--Congressional protection to slavery in the Territories.
Of the convention's preliminary work little is worth recording--there were the clamor and protest of contesting delegations and small fire of parliamentary skirmishes, by which factions feel and measure each other's strength.

Caleb Cushing was made permanent chairman, for the triple reason that he was from Massachusetts, that he was the ablest presiding officer in the body, and was for the moment filled with blind devotion to Southern views.