Freemasonry was once popular in the United States; and no one seemed to think any harm of it, though, when examined, it clearly appears an institution incompatible with true republicanism. The account given of it by some friends of mine, formerly masons, is, that it is utterly puerile in itself; that it may be dignified, under a despotism, by an application to foreign objects, but that it is purely mischievous in a republic. Its object, of course, is power. It can have no other; and ought not to have this, where the making of the laws is the office of the people. Its interior obligations are also violations of the democratic principle. All this was as true of masonry twelve years ago as it is now; but masonry was allowed to spread far and wide. One Morgan, a freemason, living in the western part of the state of New York, did a remarkable deed, for which various motives are assigned. He wrote a book in exposure of masonry, its facts and tendencies. When the first part was printed and secured, some masons broke into the printing-office where it was deposited, and destroyed as much of the work as they could lay hold of. Being partly foiled, they bethought themselves of stopping the work by carrying off the author. He was arrested for a trifling debt, (probably fictitious,) conveyed hastily to a magistrate, some miles off, who committed him for want of bail. The ostensible creditor arrived atthe jail, in the middle of the night, and let him out; four or five men put him into a carriage, which made for the Canada frontier. On landing him on British ground, the masons there refused to have any concern in a matter which had gone so far, and Morgan was shut up in the fort at Niagara village, where the Niagara river flows into Lake Ontario. There he was fed and guarded for two days. Thus far, the testimony is express; and concerning the succeeding circumstances there is no reasonable doubt. He was put into a boat, carried out into the middle of the river, and thrown in, with a stone tied to his neck. For four years, there were attempts to bring the conspirators to justice; but little was done. The lodges subscribed funds to carry the actual murderers out of the country. Sheriffs, jurymen, constables, all omitted their duty with regard to the rest. The people were roused to action by finding the law thus overawed. Anti-masonic societies were formed. Massachusetts and other States passed laws against extra-judicial oaths. In such States, the lodges can make no new members, and are becoming deserted by the old. The anti-masonic party flourishes, having a great principle as its basis. It has the control in a few States, and powerful influence in others. Morgan's disclosures have been carried on by other hands. A bad institution is overthrown. The people have learned an important lesson; and they have gone through an honourable piece of discipline in making a stand for the law, which is the life of their body politic.
Thus end, and thus, we may trust, will end the mistakes of the people, whose professed interest is in a wise self-government. Some worse institutions even than masonry remain to be cast out. The law has been again overawed; not once, but many times; and the eyes of the world are on thepeople of the United States, to see what they will do. The world is watching to discover whether they are still sensible of the sacred value of unviolated law; whether they are examining who it is that threatens and overbears the law, and why; and whether they are proceeding towards the re-establishment of the peace and security of their whole community, by resolutely rooting out from among their institutions every one which will not bear the test of the first principles of the whole.
The other ground of hope of which I spoke as being inferential, arises out of the imaginative political character of the Americans. They have not yet grown old in the ways of the world. Their immediate fathers have done such a deed as the world never saw; and the children have not yet passed out the intoxication of success. With far less of vanity and presumption than might have been looked for from their youth among the nations, with an extraordinary amount of shrewdness and practical talent shared among individuals, the American people are as imaginative as any nation I happen to have heard or read of. They reminded me every day of the Irish. The frank, confiding character of their private intercourses, the generous nature of their mutual services, the quickness and dexterity of their doings, their fertility of resource, their proneness to be run away with by a notion, into any extreme of absurdity—in all this, and in everything but their deficiency of moral independence, (for which a difference of circumstances will fully account,) they resemble the Irish. I regard the American people as a great embryo poet: now moody, now wild, but bringing out results of absolute good sense: restless and wayward in action, but with deep peace at his heart: exulting that he has caught the true aspect of things past, and at the depth of futurity whichlies before him, wherein to create something so magnificent as the world has scarcely begun to dream of. There is the strongest hope of a nation that is capable of being possessed with an idea; and this kind of possession has been the peculiarity of the Americans from their first day of national existence till now. Their first idea was loftier than some which have succeeded; but they have never lost sight of the first. It remains to be, at intervals, apprehended anew; and whenever the time shall arrive, which cannot but arrive, when the nation shall be so fully possessed of the complete idea as by a moral necessity to act it out, they will be as far superior to nations which act upon the experience and expediency of their time as the great poet is superior to common men.
This time is yet very far distant; and the American people have not only much to learn, and a painful discipline to endure, but some disgraceful faults to repent of and amend. They must give a perpetual and earnest heed to one point; to cherish their high democratic hope, their faith in man. The older they grow, the more must they "reverence the dreams of their youth." They must eschew the folly and profaneness so prevalent in the old world, of exalting man, abstractedly and individually, as a piece of God's creation, and despising men in the mass. The statesman in a London theatre feels his heart in a tumult, while a deep amen echoes through its chambers at Hamlet's adoration of humanity; but not the less, when he goes home, does he speak slightingly, compassionately, or protectingly of the masses, the population, the canaille. He is awestruck with the grandeur of an individual spirit; but feels nothing of the grandeur of a congregated million of like spirits, because they happen to be far off. This proves nothing but the short-sightedness ofsuch a man. Such shortness of sight afflicts some of the wisest and best men in the new world. I know of one who regards with a humble and religious reverence the three or four spirits which have their habitation under his roof, and close at hand; who begins to doubt and question, in the face of far stronger outward evidence of good, persons who are a hundred miles off; and has scarcely any faith left for those who happen to be over the sea. The true democratic hope cannot coexist with such distrust. Its basis is the unmeasured scope of humanity; and itsrationalethe truth, applicable alike to individuals and nations, that men are what they are taken for granted to be. "Countrymen," cries Brutus, dying,
"My heart doth joy that yet in all my life,I found no man but he was true to me."
