FOOTNOTES:[AI]In 1833, out of 108 millions the ports of the north imported 96 million dollars. Deducting the imports of New Orleans, those of all the Southern States were only of the value of 2,700,000 dollars. The exports of the South are much greater than its imports.[AJ]I asked a fellow countryman, established at Richmond, whose patriotism had not been cooled by a long absence from France, why he preferred Richmond to the northern cities, which, in some respects, are more favourable to business; "Because," he replied, "the Virginians are the French of America."[AK]It has always been endeavoured to balance the number of non-slave-holding States, as much as possible, by an equal number of slave States; by this means, the Senate would be exactly divided between the two interests. In 1789, six of the thirteen States admitted slavery; in 1792, there were 16 States, equally divided between the two systems; in 1802, out of 17 States, nine did not admit slavery, but in 1812, the admission of Louisiana restored the balance. From 1816 to 1819, four States were admitted, Alabama and Mississippi, slave-holding, Indiana and Illinois, non-slave-holding. In 1820, Maine, without slaves, and in 1821 Missouri with slaves, followed. In 1836 Michigan at the north, and Arkansas at the south, were received into the Union, and next will come the turn of the slave-holding Florida, and the non-slave-holding Wisconsin. It should be observed that Delaware, in which slavery is allowed by law, may be considered a non-slave-holding State, and is often reckoned so. The President has generally been from the South.[AL]They consisted in declaring all persons born after a certain period free, the children of a slave to remain in the service of her owner during a certain number of years.[AM]At the time of its admission into the Union, Missouri contained only ten or eleven thousand slaves, which might have been easily sold in the neighbouring slave-holding States.[AN]Deducting those in the Northern States.[AO]The indemnity allowed to the owners amounts to about 125 dollars a head, which for 2,500,000, the present number in the United States, would amount to about 312 millions.[AP]Some are surprised, that the slave and the free black are more severely dealt with by the laws of the Southern States, than by those of a colony belonging to an absolute monarchy, Cuba for instance, and that, for example, it should be prohibited, under pain of fine and imprisonment, to teach them to read or write. The contrary would be much more surprising. In a country where there is perfect liberty for the free class, it would be impossible to sustain slavery unless by the severest legislation. If the slave should read in your constitutions and bills of right, "that all men are born free and equal," how can it be that he would not be in a standing conspiracy against you? It is just to observe that, in the United States, the slaves, though intellectually and morally degraded, are humanely treated in a physical point of view. They are less severely tasked, better fed, and better taken care of, than most of the peasants of Europe. Their rapid increase attests their easy condition.
[AI]In 1833, out of 108 millions the ports of the north imported 96 million dollars. Deducting the imports of New Orleans, those of all the Southern States were only of the value of 2,700,000 dollars. The exports of the South are much greater than its imports.
[AI]In 1833, out of 108 millions the ports of the north imported 96 million dollars. Deducting the imports of New Orleans, those of all the Southern States were only of the value of 2,700,000 dollars. The exports of the South are much greater than its imports.
[AJ]I asked a fellow countryman, established at Richmond, whose patriotism had not been cooled by a long absence from France, why he preferred Richmond to the northern cities, which, in some respects, are more favourable to business; "Because," he replied, "the Virginians are the French of America."
[AJ]I asked a fellow countryman, established at Richmond, whose patriotism had not been cooled by a long absence from France, why he preferred Richmond to the northern cities, which, in some respects, are more favourable to business; "Because," he replied, "the Virginians are the French of America."
[AK]It has always been endeavoured to balance the number of non-slave-holding States, as much as possible, by an equal number of slave States; by this means, the Senate would be exactly divided between the two interests. In 1789, six of the thirteen States admitted slavery; in 1792, there were 16 States, equally divided between the two systems; in 1802, out of 17 States, nine did not admit slavery, but in 1812, the admission of Louisiana restored the balance. From 1816 to 1819, four States were admitted, Alabama and Mississippi, slave-holding, Indiana and Illinois, non-slave-holding. In 1820, Maine, without slaves, and in 1821 Missouri with slaves, followed. In 1836 Michigan at the north, and Arkansas at the south, were received into the Union, and next will come the turn of the slave-holding Florida, and the non-slave-holding Wisconsin. It should be observed that Delaware, in which slavery is allowed by law, may be considered a non-slave-holding State, and is often reckoned so. The President has generally been from the South.
[AK]It has always been endeavoured to balance the number of non-slave-holding States, as much as possible, by an equal number of slave States; by this means, the Senate would be exactly divided between the two interests. In 1789, six of the thirteen States admitted slavery; in 1792, there were 16 States, equally divided between the two systems; in 1802, out of 17 States, nine did not admit slavery, but in 1812, the admission of Louisiana restored the balance. From 1816 to 1819, four States were admitted, Alabama and Mississippi, slave-holding, Indiana and Illinois, non-slave-holding. In 1820, Maine, without slaves, and in 1821 Missouri with slaves, followed. In 1836 Michigan at the north, and Arkansas at the south, were received into the Union, and next will come the turn of the slave-holding Florida, and the non-slave-holding Wisconsin. It should be observed that Delaware, in which slavery is allowed by law, may be considered a non-slave-holding State, and is often reckoned so. The President has generally been from the South.
[AL]They consisted in declaring all persons born after a certain period free, the children of a slave to remain in the service of her owner during a certain number of years.
[AL]They consisted in declaring all persons born after a certain period free, the children of a slave to remain in the service of her owner during a certain number of years.
[AM]At the time of its admission into the Union, Missouri contained only ten or eleven thousand slaves, which might have been easily sold in the neighbouring slave-holding States.
[AM]At the time of its admission into the Union, Missouri contained only ten or eleven thousand slaves, which might have been easily sold in the neighbouring slave-holding States.
[AN]Deducting those in the Northern States.
[AN]Deducting those in the Northern States.
[AO]The indemnity allowed to the owners amounts to about 125 dollars a head, which for 2,500,000, the present number in the United States, would amount to about 312 millions.
[AO]The indemnity allowed to the owners amounts to about 125 dollars a head, which for 2,500,000, the present number in the United States, would amount to about 312 millions.
[AP]Some are surprised, that the slave and the free black are more severely dealt with by the laws of the Southern States, than by those of a colony belonging to an absolute monarchy, Cuba for instance, and that, for example, it should be prohibited, under pain of fine and imprisonment, to teach them to read or write. The contrary would be much more surprising. In a country where there is perfect liberty for the free class, it would be impossible to sustain slavery unless by the severest legislation. If the slave should read in your constitutions and bills of right, "that all men are born free and equal," how can it be that he would not be in a standing conspiracy against you? It is just to observe that, in the United States, the slaves, though intellectually and morally degraded, are humanely treated in a physical point of view. They are less severely tasked, better fed, and better taken care of, than most of the peasants of Europe. Their rapid increase attests their easy condition.
