Sacramento Daily Union, Volume 17, Number 2644, 17 September 1859 — THE SAD TERMINATION. [ARTICLE]

THE SAD TERMINATION.

The work of the bullet is completed ; David C. Broderick, iate United States Senator, died yesterday of a wound received in a duel with David S. Terry, late Chief Justice of the BtaW of California. Another victim has been sacrificed upon the altar of a mistaken code of honor. A man high in political position has fallen before the pistol of the duelist, becaase he had not the moral courage to answer that he would not vio. late the laws of God and man by fighting a duel. Broderick recognized the code; he accepted its bloody arbitrament, and sealed his acknowledgment of its obligations with his life. In so doing, in our judgment, he acted under a fatal misconception of the course necessary to shield and vindicate his personal honor. But will his death arouse a feeling among the people of the State which will eventuate in crushing out the horrible practice of resorting to the duello to vindicate personal honor? If it should, D. C. Broderick's untimely death will not have been in vain. While the people mourn his fall, let them resolve that his shall be the last valuable life sacrificed in California under the barbarous rules of the code.

No species of Bophistry will satisfy a large number of the people of California, as well as of the United States, that D. G. Broderick did not fall a martyr to his political convictions, and that the duel he fought was forced upon him by a train of well connected political actions. What* ever was personal, as developed in the progress of events, flowed naturally from political positions and combinations. Had Broderick maintained his connection with the Administration, and with the dominant party in this State, is it at all probable that he would now be lying a corpse in San Francisco from a wound caused by a pistol bullet? Personally, so far as we can learn, there has never been cause for hostility between Terry and Broderick. Until after that injudicious speech of Terry before the Democratic Convention, nothing unkind had passed between them. Upon reading a report of those remarks, Broderick was betrayed into some intemperate words which were accidentally overheard by a friend of Terry, who resented them to the extent of sending a challenge. Broderick declined to meet him under any circumstances, but left the impression, by his letter, that he wonld be ready to answer any recognized responsible party after the election. So soon as that event had passed he was addressed by Terry, who aeked a retraction of certain language used before his friend and others, which he considered personally offensive. According to the published correspondence, Broderick required the language to be defined clearly, to which exception was taken, but made no offer to retract, and left Terry to judge of its character. A peremptory challenge followed as a matter of course. This result seems to have been anticipated by both parties, as well as by their friends.

The ostensible cause of offense, to a calm observer, was not necessarily of a character to lead to a hostile meeting The margin for a satisfactory adjustment was large, and, in the hands of prudent men, ought to have been adjusted without bloodshed. A committee of mutual friends could have settled the whole difficulty in two hours, honorably and satisfactorily. But no proposition for an adjustment without resorting to the fieM appears to have been made. Terry evidently went to San Francisco to demand an unconditional retraction, or a fight, and with the fixed determination,

in the event of the latter, to shoot his opponent After Broderick's pistol was fired into the ground, and he remained unharmed, Terry was offered a fine opportunity to perform the noble and magnanimous act of firing his pistol in the air. Would not such a course have been the natural impulse of a man who had simply called his antagonist to the field to vindicate his personal honor ? To vindicate honor it is not always necessary 'to kill, as was illustrated in the duel between Clay and Randolph. Terry was the challenger, and throwing away his fire would have settled the affair instantly, because it wonld then have placed Broderick in a position where he could have honorably retracted the offensive language. It was not necessary for David S. Terry to shoot D. C. Broderick in order to establish his claim to the reputation of being a brave man. Those who know him have never heard his personal courage doubted. The inference, therefore, is that he permitted his feelings of revenge to overbalance all other considerations.

The result cannot add to his reputation or future happiness, while it has caused the sound of mourning to be heard throughout the State. He has taken the life of a man who occupied a high position, who had warm and devoted friends scattered from one end of California to the other. Those friends, personal and political, will never forget or forgive the slayer of D. C. Broderick.