"My heart doth joy that yet in all my life,I found no man but he was true to me."
"My heart doth joy that yet in all my life,I found no man but he was true to me."
"My heart doth joy that yet in all my life,
I found no man but he was true to me."
The philosophy of this fact is clear; it followed of course from Brutus always supposing that men were true. Whenever the Americans, or any other people, shall make integrity their rule, their criterion, their invariable supposition, the first principles of political philosophy will be fairly acted out, and the high democratic hope will be its own justification.
FOOTNOTE:[2]Jefferson writes, September, 1798, "The most long-sighted politician could not, seven years ago, have imagined that the people of this wide extended country could have been enveloped in such delusion, and made so much afraid of themselves and their own power, as to surrender it spontaneously to those who are manœuvring them into a form of government, the principal branches of which may be beyond their control."Again, March, 1801:—"You have understood that the revolutionary movements in Europe had, by industry and artifice, been wrought into objects of terror in this country, and had really involved a great portion of our well-meaning citizens in a panic which was perfectly unaccountable, and during the prevalence of which they were led to support measures the most insane. They are now pretty thoroughly recovered from it, and sensible of the mischief which was done, and preparing to be done, had their minds continued a little longer under that derangement. The recovery bids fair to be complete, and to obliterate entirely the line of party division, which had been so strongly drawn."—Jefferson's Correspondence, vol. iii. pp. 401, 457.
[2]Jefferson writes, September, 1798, "The most long-sighted politician could not, seven years ago, have imagined that the people of this wide extended country could have been enveloped in such delusion, and made so much afraid of themselves and their own power, as to surrender it spontaneously to those who are manœuvring them into a form of government, the principal branches of which may be beyond their control."Again, March, 1801:—"You have understood that the revolutionary movements in Europe had, by industry and artifice, been wrought into objects of terror in this country, and had really involved a great portion of our well-meaning citizens in a panic which was perfectly unaccountable, and during the prevalence of which they were led to support measures the most insane. They are now pretty thoroughly recovered from it, and sensible of the mischief which was done, and preparing to be done, had their minds continued a little longer under that derangement. The recovery bids fair to be complete, and to obliterate entirely the line of party division, which had been so strongly drawn."—Jefferson's Correspondence, vol. iii. pp. 401, 457.
[2]Jefferson writes, September, 1798, "The most long-sighted politician could not, seven years ago, have imagined that the people of this wide extended country could have been enveloped in such delusion, and made so much afraid of themselves and their own power, as to surrender it spontaneously to those who are manœuvring them into a form of government, the principal branches of which may be beyond their control."
Again, March, 1801:—"You have understood that the revolutionary movements in Europe had, by industry and artifice, been wrought into objects of terror in this country, and had really involved a great portion of our well-meaning citizens in a panic which was perfectly unaccountable, and during the prevalence of which they were led to support measures the most insane. They are now pretty thoroughly recovered from it, and sensible of the mischief which was done, and preparing to be done, had their minds continued a little longer under that derangement. The recovery bids fair to be complete, and to obliterate entirely the line of party division, which had been so strongly drawn."—Jefferson's Correspondence, vol. iii. pp. 401, 457.
"The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen, in his person and property, and in their management. Try by this, as a tally, every provision of our constitution, and see if it hangs directly on the will of the people."Jefferson.
"The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen, in his person and property, and in their management. Try by this, as a tally, every provision of our constitution, and see if it hangs directly on the will of the people."
Jefferson.