[AP]Some are surprised, that the slave and the free black are more severely dealt with by the laws of the Southern States, than by those of a colony belonging to an absolute monarchy, Cuba for instance, and that, for example, it should be prohibited, under pain of fine and imprisonment, to teach them to read or write. The contrary would be much more surprising. In a country where there is perfect liberty for the free class, it would be impossible to sustain slavery unless by the severest legislation. If the slave should read in your constitutions and bills of right, "that all men are born free and equal," how can it be that he would not be in a standing conspiracy against you? It is just to observe that, in the United States, the slaves, though intellectually and morally degraded, are humanely treated in a physical point of view. They are less severely tasked, better fed, and better taken care of, than most of the peasants of Europe. Their rapid increase attests their easy condition.
THE ELECTIONS.
New York, Nov. 11, 1834.
The autumnal elections have taken place in most of the States, and have resulted favourably to the democratic party and the President. Last April the mayor of New York, who is a Jackson man, was chosen by the small majority of 181 votes out of 35,147, and the Oppositionprevailed in the Common Council. The majority in favour of General Jackson is now 2,400; several causes have contributed to produce this result.
The name of the Bank, whose cause is closely connected with that of the Opposition, sounds more and more odious to the ears of the multitude; this is unjust, but it is, nevertheless, true, and some of the late measures of the Bank have redoubled the animosity of the democratical party towards it. It refused to show its books to the committee of inquiry appointed by the House of Representatives, unless in the presence of the officers of the Bank, and its enemies have persuaded the multitude, that theMonsterdared not reveal the secrets of its den to the representatives of the people.[AQ]The Bank persists, conformably to the custom of merchants, in demanding damages on account of the protest by the French government of the bill of exchange sold to the Bank by the Administration, and has withheld the dividends due the United States on their stock. The purpose is merely, say the officers of the Bank, to bring the question of damages before the proper tribunal. But the democratic party takes this act as the text for its tirades against the Bank. "Behold it," they say, "setting itself above the laws, taking the execution of justice into its own hands, and under false pretences, laying hold of the public money." In both these cases it is quite possible that the right was wholly on the side of the Bank, but appearances are against it, and nothing can be more injurious to it in a country governed by universal suffrage. Many of its friends, admitting that the course of the Bank has been strictly legal, would have preferred that a more prudent policy had been adopted, both for the interest of the Bank itself and of the Opposition.
The silence of the principal speakers in Congress, who are almost all in the ranks of the Opposition, has no less contributed to swell its losses since the close of the session. The friends of the Administration in Congress, and more especially in the Senate, were beaten in debate, they felt it themselves, and their whole appearance was a formal confession of defeat; the whole party was disconcerted by this hesitation and embarrassment of the leaders. Since the 30th of June, the party, generals and soldiers, has had time to rally; they have restored their ranks beyond the reach of the fire of Messrs Clay, Calhoun, and Webster, and they have gained a victory, which four months ago they could not have hoped for. The revival of business in the country has also turned to the disadvantage of the Opposition. During the April elections in New York, the community was just recovering from a crisis, all classes had suffered and were still suffering. It was difficult to deny, that the distress had been caused by the President's attack on the Bank, in what he himself called an experiment. Commerce is now active again, the autumn business has been good, and every thing encourages the expectation of a not less favourable state of the spring-trade. General Jackson's experiment seems then to have succeeded; and a great number of persons who belong to the democratic party as their natural element, and who had quitted it in the spring, have very naturally fallen back into its ranks.
But it is proper to explain the real extent of this victory of the Administration; the Opposition has not actually been driven from its former positions, but the Jackson party has maintained the greater number of those it before occupied, and has particularly stood firm in Pennsylvania and New York. In a word, to judge by the elections that have already taken place, the House of Representatives in the session that begins at the close of 1835,will be, like the present House, composed of a majority of Jackson men. The Opposition, however, has gained rather than lost. It has carried the State of Maryland by a considerable majority, and has even gained the democratic State of Ohio, upon which it hardly calculated; ten Representatives out of nineteen from that State, belong to the Opposition, and although the Governor is of the Jackson party, the majority of the State legislature is Anti-Jackson, an important circumstance because the legislatures elect the Senators in Congress.
The elections in Pennsylvania, where the Opposition has lost two representatives, have surprised no one, but those in New York have disappointed all calculations. I know that some well-informed Jackson men, who had formed correct anticipations in regard to former elections, did not expect a majority of more than three or four hundred in the city, and, as I have before observed, they had one of 2,400. The Opposition thought itself able to contest the possession of the State, and relied upon carrying the city. It is certainly extraordinary, that the commercial interest should be beaten in the first commercial city in the New World, and such a result does no honour to the system which has caused it. The unexpected triumph of the Opposition in Ohio had redoubled their confidence in New York; they had celebrated with great display the junction of the young giant of the West with the Anti-Jackson forces. One of the magnificent steamboats belonging to the New York and Albany line, and called the Ohio, had been sent up the river with cannon, and the roar of its guns had been mingled with the shout of the towns and villages on the Hudson. The little frigate Constitution, the palladium of the opposition in New York,[AR]had been publicly paraded before the eyes of the multitude. A packet-boat had been sent up the canal from Albany, and made the new and flourishing towns, which at once give to and take from that great artery of the State, life, activity, and wealth, to resound with salvos of artillery in honor of Ohio. But now the cannon of the Opposition is silent, and that of Tammany Hall only is heard. The little frigate, which during the elections was hung up before the head-quarters of the Opposition, no longer displays the coloured lights with which her rigging was then illuminated. The streets of New York, which do not indeed require it, receive no additional light, except from the Jackson processions, which parade them nightly by torch-light.
The New York elections are not only important in their results, but also on account of the order which prevailed while they were going on. During the last six months, the spirit of anarchy had raised its head in the United States in such a manner as to inspire serious alarm, even among those not prone to be timid. You know what happened in New York during the April elections; several months later, in July, the city became the theatre of a series of outrages against the poor blacks, which were repeated several nights. In August the same excesses ware committed in Philadelphia, under the same pretext, and with no less audacity and perseverance: then came the brutal assault on the convent in Charlestown, when the retreat of peaceful nuns devoted to the education of young girls was attacked, plundered, and burnt down, without the Selectmen of the town having the power or the courage to make head against the rioters, and without the well-disposed citizens, taken by surprise by this act of savage intolerance, venturing to interfere. (SeeNote 17). Hardly a month since, there was also an incendiary conflagration at Philadelphia on the evening of the election;six houses were burnt, and the firemen were driven off by the rioters, as at Charlestown, by main force. The same evening, an event of a more grave character occurred; several muskets were discharged by some of the Opposition whom the mob had assailed with stones, several persons were wounded, and one or two killed. A week before, during the preparatory elections, an obscure and peaceable individual was killed by a stab with a dagger.
