But had Douglas no policy peculiarly his own, to qualify him for the leadership of his party?  Distrustful Whigs accused him of being willing to offer Cuba for the support of the South.[381] Indeed, he made no secret of his desire to acquire the Pearl of the Antilles.  Still, this was not the sort of issue which it was well to drag into a presidential campaign.  Like all the other aspirants for the presidency, Douglas made what capital he could out of the visit of Kossuth and the question of intervention in behalf of Hungary.  When the matter fell under discussion in the Senate, Douglas formulated what he considered should be the policy of the government: 

“I hold that the principle laid down by Governor Kossuth as the basis of his action—­that each State has a right to dispose of her own destiny, and regulate her internal affairs in her own way, without the intervention of any foreign power—­is an axiom in the laws of nations which every State ought to recognize and respect....  It is equally clear to my mind, that any violation of this principle by one nation, intervening for the purpose of destroying the liberties of another, is such an infraction of the international code as would authorize any State to interpose, which should conceive that it had sufficient interest in the question to become the vindicator of the laws of nations."[382]

Cass had said much the same thing, but with less virility.  Douglas scored on his rival in this speech:  first, when he declared with a bit of Chauvinism, “I do not deem it material whether the reception of Governor Kossuth give offence to the crowned heads of Europe, provided it does not violate the law of nations, and give just cause of offence”; and again, scorning the suggestion of an alliance with England, “The peculiar position of our country requires that we should have an American policy in our foreign relations, based upon the principles of our own government, and adapted to the spirit of the age."[383] There was a stalwart conviction in these utterances which gave promise of confident, masterful leadership.  These are qualities which the people of this great democracy have always prized, but rarely discovered, in their Presidents.

It was at this moment in the canvass that the promoters of Douglas’s candidacy made a false move.  Taking advantage of the popular demonstration over Kossuth and the momentary diversion of public attention from the slavery question to foreign politics, they sought to thrust Douglas upon the Democratic party as the exponent of a progressive foreign policy.  They presumed to speak in behalf of “Young America,” as against “Old Fogyism.”  Seizing upon the Democratic Review as their organ, these progressives launched their boom by a sensational article in the January number, entitled “Eighteen-Fifty-Two and the Presidency.”  Beginning with an arraignment of “Webster’s un-American foreign policy, the writer,—­or writers,—­called