Though it be true that the principles of government are to be deduced more from experience of human nature than experience of human governments, the institutions in which those principles are to be embodied must be infinitely modified by preceding circumstances. Bentham must have forgotten this when he offered, at sixty-four, to codify for several of the United States, and also for Russia. He proposed to introduce a new set of terms. These could not, from his want of local knowledge, have been very specific; and if general, what was society to do till the lawyers had done arguing? How could even a Solomon legislate, three thousand miles off, for a republic like that of Connecticut, which set out with taking its morals and politics by handfuls, out of Numbers and Deuteronomy? or for Virginia, rank with feudal prejudices and methods? or for Delaware, with its monarchicalmartyr spirit? or for Louisiana, compounded of Spain, France, and America? Though at the time of the framing of the constitution, the States bore a strong general resemblance in their forms of government, endless minor differences existed, mainly arising from the different tenure on which they had been held under the English crown. Some had been provinces, governed by royal commissions, according to royal convenience. These were New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. Others had been under proprietary government; as Maryland, held under patent, by Lord Baltimore; and Pennsylvania and Delaware, held by William Penn. Others, again, were under charter governments; ruled and altogether disposed of by political corporations. Such were Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. Within the memory of middle-aged men, the governor of New Hampshire used to travel in a coach and six, while the governor of the much more important Massachusetts went on a horse, with his wife on a pillion. It is within the memory of living men how Massachusetts rose up in rejection of the imposition of a clergy by England; while the colonial law of Virginia ordained parsons to be paid yearly six thousand weight of prime tobacco, in addition to marriage, burial, and birth-fees; in which days, an unholy pastor, appointed by Lord Baltimore, was seen to ride about with the church key in one hand, and a pistol in the other. It is absurd to suppose that communities, where wide differences of customs, prejudices, and manners still exist, can be, or ought to be, brought into a state of exact conformity of institutions. Diversities, not only of old custom, but of climate, productions and genealogy, forbid it; and reason does not require it. That institutions should harmonise with the same first principles, is all that is requisite. Some, who would not go so far as tooffer to codify for countries where they have not get their foot, are yet apt to ask the use of one or another institution, to which the Americans seem to be unreasonably attached. It is a sufficient general answer that institutions are rarely sudden and complete inventions. They have usually an historical origin, even when renovated by revolution. Their protracted existence, and the attachment of the people to them are strong presumptions of their having some use. If their purposes can be better attained in another way, they will surely be modified. If they are the result of compromise, they will be abolished, according to the invariable law by which expediency finally succumbs to principle. That this will be the fate of certain of the United States' institutions which no one yet dreams of touching, and few dare to analyze, has been clearly foreseen, for forty years past, by many of the most upright and able men in the country. Some of them entertain an agonizing alarm at the prospect of change. Others, more reasonably, trust that, where no large pecuniary interests are at stake, the work of rectifying may very quietly and safely succeed that of reconciling: and the majority have no idea of the changes which their own hands, or their children's, will have to effect. The gradual ripening for change may be an advantage in more respects than one. Political changes which are the result of full conviction in a free people, are pretty sure to be safe. Time is also allowed, meanwhile, for men to practice their new lesson of separating the idea of revolution from the horrors which have no more natural connexion with it than burning at the stake has with the firm grasp of speculative truth.
"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
So much for the authority, and the objects of this celebrated constitution, as set forth in its preamble.
Its provisions are so well known that it is needful only to indicate them. In Europe, the difficulty is to avoid supposing the state governments to be subordinate to the general. "They are coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole." State government legislates and administers in all affairs which concern its own citizens. To the federal government are consigned all affairs which concern citizens, as foreigners from other states, or as fellow-citizens with all in certain specified relations.
The general objects of the instrument are easily stated; and an apparently clear case of separation between the general and state governments drawn out upon paper. But the application of the instrument to practice is the difficulty.
In this, there are two grand difficulties, among many of inferior importance. The one is, to construe the instrument; the other is, to bridge over its awful chasms of compromise.
There has never been a solemn instrument drawn up yet without leaving room for varieties of construction. There never can be, under our present use of abstract terms; no two men's abstractions being alike, or discoverably so. Of course, the profession in this case is, that words are to be taken according to their just and natural import; that there is to be no straining; that they are to be judged of according to common sense; and so on. The old jests against etymologists are enough to prove how far men are from agreeing what straining is. As to common sense, men respond in unison to a revelation of it; but they rarely agree,à priori, as to what it is. This difficulty is a wholly unavoidable one. The refuge under it is in the maxim "the majority are right." If the case in dispute be one of judicial import, the citizen may appeal to the Supreme Court. If it be of a different nature, it must be left to that other kind of supreme court,—the majority,—and the verdict will be given through the ballot-boxes.
The other difficulty, that of compromise, is declared to have been equally unavoidable. Concession, large mutual concession, was clearly necessary. To what extent, may be faintly conceived from the following extract from the Federalist. To some readers, who are more interested in the present workings of the government, than in the embarrassments of its inventors, this extract may appear dull. But it is useful to be presented with an outline of the difficulties incurred in legislating for a federal republic, both as a fact in political science; as a means of forming something like a just judgment of the framers of the constitution; and as a ground of hope that, so much danger having been surmounted, that which remains may be also overcome.