A repetition of these scenes of disorder was feared in New York; but nothing of the sort occurred. Nearly 36,000 voters exercised their right of suffrage without any disturbance, although both parties were highly excited. The merit of this wise conduct is wholly due to the people; the Common Council had, indeed, taken extraordinary measures for the preservation of the peace, but what is here considered extraordinary, hardly comes up to the ordinary police in Europe. If the multitude in the United States abstain from acts of violence, it is because they choose to do so; if they preserve order, it is because they love order. Three hundred constables more or less, in a city of 260,000 souls, like New York, could do nothing. Some persons, however, attribute this moderation of the democracy wholly to its confidence in success, and insist, that, if there had been any symptoms of the elections going the other way, the streets would have been thronged, as in April, by bodies of men armed with clubs.
The fate of the Bank has been decided by these elections. In fifteen months its charter expires, and the Bank will die, to be revived ere long under a new form, when a new series of commercial disasters, shall have proved to the conviction of the most incredulous, that they cannot get along without it. It is worthy of note, that it falls by the hands of the two States that owe it the most, New York and Pennsylvania. The blindness of Pennsylvania in particular is inexplicable. Who would expect this stupid fury in drying up the sources of its own prosperity? For without the Philadelphia capital, the interior districts of the State would yet be a wilderness; its one thousand miles of canals and railroads, its innumerable bridges, the finest wooden structures in the world, its numerous roads, its manufactures and mines which now enrich it, would not exist. Some persons assert, that Pennsylvania, which begins with perhaps the most enlightened and refined city in the United States, ends with a rural population of German origin, the most ignorant and stupid in North America. The conduct of the Pennsylvanians in regard to the Bank is not calculated to change the opinion of these severe judges.[AS]As for the New York electors, it may be supposed, that, if the seat of the Mother Bank were in their capital, the votes of the town and the State would have resulted very differently.
The only chance left for the Bank is, that the portion of the South which is under the influence of Virginia, should condescend to lend it a helping hand. Such an act of generous compassion on the part of the South is not probable, but it is not absolutely impossible. I have often been present at discussions between men of the South and the North, in which the latter have said to the former: "Without us you would be at the mercy of your slaves; it is our union with you which will prevent them from rising and cutting your throats." The Southerners answered: "We will take it upon ourselves to keep down our slaves; we shall have no need of your help against any attempts at insurrection for a long time to come. All we ask of you is, not to stir them up to revolt. But as for you, why you are yourselves overwhelmed by a flood of ultra-democracy.Your workmen give you the law. Before long you will be glad to get the aid of the South to restore the balance which your universal suffrage has destroyed." The South has now a fine opportunity to exercise in the North this moderating power of which it boasts the possession.
Frederic the Great, having gained a victory over the Imperialists just after the battle of Fontenoy, wrote to Louis XV.: "I have just paid the draft which your majesty drew on me at Fontenoy." General Jackson has honoured the bill drawn on him by the New York electors more promptly. A circular has been directed by the Secretary of the Treasury to the receivers of the public money, prohibiting the reception of certain drafts on the branch banks. These drafts were issued, merely because it was physically impossible for the president and cashier of the Mother Bank to sign five and ten dollar notes, fast enough to supply the place of those that were worn out or torn in the course of circulation. They have the same form with the Bank-notes, and pass like them, although the charter of the Bank makes no mention of them. This act of the Administration will, however, do no injury to the Bank; for if it is obliged to withdraw all these drafts, amounting to seven millions, from circulation, there is nothing to prevent its issuing bills to the same amount. The Bank is prepared for every event; the amount of its bills in circulation comprising the drafts on the branches, does not exceed 17 millions, and its means in specie, or other property that can be realised at a moment's warning, exceed 20 millions. It will merely be necessary for the president, Mr Biddle, and the cashier, Mr Jaudon, who were already crowded with business, to devote three or four hours a day to signing bills; for the branch drafts were only designed to relieve them from this duty. The order of the Secretary of the Treasury amounts, therefore, merely to a task inflicted on those gentlemen.
On both sides of the Atlantic, there is at present a reaction against the aristocracy of money. Whilst here the eternal chorus ofNo Bank! Down with the Bank! No Rag-Money!is forever displayed on the liberty-poles and the flags of the democracy, amongst us the bankers are denounced from the national tribune by our most able speakers. Do those who hope that industry will soon raise itself to political influence and dignity, deceive themselves then? Or are not rather the industrial classes themselves, and particularly those who are at their head, the financial class, yet unconscious of their future destiny, and too slow to shake off the bad habits which they contracted when the sword was law, and work was the lot of slaves and serfs? Do not these Princes of Industry pay too little regard to those lofty and noble sentiments which are well worth letters of nobility, and without which no supremacy could ever be sustained? To engage in public affairs with dignity, the hands must be clean, the public good must be prized above the money bags; and yet, such is the state of commercial dealings in our day, that, without inheriting a double share of generosity and patriotism, it is difficult to escape from them without becoming contaminated and callous. How many honorable men are there not in the industrial ranks, who groan over the customs to which they are obliged to conform, over the examples which they are obliged to imitate? The Bank of the United States must pay the penalty of the vices, which even in our day degrade commerce, but which are henceforth to belong only to history. It is punished for the sins of others, for this great institution has not itself deserved the reproach of cupidity; the services it has rendered to the country are immense; those which it has rendered itself, that is to say, its profits, have been moderate.
I must, however, do America the justice to observe,that, although the desire to make money is universal, yet in the principal and older commercial centres, there is more honesty and less illiberality than amongst us. American selfishness is less contracted than ours; it does not stoop to petty meannesses; it operates on a more liberal scale. There are certainly wild speculators, blind and desperate gamblers here also: but the objects of their schemes are almost always enterprises of public utility. The spirit of speculation in the United States has strown this vast country with useful works, canals, railroads, turnpike-roads, with manufactories, farms, villages, and towns; amongst us it has been more rash, wild, and foolish, and much less productive in useful results. It is with us mere stock-jobbing, without any good influence on the prosperity of the country; it is a game in which the dice are loaded, in which the credulous lose the earnings of years in a fever-fit of a moment. Its only results are ruin and despair, and if it contributes to people any thing, it is the cells of the mad-house. These are sad truths, but truths which it may be useful to utter.
FOOTNOTES:[AQ]The reason given for this refusal was the indiscreet use by a former committee of inquiry, of notes made during a similar examination.[AR]This is a miniature frigate that takes its name from a favorite ship in the American navy, which covered herself with glory in the last war under the command of Hull, Bainbridge, and Stewart.[AS]The able Correa, for some time Portuguese minister to the United States, used to say, that this State reminded him of the Sphinx,which had the head of an angel, and the body of a beast. This saying is often quoted in the United States.
[AQ]The reason given for this refusal was the indiscreet use by a former committee of inquiry, of notes made during a similar examination.
[AQ]The reason given for this refusal was the indiscreet use by a former committee of inquiry, of notes made during a similar examination.
[AR]This is a miniature frigate that takes its name from a favorite ship in the American navy, which covered herself with glory in the last war under the command of Hull, Bainbridge, and Stewart.
[AR]This is a miniature frigate that takes its name from a favorite ship in the American navy, which covered herself with glory in the last war under the command of Hull, Bainbridge, and Stewart.