"This one tells us, that the proposedconstitution ought to be rejected, because it is not a confederation of the States, but a government over individuals. Another admits, that it ought to be a government over individuals, to a certain extent, but by no means to the extent proposed. A third does not object to the government over individuals, or to the extent proposed; but to the want of a Bill of Rights. A fourth concurs in the absolute necessity of a Bill of Rights, but contends that it ought to be declaratory, not of the personal rights of individuals, but of the rights reserved to the States in their political capacity. A fifth is of opinion that a Bill of Rights of any sort would be superfluous and misplaced; and that the plan would be unexceptionable, but for the fatal power of regulating the times and places of election. An objector in a large State exclaims loudly against the unreasonable equality of representation in the senate. An objector in a small State is equally loud against the dangerous inequality in the House of Representatives. From one quarter, we are alarmed with the amazing expense, from the number of persons who are to administer the new government. From another quarter, and sometimes from the same quarter on another occasion, the cry is that the Congress will be but the shadow of a representation; and that the government would be far less objectionable, if the number of the expenses were doubled. A patriot in a State that does not import or export, discerns insuperable objections against the power of direct taxation. The patriotic adversary, in a State of great exports and imports, is not less dissatisfied that the whole burthen of taxes may be thrown on consumption. This politician discovers in the constitution a direct and irresistible tendency to monarchy. That, is equally sure that it will end in aristocracy. Another is puzzled to say which of these shapes it willultimately assume, but sees clearly it must be one or other of them. While a fourth is not wanting, who, with no less confidence, affirms, that the constitution is so far from having a bias towards either of these dangers, that the weight on that side will not be sufficient to keep it upright and firm against its opposite propensities. With another class of adversaries to the constitution, the language is, that the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments are intermixed in such a manner as to contradict all the ideas of regular government, and all the requisite precautions in favour of liberty. Whilst this objection circulates in vague and general expressions, there are not a few who lend their sanction to it. Let each one come forward with his particular explanation, and scarcely any two are exactly agreed on the subject. In the eyes of one, the junction of the senate with the president, in the responsible function of appointing to offices, instead of vesting this power in the executive alone, is the vicious part of the organisation. To another, the exclusion of the House of Representatives, whose numbers alone could be a due security against corruption and partiality in the exercise of such a power, is equally obnoxious. With a third, the admission of the president into any share of a power, which must ever be a dangerous engine in the hands of the executive magistrate, is an unpardonable violation of the maxims of republican jealousy. No part of the arrangement, according to some, is more inadmissible than the trial of impeachments by the Senate, which is alternately a member both of the legislative and executive departments, when this power so evidently belonged to the judiciary department. We concur fully, reply others, in the objection to this part of the plan; but we can never agree that a reference of impeachments to the judiciary authority would bean amendment of the error: our principal dislike to the organisation arises from the extensive powers already lodged in that department. Even among the zealous patrons of a council of state, the most irreconcilable variance is discovered, concerning the mode in which it ought to be constituted. The demand of one gentleman is, that the council should consist of a small number, to be appointed by the most numerous branch of the legislature. Another would prefer a larger number, and considers it a fundamental condition, that the appointment should be made by the president himself."[3]
It must have cost Mr. Madison some trouble to vary the mode of expression in putting this host of objections. We cannot but admire the ingenuity with which he has brought them into view. But what should we say to the management which should reconcile the differences themselves? Concessions, various and large, were obviously necessary. I am not about to give a catalogue of what these actually were. They may be learned from any history of the period. Suffice it that the general and state governments not only urged and established claims, but admitted a set of prohibitions on themselves.
In all this there appears no fatal compromise. But there were some which made the wisest men of the time tremble for the stability of their noble work. There seems peril enough in the liability to the occurrence of new questions, which could not be foreseen, and for which an opening might, or might not, happen to be left. When, in addition to such, there were some questions left to be settled by a future government, from the inability of the statesmen of 1787 to agree uponthem, these statesmen might well be uneasy about the stability of their work. Of the first order of questions is that which is now debated with great animosity,—whether Congress has power to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia: a disputed point of construction, on which it seems to me that no plain person can be blamed for not anticipating any difference of opinion. Of the second class is that great question, or nest of questions, respecting Reserved Rights. It was agreed that all unforeseen questions which might arise with regard to the respective powers of the general and state governments, should be settled by the state governments; but then, there was an indefinite limitation introduced in the clause, that the general government should have all powers necessary for the prosecution of such and such purposes. This vague clause has been the occasion of the Union being shaken to its centre; and it may be thus shaken again, before the questions arising out of it are all settled.
Even these, being open questions, are less formidable than the compromise of the true republican principle which is apparent in some provisions of the constitution, and in some of the most important institutions of the country. The northern States, which had abolished, on principle, a far milder slavery than that of the cotton and sugar-growing south, agreed to admit slavery in the south as a basis for direct taxation, and for representation. They did worse. They agreed to act in behalf of their southern fellow-citizens in the capture and restitution of runaway slaves, and in the defence of masters against rebellious slaves. What bitter sorrows of conscience and of feeling this compromise has cost their children, it is impossible fully to describe. Of course, the law, being against conscience,i. e.the law of man coming into collision with the law of God, isconstantly broken; and causes of dissension hence arise. I know that slavery is only recognised by the constitution as a matter of fact; and that it is only twice mentioned; in connexion with representation, and with the restitution to their masters of "persons held to labour escaping into another State:" but the fact remains that a man who abhors slavery is compellable by the law which his fathers made, to deliver up to the owner a slave whose act of absconding he approves. It is impossible to estimate the evils which have proceeded from, and which will yet arise out of this guilty but "necessary" compromise.
There was difficulty in bringing the greater and smaller States into union. The smaller States could not agree to such an unequal representation as should render them liable to be swallowed up by the larger; while the larger could not consent to be reduced to an equality with the smaller. The Senate was established to afford an equal state representation; while the House of Representatives affords a fair representation of the nation in the aggregate, according to numbers. But the principle of the general government is, that it governs the entire people as one nation, and not as a league of States. There ought, in consistency with this, to be no state representation at all; and the Senate is an anomaly. An anomalous institution cannot be very long-lived. A second chamber, on a more consistent principle, will probably be established in its place, to fulfil its functions as a Court of Review, and as a check upon the precipitation of the other house, and, if need be, upon the encroachments of the executive. There is yet more of compromise involved in this institution of the Senate; as might be expected, since there is no end of compromise when principle is once departed from; yet there are statesmen who defendit on other grounds than that its establishment was necessary to the foundation of any federal government at all. One observed to me, "Some things look well in theory, and fail in practice. This may not be justifiable in theory; but it works well." If this last sentence be true, the well-working of the Senate is only a temporary affair; an accident. Its radical change becomes a question of time merely; and the recent agitation of the question of Instructions seems to indicate that the time is not very far distant.