[AS]The able Correa, for some time Portuguese minister to the United States, used to say, that this State reminded him of the Sphinx,which had the head of an angel, and the body of a beast. This saying is often quoted in the United States.
[AS]The able Correa, for some time Portuguese minister to the United States, used to say, that this State reminded him of the Sphinx,which had the head of an angel, and the body of a beast. This saying is often quoted in the United States.
PITTSBURG.
Pittsburg, November 24, 1834.
Seventy-six years ago this day, a handful of Frenchmen sorrowfully evacuated a fort, which stood on the point of land where the Alleghany and Monongahela mingle their waters to form the Ohio. The French, with their faithful allies the Indians, had made a vigourous resistance; they had defeated the expedition sent against them in 1754, and compelled Washington, then a lieutenant-colonel in the Virginia militia, to surrender Fort Necessity. They had routed the troops of the boastful Braddock, and spread terror, of which the memory is not yet effaced, through the English colonies. But the destiny of France was then in the hands of him, who of all her kings will be most severely judged by the tribunal of history. Under that most dissolute and selfish prince, France, sacrificed to the paltry intrigues of the bed-chamber, humbled at home, could not triumph abroad. The French were, therefore, obliged to abandon Fort Duquesne; on that day, November 24, 1758, one of the most magnificent schemes ever projected, was annihilated.
France had then possession of Canada and Louisiana; we were then masters of the two finest rivers, the two largest and richest basins of North America, that of the St. Lawrence and that of the Mississippi.[AT]Between these two basins nature has raised no barrier, so that in the rainy seasons, canoes can pass from Lake Michigan into the bed of the Illinois, and continue their course thence without any obstruction to the Gulf of Mexico. The plan of our heroic pioneers, priests, sailors, and soldiers, had been to found the empire of New France in this great valley. It is beyond a doubt, that this idea had attracted the attention of Louis XIV., and that its execution was already begun by the erection of a chain of posts, the sites of which were admirably chosen. There is no country in the world which comprises such an amount of so highly fertile land; none which offers natural routes of communication comparable to the net-work of navigablerivers and streams spread over this great region. There is none more healthy, for with the exception of a few points or tracts subject to autumnal fevers, but which rapidly lose this character when brought under cultivation, there are only two infected spots, New Orleans and Natchez, in which the yellow fever occasionally makes its appearance, during a few months in the year. The sums swallowed up by one of the foolish wars of Louis XV., would probably have been amply sufficient to accomplish this noble project. But the enterprise, although pushed forward by the local agents with admirable zeal and sagacity, encountered only indifference from the ministers at home, the great point of whose policy was to know, who was to be the favourite mistress of his Most Christian Majesty on the morrow. The capture of Fort Duquesne was soon followed by the conquest of all Canada by the English; and in 1763, by the treaty of Paris (these treaties of Paris never bode us any good), France, exhibiting an example of that complete submission and flat despair, of which our annals exhibit so many instances, and the English so few, ceded the basin of the St. Lawrence and the left bank of the Mississippi to England, with one hand, and the right bank of that great river to Spain, with the other.
Thus it came to pass, that the empire of New France, like so many other magnificent schemes conceived in our country, existed only on paper, or in the visions of youthful officers, full of sagacity and boldness, and intrepid missionaries, heroes alike without a name, whose memory is honoured only in the wigwam of some poor exiled Sachem. Fort Duquesne is now become Pittsburg; in vain did I piously search for some relics of the French fortress; there is no longer a stone, a brick, on the Ohio, to attest that France bore sway here.[AU]
Pittsburg is at present essentially pacific; if cannon and balls are seen here, it is because a trading people make it a rule to supply the market with whatever is wanted. The cannon are new, fresh from the mould, and equally at the disposition of the Sultan Mahmoud, or the Emperor of Morocco, or the government of the States, whichever will pay for them. Pittsburg is a manufacturing town, which will one day become the Birmingham of America; one of its suburbs has already received that name. It is surrounded, like Birmingham and Manchester, with a dense, black smoke, which, bursting forth in volumes from the founderies, forges, glass-houses, and the chimneys of all the manufactories and houses, falls in flakes of soot upon the dwellings and persons of the inhabitants; it is, therefore, the dirtiest town in the United States. Pittsburg is far from being as populous as Birmingham, but it exhibits proportionally a greater activity. Nowhere in the world is everybody so regularly and continually busy as in Pittsburg; I do not believe there is on the face of the earth, including the United States, where in general very little time is given to pleasure, a single town in which the idea of amusement so seldom enters the heads of the inhabitants. Pittsburg is, therefore, one of the least amusing cities in the world; there is no interruption of business for six days in the week, except during the three meals, the longest of which occupies hardly ten minutes, and Sunday in the United States, instead of being, as with us, a day of recreation and gaiety, is, according to the English custom, carried to a greater degree of rigour by the Anglo-Americans, consecrated to prayer, meditation, and retirement. By means of this energetic assiduity in work, which is common to all ages and classes, and by the aid of numerous steam-engines which labour like humble slaves, the inhabitants of Pittsburg create an amount of products, altogether disproportioned to their number. Thenature, bulk, and weight of the articles make this disproportion more striking; for, whether it be that American art, yet a novice, cannot give the finish required for articles of luxury and ornament, or that the Americans have the good sense to discern at a glance, that the manufacture of objects of the first necessity or of essential use, is more profitable than that of the trinkets with which civilisation seeks to adorn herself wherever there is wealth, and even where there is none, only the ruder and coarser kinds of work are done in Pittsburg.
Although Pittsburg is at this moment the first manufacturing town in the Union, it is yet far from what it is destined one day to become. It stands in the midst of an extensive coal-formation, the beds of which are very easily worked. The district east of Pittsburg furnishes much pig-iron, which is brought hither to be converted into malleable iron, or into all kinds of machines, tools, and utensils. Pittsburg has then coal and iron within reach; that is to say, power, and the lever by which the power is to be applied. The vent for its wares is still more vast than its means, for the whole basin of the Mississippi, with all its lateral valleys, which on our continent would be basins of the first class, lies open to it. The population, which improves in its condition, as rapidly as it increases in numbers,[AV]creates an indefinite demand for the engines and machines, hollow-ware, nails, horse-shoes, glass, tools and implements, pottery, and stuffs of Pittsburg. It needs axes to fell the primitive forests, saws to convert the trees into boards, plough-shares and spades to turn upthe soil once cleared. It requires steam-engines for the fleet of steamers, which throng the western waters. It must have nails, hinges, latches, and other kinds of hardware for houses; it must have white lead to paint them, glass to light them; and all these new households must have furniture and bed linen, for here every one makes himself comfortable.