The appointment of the judges for life is another departure from the absolute republican principle. There is no actual control over them. Theirs is a virtually irresponsible office. Much can be and is said in defence of this arrangement; and whatever is said, is most powerfully enforced by the weight of character possessed by the judiciary, up to this day. But all this does not alter the fact that irresponsible offices are an inconsistency in a republic. With regard to all this compromise, no plea of expediency can alter the fact that, while the House of Representatives is mainly republican, the Senate is only partially so, being anomalous in its character, and its members not being elected immediately by the people; and that the judiciary is not republican at all, since the judges are independent of the nation, from the time of their appointment.
I was told, on high authority, that the assent of the first nine States to the constitution, in 1788, was obtained by means not absolutely fair. What devices were used to procure an apparent majority, I was not informed; but it is generally supposed that if there had been no legislatures active on the occasion, if it had been put to the vote throughout the nation, the ratification would not have taken place when it did. Chief Justice Marshall gives testimony to this effect in his Life of Washington."So small, in many instances, was the majority in favour of the constitution, as to afford strong ground for the opinion that, had the influence of character been removed, the intrinsic merits of the instrument would not have secured its adoption. Indeed, it is scarcely to be doubted that, in some of the adopting States, a majority of the people were in opposition."
That a constitution, so framed, and so carried, should have worked as well as it has done, seems to point out two very encouraging things; that we may, without rashness, speak of it as Washington did, when he said, "I was convinced it approached nearer to perfection than any government hitherto instituted among men;" and that the world may quietly and hopefully await the further proceedings of the American people, in their advances towards an uncompromising democracy. There will be changes, but not therefore convulsion. There will be the change which Jefferson foresaw, and provided for without dread. "Still," says he, so lately as June, 1824, "we consider our constitutions not otherwise changeable than by the authority of the people, on a special election of representatives for that very purpose: they are, until then, thelex legum. But can they be made unchangeable? Can one generation bind another, and all others, in succession for ever? I think not. The Creator has made the earth for the living, not the dead."—"A generation may bind itself as long as its majority continues in life; when that has disappeared, another majority is in place, holds all the rights and powers their predecessors once held, and may change their laws and institutions to suit themselves. Nothing then is unchangeable but the inherent and inalienable rights of man."[4]
Nothing can be more striking to a stranger than the experience gained, after some residence in the United States, of the ultimate ascendency of the will of the majority—i. e.of the right—in defiance of all appearances to the contrary. The review of what I witnessed of this kind, in the course of two years, with regard to the conduct of Congress alone, surprises and cheers me. It is true that I see several wrongs unredressed; several wounds inflicted on the people's liberties yet unhealed; but these are cases in which the people do not yet understand what has been done; or have not yet roused themselves to show that they do.
In the Senate, the people's right of petition is invaded. Last session, it was ordained that all petitions and memorials relating to a particular subject—slavery in the District of Columbia—should be laid on the table unread, and never recurred to. Of course, the people will not long submit to this. What has been already achieved in Congress on this topic is a security that the rest will follow. When I entered the United States, there was an absolute and most ominous silence in Congress about slavery. Almost every leading man there told me in conversation that it was the grand question of all; that every member's mind was full of it; that nearly all other questions were much affected, or wholly determined by it; yet no one even alluded to it in public. Before I left, it had found its way into both houses. The houses had, in some sort, come to a vote upon it, which showed the absolute abolition strength in the House of Representatives to be forty-seven. The entering wedge having been thus far driven, it is inconceivable that the nation will allow it to be withdrawn by surrendering their right of petition. When I left, however, the people had virtually no right of petition with regard to theDistrict over which they—i. e.their Congress—have an exclusive jurisdiction.
Again. There were loud and extensive complaints, last session, of the despotism of the chair in the House of Representatives, chiefly in connexion with the subject of slavery. No members, it was said, were allowed a fair hearing but those who sat in a particular part of the house. If this complaint arises out of the peevishness of political disappointment, it will soon be contradicted by facts. If it is true, it is a grave injury. In either case, the chair will not long possess this power of despotism. If the favoured are few, as the complaint states, the injured many will demand and obtain the power to make themselves heard in turn; and no spirit of party can long stand in the way of a claim so just.
Again. After the gentlemen of Charleston had disgraced their city and country, by breaking into the post-office, and burning the contents of the mail-bags, in their dread of abolition papers, a post-master wrote to a member of the cabinet, desiring his approbation for having examined and refused to forward certain papers mailed at his office. The member of the cabinet, Kendall, gave the desired sanction to this audacious stoppage of the post-office function, declaring that the good of the community (as judged of by the individual) is a consideration above the law. The strangers in the land knew not what to make of the fool-hardiness of hazarding such a declaration, in a man of Kendall's wit. It was known that he desired the office of post-master-general; that the president wished him to have it, and that the doubt was whether the Senate would confirm the appointment. Soon after this apparently fatal declaration, he was nominated, and the Senate confirmed his appointment. The declaration, no doubt,seated him in office. The southern members were won by it. Kendall calculated rightly for his immediate object. What is to become of him when the people shall at length recognise the peril and insult to themselves of one of their favoured servants declaring the will of an individual to be occasionally subversive of the law—i. e.of the will of the majority—remains to be seen. Meantime, the continuance in office of the person whose declaration to the above effect remains unretracted, may be regarded as one of the deepest wounds which has been inflicted on the liberties of the nation.