Thus Pittsburg is beginning to be what Birmingham and St Etienne are, and what several places in the departments of the Aveyron and Gard will become, when we become more enterprising, and use the proper exertions to develop all the resources now buried in the bowels of ourbelle France, for so it is called everywhere abroad. Pittsburg is beside and must be a commercial city, a great mart. Standing at the head of steam navigation on the Ohio, it is, directly or indirectly, that is through the medium of the more central cities of Cincinnati and Louisville, the naturalentrepôtbetween the upper and lower country, the North and the South. Pennsylvania has spared no pains to secure and extend the advantages resulting from this situation. It has made Pittsburg one of the pivots of its great system of internal improvements, which was undertaken with such boldness, and has been pursued with such perseverance. Pittsburg is connected with Philadelphia by a line of railroads and canals nearly four hundred miles in length, and the numerous branches of the Pennsylvania Canal give it a communication with all the most important points in the State. A direct communication with Lake Erie is, indeed, wanting, but it will soon have a double and triple one. A railroad, 300 miles in length is projected between Baltimore and the Ohio, and one third of the distance is already completed; the legislature of Pennsylvania have made it a condition that the western terminus of this work shall be at Pittsburg. A canal, for which the plans and drawings were furnished by GeneralBernard, is to connect Chesapeake Bay by the way of Washington with the Ohio, and the same condition in favour of Pittsburg has been prescribed in this case.
Pittsburg is one of the few American towns, which owe their birth to war; it was at first one of the chain of French forts, and was afterward occupied by the English as a frontier post against the savages. In 1781, Pittsburg consisted of a few houses under the protection of the cannon of Fort Pitt. The origin of Cincinnati was similar; both commenced with a fortress, but more fortunate than some of our great commercial towns, such as Havre, which is stifled in the embrace of its fortifications, Pittsburg and Cincinnati have caused all traces of their original destination to disappear. Of Fort Pitt, which the English constructed just above the site of Fort Duquesne, nothing remains but a small magazine which has been converted into a dwelling house; another trace of the martial epoch (which here forms the mythological ages), is the name of Redoubt Alley, which is taken from a battery once erected there, to sweep the Monongahela. At Cincinnati, Fort Washington has been razed, and on its site now stands a bazaar built by Mrs Trollope. Not one of the least singular changes that have taken place in America within a half century, is the difference between the old mode of founding a town, and the manner in which they are at present made to rise out of the ground.
Some weeks ago I visited the anthracite coal district in Pennsylvania (seeNote 18); the Anthracite, the most convenient kind of fuel, is at present in general use all along the Atlantic coast from Washington to Boston, and its introduction has made a revolution in household matters. Six or seven years since, when the demand for it was suddenly very much increased, the district which contains the coal-beds became the subject of speculation, at first prudently conducted, but finally growing wild and extravagant. The speculators vied with each other in tracing out town-plots; I have seen detailed plans, with straight streets and fine public squares scrupulously reserved, of cities which do not actually consist of a single street, of towns which hardly contain three houses. This frenzy gave birth, however, to one town of 3,000 inhabitants, Pottsville, to ten or twelve railroads, great and small, to several canals, basins, and mining explorations, that have proved pretty successful. As for the great cities, several of them have really become flourishing villages, although the dreams of their founders have not proved true.
In this anthracite region, in the manufacturing districts of the North East, along the New York canals, and in all parts of the West, a traveller often has an opportunity of seeing the process of building towns. First rises a huge hotel with a wooden colonnade, a real barrack, in which all the movements, rising, breakfasting, dining, and supping, are regulated by the sound of a bell with military precision, uniformity, and rapidity, the landlord being, as a matter of course, a general or, at least, a colonel of the militia. The bar-room is at once the exchange, where hundreds of bargains are made under the influence of a glass of whiskey or gin, and the club-room, which resounds with political debate, and is the theatre of preparations for civil and military elections. At about the same time a post-office is established; at first the landlord commonly exercising the functions of postmaster. As soon as there are any dwelling-houses built, a church or meeting-house is erected at the charge of the rising community; then follow a school-house and a printing press with a newspaper, and soon after appears a bank, to complete the threefold representation of religion, learning, and industry.
A European of continental Europe, in whose mind the existence of a bank is intimately associated with that of a great capital, is very much surprised even for the hundredthtime, at finding one of these institutions in spots yet in an intermediate state between a village and the primitive forest inhabited by bears and rattle-snakes. On the banks of the Schuylkill, which has lately been canalled, and which, flowing from the coal-region, empties itself into the Delaware near Philadelphia, may be seen the beginnings of a town, built during the time of the mining speculations, at the head of navigation. Port Carbon, for that is its name, consists of about thirty houses standing on the declivity of a valley, and disposed according to the plan of the embryo city. Such was the haste in which the houses were built, that there was no time to remove the stumps of the trees that covered the spot; the standing trees were partially burnt and then felled with the axe, and their long, charred trunks still cumber the ground. Some of them have been converted into piles for supporting the railroads that bring down the coal to the boats; the blackened stumps, four or five feet high, are still standing, and you make your way from one house to another by leaping over the prostrate trunks and winding round the standing stumps. In the midst of this strange scene, appears a large building with the words,Office of Deposit and Discount. SCHUYLKILL BANK. The existence of a bank amidst the stumps of Port Carbon, surprised me as much as the universal neatness and elegance of the peaceful Philadelphia, or the vast fleet which is constantly receiving and discharging at the quays of New York, the products of all parts of the world.
I return to the triple emblem of the church, the school with the printing-press, and the bank. A society which is formed by accretion around such a nucleus, must differ more and more from the present European society, which was formed chiefly under the auspices of war, and by a succession of conquests, following one upon another. American society, taking for its point of departure labour,based upon a condition of general ease on one side, and on a system of common elementary education on the other, and moving forward with the religious principle for its lode-star, seems destined to reach a degree of prosperity, power, and happiness, much superior to what we have attained with our semi-feudal organisation, and our fixed antipathy against all moral rule and all authority. It presents, doubtless, especially in the newer States, many imperfections, and it will have to submit to various modifications; this is the lot of all unfinished works, even when God himself is the maker. But a few errors and follies are of little import in the eyes of those whose thoughts are occupied with the great interests of the future rather than with the paltry troubles of the present hour. Of little moment are the disgust and disappointment that a European of delicate nerves may have to encounter, if, for the purpose of killing time, he ventures upon a western steamboat, or into a western tavern; so much the worse for him, if he has fallen into a country where there is no place for an idle tourist, seeking only for amusement! Let the foreigner smile at the simplicity and extravagance of national vanity. That patriotic pride, rendered excusable by brilliant success, will be moderated; the errors and the follies are daily correcting themselves; the unavoidable rudeness of the backwoodsman will be softened, as soon as there are no more forests to fell, no more swamps to drain, no more wild beasts to destroy. The evil will pass away, and is passing away; the good remains and grows and spreads, like a grain of mustard.
FOOTNOTES:[AT]The valley of the Mississippi with a small part of that of the St. Lawrence belonging to the United States, is six times larger than all France. A large tract in the extreme west is sterile; but the most fertile portion, already occupied by States and Territories, is three times as large as France.[AU]At Kingston, (U. C.) the site of Fort Frontenac, I found the remains of a wall built by La Salle, or one of his successors, in the barrack yard of one of the English regiments.[AV]The valley of the Mississippi contained, exclusive of Indians,In 1762about100,000inhabitants,In 1790150,000In 1800580,000In 18101,365,000In 18202,625,000In 18304,232,000The Indians, now mostly removed to the west of the Mississippi, number only about 300,000 souls.