Another attempt, brought on, no doubt, by Kendall's success, to derange or stop the functions of the post-office, has failed. Mr. Calhoun's Bill, commonly called the Gag Bill, prohibiting postmasters from receiving and forwarding any papers whatsoever containing anything relating to slavery, actually was brought to a third reading by the casting vote of the president of the Senate. There was fear, at the time, that this casting vote might ensure the success of the bill, from the popularity of the vice-president. But the bill was thrown out on the third reading; and the effect of the casting vote has been, not to aid the bill, but to injure materially the popularity of the vice-president. This is so far well. It shows that the people are preparing to grapple honestly with the great, the hideous question, out of which arise these minor encroachments upon their liberties.
Out of the slavery question arose the last monstrous usurpation of Congress, for which the emphatic rebuke of the nation awaits the sinning members. The story deserves to be told at length, on account both of its peculiarities, and of its furnishing a fair illustration of certain relations between the state and general governments.
Great Britain was not very learned in the geography of the new world, in the early days of her colonies there. She gave Virginia a patent for lands, including what is now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, and on to the Pacific. Other colonies obtained grants of equal moderation as to size, and wisdom as to disposition. This absurd partition, it was found, must occasion irreconcilable quarrels among the members of the confederation; and Washington proposed that all, after fixing their own boundaries, should throw into the common stock the huge unoccupied domain. Virginia led the way in making this honourable sacrifice. She fixed her own boundary; and the articles of compact between the United States and the people of the territory north-west of the Ohio river, declared that the territory should be divided into not more than five, nor less than three States. This was in 1787. The boundary prescribed for Ohio and Michigan, was found to be "not convenient." That is, Ohio found it so; and Michigan was not in a situation, at the time when Ohio was admitted into the Union, to insist upon the ancient boundary, prescribed at the time of the cession of land by Virginia. When Ohio was made a State, the boundary she desired was, among other particulars, ratified by Congress.
In 1816, another portion of land, lying within what Michigan supposed to be her own territory, was taken from her, and added to Indiana, on the latter being made a State. An equivalent is offered to Michigan in a portion of land, to be taken out of Wisconsin, on the western side of Lake Michigan, which is the natural boundary of the territory. Michigan alleges that the inconvenience of a part of her territory lying on the other side of the lake would be so great, that the inhabitants would prefer belonging to Wisconsin; and the land would beceded, as soon as Wisconsin becomes a State. The decision of the right of this case is the proper business of the Supreme Court, whenever the contesting parties shall have all come into the Union. Meantime, all parties are interested in bearing down the claims of Michigan. Ohio and Indiana desire to keep the lands Congress has authorised them to take. The slave States are anxious to hinder the increase in number of the free States; and by the ordinance of 1787, slavery is prohibited for ever, north-west of the Ohio. The slave States hope, by giving to Michigan a slice of Wisconsin, to make Wisconsin too small to be hereafter divided into two States. In this object, the south will be foiled. Even if slavery should exist till Wisconsin is ready for admission into the Union, there are two ways by which the desire of the south may and will be foiled. By the re-cession of the inconvenient portion by Michigan, as mentioned above; and by the willingness of these northern States to make themselves smaller, and add one to their number, as, by aprovisoin the original compact, they have power to do, than let themselves be overborne by the south. This part of the contest, for "a balance of power," arises altogether out of the slavery question.
Soon after I entered the country, Michigan became qualified to request admission into the Union. She did so, declaring her discontent with the boundaries prescribed to her by Congress, and her intention to demand, in the Supreme Court, on her admission, the re-establishment of the old ones. I was amused with the different views of the affair presented to me in different parts of the country. At Cincinnati, in June, 1835, I was told that the President had just transmitted a threat to Ohio, that if she did not yield the boundary claimed by Michigan, he would send the United States troopsto fight it out. It was added that the vice-president had thus far prevailed with the President; it being of importance to Mr. Van Buren, that Michigan, which he considered in his interest, should be admitted into the Union in time to vote for him in the presidential election of 1836. There was much talk at Cincinnati of the resources of Ohio. The people would turn out, to a man. The legislature had instantly voted 300,000 dollars to raise troops; and one hundred and fifty thousand men would immediately be in the field: while Michigan had neither men nor money;—had absolutely nothing to depend upon but the six thousand United States' soldiers. This seemed to me to be too clear a case to be a very true one: and the event belied the story in almost every particular. Michigan did raise men; (though there was no war:) she had not the United States' troops: she is not in the interest of Van Buren; and Ohio could bring no troops into the field.
Michigan proceeded to organise her state government, and sent her senators to Washington, during the session of 1835 and 1836. They were allowed to witness the proceedings, but not, of course, to vote. When I arrived at Detroit, the capital of Michigan, in the middle of June, 1836, the Governor told me that the Michiganians were in the singular position of having a state government in full operation, while they were excluded from the Union. The general opinion seemed to be that some concession must be made about the boundary line; in which case, Michigan would be admitted, in time to vote at the presidential election. I pursued my travels through and around the Territory; and when I returned to Detroit, a month afterwards, I found the place in a state of high excitement: an excitement fully warranted by the circumstances which had occurred.
Congress had acknowledged Michigan to be a sovereign State; and had offered to admit her into the Union, on condition of her surrendering all claim to the disputed portions of territory.