[AT]The valley of the Mississippi with a small part of that of the St. Lawrence belonging to the United States, is six times larger than all France. A large tract in the extreme west is sterile; but the most fertile portion, already occupied by States and Territories, is three times as large as France.
[AT]The valley of the Mississippi with a small part of that of the St. Lawrence belonging to the United States, is six times larger than all France. A large tract in the extreme west is sterile; but the most fertile portion, already occupied by States and Territories, is three times as large as France.
[AU]At Kingston, (U. C.) the site of Fort Frontenac, I found the remains of a wall built by La Salle, or one of his successors, in the barrack yard of one of the English regiments.
[AU]At Kingston, (U. C.) the site of Fort Frontenac, I found the remains of a wall built by La Salle, or one of his successors, in the barrack yard of one of the English regiments.
[AV]The valley of the Mississippi contained, exclusive of Indians,In 1762about100,000inhabitants,In 1790150,000In 1800580,000In 18101,365,000In 18202,625,000In 18304,232,000The Indians, now mostly removed to the west of the Mississippi, number only about 300,000 souls.
[AV]The valley of the Mississippi contained, exclusive of Indians,
The Indians, now mostly removed to the west of the Mississippi, number only about 300,000 souls.
GENERAL JACKSON.
Louisville, (Ky.), December 15, 1834.
You must have been astonished in France at the President's Message; here the sharp and reckless tone of a portion of the press had prepared the public mind for some energetic demonstration; but the Message has exceeded the hopes of those who wished to assume an attitude of defiance in regard to France, and the fears of those who dreaded some imprudent step. Had such a paper come from any former President,—from Washington to John Quincy Adams,—it would have been looked upon as an expression of the sentiments of a majority of the American people. Neither of them would have been willing thus to commit the United States, without being sure that the national will really required it. Their rule of action would have been to let themselves be pushed on by the nation, rather than to draw it after them, or to go beyond it; and this, in fact, is more conformable to notions of self-government. They would have had the question profoundly discussed by the cabinet, not only orally, but in writing, as Washington did at the time of the establishment of the first bank in 1791. They would have consulted individually some of the leading statesmen of the country of all parties and all interests. They would have listened patiently to the representations of those upon whom the heavy burden of war would have most directly fallen, the merchants of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, New Orleans, and other large ports; and finally, after having weighed all objections, measured all difficulties, if they had been convinced that the interest andhonour of their country absolutely required the appeal to the last argument, they would have reluctantly addressed the challenge to their oldest ally and friend, to the firmest stay of liberty and improvement in the Old World.
General Jackson has changed all this; the rules of conduct and the policy of his administration are no longer those adopted by the wisdom of his predecessors. Some may maintain that this change is for the better; on this point, the future, and no distant future, will decide; but the fact of a change is undeniable. General Jackson possesses in the highest degree the qualities necessary for conducting a partisan warfare. Bold, indefatigable, vigilant, quick-sighted, with an iron will and a frame of adamant, devoted to his friends, harsh and terrible to his enemies, making light of obstacles, passionately fond of danger, his campaigns against the Creeks and Seminoles were marked by the most brilliant success, and his resistance to the English army under Packenham, at New Orleans, was heroic. By these exploits and the enthusiasm which military services excite in all countries, General Jackson found himself the most popular man in the Union, when the founders of the national independence disappeared, and naturally became the candidate for the presidential chair. Objections were made to his unbending temper, the impatience of contradiction which he had shown throughout his whole career, his obstinacy in following his own impulses, in spite of the provisions of the laws, and his disposition to use the sword of Alexander, rather than to conform himself to the delays of constitutional forms. His natural propensities, strengthened by the habits of military command, and by the peculiarities of that kind of warfare in which he had been engaged, must, it was urged, have become ungovernable; and it would be impossible for him to acquire that moderation, which is necessary in the exercise of civil authority. It was predicted that in politics, as in war, he would be zealous for his friends, implacable towards his adversaries, violent against whoever should attempt to check his course; that, instead of being above party-quarrels, he would come down into the arena in person. His arrest of a judge in New Orleans, the execution of the militia men, and of the two Englishmen, Arbuthnot and Ambristier, his invasion and conquest of Florida in time of peace, his anger and threats when Congress was deliberating upon charges founded on these summary acts, were all dwelt upon.
But his chivalric character, his lofty integrity, and ardent patriotism, seemed sufficient guarantees for his conduct, and from reasons of domestic policy, which it would take too much time to explain, many enlightened men, who had at first treated the idea of supporting him for the presidency with ridicule, gave into the plan, trusting that they should be able to exercise a salutary influence over him. His fiery temper seemed in fact to be calmed by his elevation; the recollection of his professions, which, at the moment they were made, were made in good faith, was yet fresh; he had conscientiously resolved to observe the principles consecrated by Washington, Jefferson, and and the other patriarchs of America, to keep himself scrupulously within the narrow limits of prerogative, as he had traced them or allowed them to be traced out for him; to follow the current of public opinion, without seeking to bar its course or divert it from its regular channels; to be moderate, patient, and calm. During his first term, he continued pretty faithful to his resolution, to his professed principles, and to the advice of those who raised him to his seat. But this state of constraint was insupportable to him; it is too late to reform at the age of sixty years.
Besides, it is not all temperaments, or, I should rather say, the distinctive qualities of all men, that can adaptthemselves to that high sphere of serenity, in which he who governs others should move. Such a conformity was even more difficult for General Jackson than for any other man; the turbulence and impetuosity of youth had not been tempered in him either by age or by the fatigues of war. And in a country where universal suffrage prevails, political disputes are of a character to exhaust the patience of an angel. Step by step, then, the stormy propensities of the Tennessee planter were seen returning. The character of the bold, daring, restless, obstinate, fiery, indomitable partisan chief, of the conqueror of the Creeks and Seminoles, gradually broke through the veil of reserve, caution, gravity, and universal good-will which had covered it, and tore in pieces the constitutional mantle in which his friends had taken so much pains to wrap him.
At length, in 1832, South Carolina furnished a natural occasion for giving the rein to his warlike propensities, which had now been curbed for four years. That State had, on its own individual authority, declared the tariff act of Congress null and void, and had armed its militia to sustain its nullification Ordinance. The President immediately began preparations for war, retaining, however, the language of moderation, and obtained an act of Congress (the Force Bill) authorising him to employ all means to maintain the laws of the United States; when this storm was laid (seeNote 5), General Jackson was proclaimed the saviour of the Constitution; and perhaps sufficient care was not taken to prevent a very natural mistake of an old soldier, and to make him sensible that the congratulations of a grateful people were addressed less to his warlike attitude, than to the pacific measures taken under his auspices. In the heat of debate and the shout of acclamation that followed the restoration of order, the old military leaven began to ferment in the President's heart, andwithout a pause, he rushed into a vigourous campaign against the Bank. This was a war almost without provocation, certainly without a just cause, and for some time it appeared that the General would be worsted. But he held his own, and neither bent nor broke. In this affair he was the sameOld Hickorythat the Indians had found always and everywhere on their trail, whom they could neither tire nor surprise, and upon whom they could get no hold, either by force or fraud. The last elections of Representatives assure him the victory, and the Bank is condemned to the fate of the Creeks and Seminoles, of Mr Clay and Mr Calhoun, of the Spanish government of Florida, and of the English General Packenham (seeNote 19.)