A grosser usurpation of power can hardly be conceived. Congress here usurped the function of the Supreme Court in passing sentence against Michigan: passing sentence, too, without hearing, or having a right to listen to, evidence on the case. Congress here required of Michigan to lay down her rights on the threshold of the Union, if she meant to be admitted. Mr. Adams intrepidly declared in the House of Representatives, that Michigan had more cause to ply the Nullification doctrine than South Carolina ever had. A South Carolina nullifier declared in conversation, that he believed the Michiganians' claims to be just: but that, sooner than give her the means of summoning another sovereign State before the Supreme Court, he would vote for her exclusion from the Union as long as he lives. A strange posture of affairs, where all justice seemed to be set aside, and the constitution to have become a dead letter!
The anxiety next was to know what Michigan would do. There seemed too many symptoms of yielding. It was mournful to those who felt that now was the time, now the opportunity, so often sighed for in the best moments of the best men, for making a heroic stand for the right, to hear the forebodings about the canal shares, the lake trade, the probable pecuniary loss in various ways, if there should be delay in the admission of Michigan into the Union. If we spoke of the constitution, we were answered with the canal. If we spoke of patriotism, we were answered with the surplus revenue—the share of it that would be lost. Then, there were fears of war. We were told that the alternative was—admission, with its advantages, and asurrender of the contested lands; and exclusion, with war between infant Michigan and Ohio, backed by the United States. The alternative was rather, admission, with submission to unconstitutional force; or exclusion, with the lonely enjoyment of an honest sovereignty. But this was not the only alternative. Remaining out of the Union did not involve war. Michigan might remain out of the Union, peaceably, and under protest, till the people of the United States should become fully possessed of her case, and aroused to do her justice. It was with heartfelt delight that I found, at length, that this last honest course is that which Michigan has determined to pursue. It is so common for communities, as for individuals, to miss the moment for doing the greatest of their deeds, to have the bright object of their preceding worship eclipsed at the critical moment, to pray incessantly that they may be honest, and then stand aghast, after all, at an honest deed, that the meeting of the Convention which was to consider of this affair, was watched with deep anxiety by the friends of Michigan. We, their visitors, gathered hope from the tone of the Governor, and others with whom we conversed; from the aspect of the legislators who were assembled to discuss the Governor's message;—men with earnest and sensible faces, who looked as if they were aware that their liberties were at stake; and from the spirited conduct of Michigan from the beginning of the quarrel. Still, we were doubtful whether the canal, the surplus revenue, and the probable war, would not be too much for the fortitude of so young a people. They have shamed our fears, and made a stand for constitutional liberty, which will secure to them the gratitude of the Union, to the latest day of its existence. They have refused to enter the Union on the unconstitutional termsproposed. The people will see that they are honourably admitted, and that Congress is duly rebuked.
The principle which is professed in the appointment of a chief magistrate in the United States is, that his removal is to be as easy as possible, and effected without disturbing for a moment the proceedings of government. Under the idea that this last must be impossible, some of the patriots of 1789 were opposed to the institution of the office of President altogether; and there are now some who desire that the chief magistrate should be, as nearly as possible, a cipher; that, for this purpose, his election should be annual; and that, if this cannot be, the term should continue to be four years, but without renewal. Such declare that the office was made for the man, Washington, who was wanted, to reconcile all parties. They maintain that, though it was, for a considerable time, well filled, it must become, sooner or later, dangerous to the public welfare: that it comprehends too much power for a citizen of a republic to hold, presents too high a stake, occupies too much thought, and employs too much endeavour, to the exclusion of better objects.
Some desire that the office should have a duration of six years, without renewal.
No one dreams of an attempt to hold the officefor a third term; and there is every prospect that, if any President should be ambitious enough to desire a second re-election, he would fail, and descend from his high station with a total loss of honour.
Some think so highly of the dignity of the chief magistracy, as to propose that ex-presidents should be debarred from holding lower offices. This looks too like an approximation to the monarchical principle to be, or to become, a popular way of viewing the subject. It is a proposition of the high federalists. I was far more gratified than amused at seeing Mr. Adams daily in his seat in the House of Representatives, while the history of his administration was perpetually referred to by those who discussed the politics of the country with me. I am aware that two interpretations may be put upon the fact of an ex-president desiring a lower office. It may occur from a patriotism which finds its own dignity in the welfare of its country, or from a restless ambition to be in the public eye. In either case, it seems to be no matter for a fixed rule. The republican principle supposes every man to be at all times ready to serve his country, when called upon. The rest must be left to the character of the man, and the views of his constituents.
Others think so much more highly of the dignity of the Senate than of the executive, as to desire that senators should be ineligible for the office of President. The object here is two-fold: to exalt the Senate; and, by making half a hundred offices higher in honour than that of President, to drain off some of the eager ambition which flows in the direction of the executive function. But power is more alluring than honour; and executive offices will always be objects of choice, in preference to legislative, except with a very small class of men. Besides, the Senate is already further removedfrom the control of the people, than consistency with the true republican principle allows: and if the people are to be precluded from choosing their chief magistrate from among the fifty wisest men (as the senators are in theory) that the States can choose for the guardianship of their interests, the dignity of both functions would be much lowered. In theory, the people's range of choice for their chief magistrate is to extend from the vice-president's chair to the humblest abode which nestles in the rocks of their eastern coasts, or overlooks the gulf of Mexico. The honour in which the Senate is held must depend on its preserving the character, which, on the whole, it has hitherto maintained. A nobler legislative body, for power and principle, has probably never been known. Considering the number of individuals of whom it is composed, its character has, perhaps, been as remarkable as that of the noble array of Presidents, of which the United States have to boast. If, amidst its indirect mode of election, and long term of office, it should prove equally stable in principle, and flexible in its methods of progress, it may yet enjoy a long term of existence, as honourable as could be secured by any exclusion of its members from other offices in the commonwealth.