The intoxication of success seems to have restored all the fire of his youth, and at an age when other men look only towards repose, he requires new perils and new fatigues. Last winter, Mr Clay declared in the Senate, that, if phrenology were a true science, President Jackson must certainly have the bump of combativeness, for his life had been nothing but the perpetual exercise of that appetite; at fourteen years of age, against the English, then against his neighbours the first settlers of Tennessee, not a very tractable race, and who handled the knife, the sword, the pistol, and the rifle, with as much promptness as himself; next against the Indians, the English, the Indians again, and the inoffensive Spaniards; then against Mr Clay, Mr Calhoun, and South Carolina, and finally, for want of other adversaries, he was engaged in a bout with the Bank. The General seems, in fact, to be possessed with the demon of war; for no sooner had he put his foot on the throat of the Bank, than he required a new enemy, and finding in America none but vanquished adversaries, or objects unworthy of his anger, he flings down the glove to France. Thus far the defiance thrown out to Franceis merely the expression of General Jackson's humour. But, unluckily, this act of an individual emanates from a man who is President of the United States until the 4th of March, 1837, and who is even more pertinacious in his enmities than in his friendships. Unluckily too, the defiance has been inserted in a solemn document, which is looked upon in Europe as the faithful exhibition of the sentiments of the American people. And finally, the man who has set the United States in this posture, has just made an experiment which shows the degree to which he can lead the people to espouse his personal quarrels.
His tactics in politics, as well as in war, is to throw himself forward with the cry of,comrades, follow me!and this bold stroke has succeeded admirably in the case of the Bank. If he had recommended to Congress to withdraw the public deposits from that institution, he would certainly have failed; Congress would have declared against it. He, therefore, boldly took the first step himself, and ordered the removal, in opposition to the advice of the majority of his cabinet, two months before the meeting of Congress, without the slightest possible pretence of the urgency of the measure.I will take the responsibility, he said. The Secretary of the Treasury refused to execute the order, because he considered it a fatal abuse of power, and he was dismissed. The majority of the House of Representatives, and in the last elections, of the people, have sanctioned those dictatorial acts. General Jackson has, indeed, lost most of his friends in the enlightened classes and among the merchants, but he cares little for individuals, however distinguished; by virtue of universal suffrage, it is numbers that rule here.
Will the bold policy by which he carried the multitude against the Bank, be as successful now that he attempts to edge them on against France? It may be compared toone of those feats of strength, in which one may succeed the first and even the second time, but will break his back the third. General Jackson may be considered to possess that sort of popularity which is irresistible for a short time; but the duration and solidity of which are in the inverse ratio of its intensity and brilliancy; this, however, is a mere conjecture. One thing is certain, that the General has the majority in the House of Representatives, and from what is known of the composition of the next Congress, there is every appearance that he will keep it during the term of his Presidency; whilst the Opposition, which now has the majority in the Senate, may lose it after the present session. Besides, it is not plain to me, that the Opposition will be unanimous in censuring the measures of General Jackson in regard to France. The opponents of General Jackson, as well as his friends, are obliged to court their common sovereign, the people. Now in all countries the multitude are very far from being cosmopolites; their patriotism is more lively and warm, but it is also more brutal, more unjust, and more arrogant, than that of the higher classes. In France, they cry with enthusiasm,Our country before all things!Here the word is,Our country, right or wrong!which is the perfection of national selfishness.
As General Jackson is not, however, a madman or a fool, it is difficult to imagine, that he wishes the United States to pass at once from a close friendship to a state of hostility with France. If he thinks that France has exceeded all reasonable bounds of delay, that she has exhausted all the patience she had a right to expect from an old ally, from a nation whose independence was bought with our blood and our treasure, why is he not content with proposing measures of commercial restriction? A duty upon our goods would also be a means of paying thetwentyfive millions. He knows, that, if France has more to lose than the United States in a war of tariffs, the United States, whose commerce and navigation are much more extensive than ours, have more to lose in a war of cannon, of which the sea would naturally be the theatre. But which class in the United States will suffer most by a war? The commercial, certainly. Who own the vessels and the goods? Oh! the merchants and ship-owners who vote against the General and his friends, his adversaries whom he detests and despises; the traders of Boston, who beheaded his statue on the bows of the Constitution frigate; those of New York, who have had caricature medals struck at Birmingham, holding up his government to hatred and contempt; the capitalists of Philadelphia, friends of Mr Biddle and admirers of Mr Clay. General Jackson troubles himself very little about the interest of such fellows as these.
On the contrary, an increase of the customs duties, whatever should be the motive of it, would be particularly hurtful to the Southern States, and would be very unwelcome to them. As it is the South that produces cotton, the principal article of export from the United States to France, the reprisals which the French government would not fail to make, would fall chiefly upon the South. Now the democratic party at present needs the support of the South, and is courting Virginia in particular, the most influential of the Southern States. The success of the plans of the democratic party, that is to say, the election of Mr Van Buren to the presidency, depends much upon the attitude taken by Virginia, not in 1836, the year of the election, but the present year, not tomorrow but to-day. Public opinion is yet undecided in Virginia; it is desirable, at any price, to prevent it from leaning in any degree to the side of the Opposition, and it is well understood thatVirginia will not consent to laying any especial burdens on the South. The Virginia legislature is now in session, and one of its first acts will be the choice of a Senator in Congress. If Mr Leigh, the present Senator, is chosen, then it will be committed in favour of the Opposition, and perhaps lost to the democratic party. The loss of the legislature may involve that of the State; the loss of Virginia may involve that of the South. Considerations of this kind have much more weight here than would be imagined in Europe. In the midst of the changing institutions of this country, politicians live only from hand to mouth.
It sometimes happens that European governments are clogged in their foreign policy by domestic difficulties. General Jackson would have been more cautious, if he had not thought that such is the position of the French government at this moment. But be assured, that he also has his domestic embarrassments, which affect his measures. This is more peculiarly the case with him than with any other President, because he is more a man of party, more entangled in party meshes, than any of his predecessors. Congressional intrigues and sectional interests create the same difficulties here, particularly for an administration like his, which amongst us result from an ill-balanced population, and the burden of the past. The French government may be confident of this, and ought to act conformably.
PUBLIC OPINION.
Louisville, December 22, 1834.
The first impression produced in the United States by General Jackson's Message, was astonishment, as the tone was wholly unexpected to every one. In Europe, I suppose that it will have excited more than surprise, and it will be a matter of wonder, how a measure so rash and reckless could have emanated from a government, which, from its origin, has been characterised by address and prudence. I have already attempted to give an explanation of this mystery, and I have stated, that thisquasideclaration of war was altogether an individual affair of General Jackson, that in this, as in every thing else, he has acted from his own impulse. The enlightened statesmen, who surrounded him in the beginning of his government, and whose wise counsels repressed his ardour, no longer have any influence. One after another has been separated from him, and several, such as Mr Calhoun, who, during his first term, was Vice-President, are now become his irreconcileable enemies. His position, as the head of the democratic party, obliges him, therefore, to supply some fuel for the furious passions, which the late contests had kindled.
It would be a mistake to judge of the reception of a document of this character in this country, by what would take place under similar circumstances in Europe. Public opinion has not the same arbiters here as in European societies; what is called public opinion in Europe, is the generally current opinion among the middling and higher classes, that of the merchants, manufacturers, men of letters, and statesmen, of those who, having inherited a competency, devote their time to study, the fine arts, and, unfortunately too often, to idleness. These are the persons, who govern public opinion in Europe, who have seats in the chambers, fill public offices, and manage or direct the most powerful organs of the press. They are the polite and cultivated, who are accustomed to self-control, more inclined to scepticism than fanaticism, and on their guard against the impulses of enthusiasm; to whose feelings all violence is repugnant, all rudeness and all brutality offensive; who cherish moderation often even to excess, and prefer compromises and half-measures. Among persons like these, General Jackson's message would have met with universal condemnation, or rather if General Jackson had derived his ideas from such a medium, he would never have dictated such a message.
The minority, which in Europe decides public opinion, and by this means is sovereign, is here deposed, and having been successively driven from post to post, has come to influence opinion only in a few saloons in the large cities, and to be itself under as strict guardianship as minors, women, and idiots. Until the accession of General Jackson, it had, however, exercised some influence over all the Presidents, who were generally scholars, and all of whom, aside from their party connections, were attached to it by family and social relations, and by their habits of life. Up to the present time, this class had also preserved some influence over the two houses; but it has now completely broken with the President, or rather the President has broken with it; it has no longer any credit, except with one of the Houses, because the Senate still consists of men whom it may claim as belonging to it by their superior intelligence, education, and property. The democracy does not fail, therefore, to stigmatise the Senate as an aristocratic body, and to call it the House of Lords.The mass, which in Europe bears the pack and receives the law, has here put the pack on the back of the enlightened and cultivated class, which among us on the other hand, has the upper hand. The farmer and the mechanic are the lords of the New World; public opinion istheiropinion; the public will istheirwill; the President istheirchoice,theiragent,theirservant. If it is true that the depositaries of power in Europe have been too much disposed to use it in promoting their own interests, without consulting the wishes and the welfare of the mass beneath them, it is no less true that the classes which wield the sceptre in America are equally tainted with selfishness, and that they take less pains to disguise it. In a word, North America is Europe with its head down and its feet up. European society, in London and Paris as well as at St. Petersburg, in the Swiss republic as well as in the Austrian empire, is aristocratical in this sense, that, even after all the great changes of the last fifty years, it is still founded more or less absolutely on the principle of inequality or a difference of ranks. American society is essentially and radically a democracy, not in name merely but in deed. In the United States the democratic spirit is infused into all the national habits, and all the customs of society; it besets and startles at every step the foreigner, who, before landing in the country, had no suspicion to what a degree every nerve and fibre had been steeped in aristocracy by a European education. It has effaced all distinctions, except that of colour; for here a shade in the hue of the skin separates men more widely than in any other country in the world. It pervades all places, one only excepted, and that the very one which in Catholic Europe is consecrated to equality, the church; here all whites are equal, every where, except in the presence of Him, in whose eyes, thedistinctions of this world are vanity and nothingness.[AW]Strange inconsistency! Or rather solemn protest, attesting that the principle of rank is firmly seated in the human heart by the side of the principle of equality, that it must have its place in all countries and under all circumstances!
Democracy everywhere has no soft words, no suppleness of forms; it has little address, little of management; it is apt to confound moderation with weakness, violence with heroism. Little used to self-control, it gives itself unreservedly to its friends, and sets them up as idols to whom it burns incense; it utters its indignation and its suspicions against those of whom it thinks that it has cause for complaint, rudely, and in a tone of anger and menace. It is intolerant towards foreign nations; the American democracy in particular, bred up in the belief that the nations of Europe groan ignobly under the yoke of absolute despots, looks upon them with a mixture of pity and contempt. When it throws a glance beyond the Atlantic, it affects the superior air of a freeman looking upon a herd of slaves. Its pride kindles at the idea of humbling themonarchical principle in the person of the "tyrants who tread Europe under foot."
It may, then, be expected, that public opinion here will approve the Message, both as to its manner and matter, that it will consider it full of moderation and propriety. It is probable, that most of the men and the journals of the Opposition will fear to censure it openly and boldly. Not that the Jackson men themselves are unanimous in its favour; but that the speakers and writers of the Opposition consider themselves and are, bound to pay homage to the sovereign people, that they are all obliged to court the multitude, which is not very manageable in regard to points of national dignity and vanity. A certain number of journals and of political men have expressed their views as to the occasion and the consequences of a declaration of war with independence, and have been able to reconcile their patriotism with a lofty courtesy toward the oldest and the most faithful ally of America; but these are exceptions to the general rule. Some of the best informed and most influential of the Opposition journals have, to the general astonishment, suddenly turned right-about-face, and welcomed the part of the Message relative to France with acclamations. Thus they appear more democratic than the democracy, furious upon a point of honour, ready to sacrifice every thing in order to obtain redress for an outrage, to which, after twenty years, they have now first become sensible. He, who yesterday was a peaceful and reasonable writer, is to-day a thunderbolt of war, can talk of nothing but the violated national dignity, thinks only of blowing up the flame. The cause of this sudden change is this; if the United States were at war, they would spend a great deal of money, and a Bank then would be indispensable to the Federal government. NowaBank andtheBank is at bottom all one. This is what is called policy, cleverness, but it remains to be seen if the democratic party will be the dupe of such arts, and if those who are most interested in the existence of the Bank, that is, the merchants of New York, Boston, and New Orleans, and even those of Philadelphia, wish to have a Bank at any price.
Happily for the peace of the world, the majority of the Senate of the United States consists of men eminent for their experience, their ability, and their patriotism, who judge the interests of their country on grounds of high policy, and who, among other questions, will not fail to consider this; whether it would not be the worst of all means of securing the liberty of the seas, an object which they have at heart, for the French and American navies to destroy each other. They do not hesitate, when circumstances require it, to take a stand above the demands of an ephemeral popularity, and to meet the difficulties face to face. A handful of firm and eloquent men in this illustrious assembly, was sufficient last winter to sustain the shock of the popular masses, and to check and bear them back. The Senate has only to continue equal to itself, to deserve well of its country and of mankind.