By far the greatest apprehension connected with the President's office, relates to the extent of his patronage. It was highly alarming, at first, to hear all that was said about the country being ridden with administration-officers, and office-expectants. A little arithmetic, however, proved very cheering. The most eminent alarmist I happened to converse with, stated the number of persons directly and indirectly interested in the bestowment of office by the executive, to be 150,000. No exact calculation can be made, since no one can do more than conjecture how many persons at atime are likely to be in expectation of any one office. But the above may be taken as the widest exaggeration which an honest alarmist can put forth. This class of interested persons is, after all, but a small section of the population. There is every reason to fear that official corruption is abundant under all governments; and, for some reasons which will be easily apprehended, remarkably so under the government of the United States; but, when it is considered how small a proportion of the people is, at any time, interested in office, and how many persons in office are to be, in fairness, supposed honest, the evil of executive patronage diminishes to the imagination so rapidly as to induce a suspicion that many who say the most about it are throwing a tub to the whale. The watchfulness on the executive power thus induced is a benefit which will set off against a great amount of alarm. It will assist the people to find the true mean between their allowing the President too much power over the servants who are to transact their business, and their assuming too much control over the servants who are to transact his.
Difficult as it is to resist impressions on the spot, from all that is said about the power of the executive, and the character of the President of the time, the worst alarms are derided by the event. It does not appear as if the President could work any permanent effect upon the mind and destiny of the nation. It is of great consequence to the morals and prosperity of the season, that the chief magistrate should be a man of principle, rather than expediency; a frank friend of the people, rather than their cunning flatterer; a man of sense and temper, rather than an angry bigot; a man of business, rather than a blunderer. But the term of an unworthy or incapable President is pretty sure to be the shortest; and, if permitted to servehis eight years, he can do little unless he acts, on the whole, in accordance with the mind of the people. If he has any power, it is because the people are with him: in which case, he cannot be very destructive to their interests. If he does not proceed in accordance with public sentiment, he has no power. A brief review of the course of the American Presidents seems to show that their influence subsides into something very weak and transitory; always excepting that immeasurable and incalculable influence which is breathed forth through the remotest generations, by the personal character of conspicuous individuals.
Washington's influence is a topic which no one is ever hardy enough to approach, in the way of measurement or specification. Within the compass of his name lies more than other words can tell of his power over men. When the British officers were passing up the Potomac, in the last war, to perpetrate as dastardly a deed of spoliation at the capital as ever it was the cruel fate of soldiers to be ordered to do, they desired to be told when they were passing the burial place of Washington, and stood uncovered on deck as long as they were within sight of Mount Vernon. Any in England who happen to know how deeply disgraced their country was by the actors in this expedition, will feel what the power must have been which, breathing from that shore, humanised for the hour the cowardly plunderers as they floated by. But it was Washington, the man, not the President, who moved them to uncover their heads. It is Washington, the man, not the President, whose name is lovingly spoken, whose picture smiles benignly in every inhabited nook of his own congregation of republics. It is even Washington, the man, not the President, whose name is sacred above all others, to men of all political parties. It wasWashington, the man, who united the votes of all parties in his presidentship, since, so far from pretending to agree with all, he took and left, without fear or favour, what convictions he could or could not adopt from each. The one impression which remains of his presidentship is its accordance with himself. Had it been, in any respect, a lower self, there would have been little left of Washington in the people now.
Adams came in by the strength of the federal party. Supported by the slave States, and all the federalism of the north, he had the means, if any President ever had, of leaving a strong and permanent impression on the face of affairs. He filled up his offices with federalists. Everything during his term of office favoured the influence of the federalists. The nation was almost beside itself with panic at the political convulsions of Europe. Yet, notwithstanding all this, and Mr. Adams's great weight of character, giving influence to his partialities, the people revealed themselves, in the choice of his successor, staunchly republican.
Jefferson's influence was greater than that of any other President, except Washington; and the reason is, that his convictions went along with the national mind. If Jefferson, with the same love of the people, the same earnestness of temper, and grace of manners, had been in any considerable degree less democratic, he might have gone creditably through his term, and have been well spoken of now; but he would not have been the honourable means of two successors of the same principles with himself, being brought in; nor would he have lain, as he now does, at the very heart of the people. At the outset, his state-rights principle secured him the south, and his philanthropic, democratic principles, the north. He was popular, almost beyond example. His popularity couldscarcely be increased; but it has never declined. The common charges against him, of irreligion, of oppression in the management of his patronage, of disrespect to his predecessors, are falling into oblivion, while his great acts remain. As to his religion, whatever might be his creed, its errors or deficiencies, these are still matters of disagreement among the wise and good; and it is certain that Jefferson viewed all the realities that came within his ken, with that calm earnestness which is the true religious spirit. As to the removals from office, which are still complained of, it should be remembered that his predecessor had filled as many offices as possible with high federalists, many of whom provoked their own discharge by their activity against the government they professed to serve. There is no evidence that Jefferson went beyond his own principle; and a principle is no matter of reproach, though it may be of controversy. He says, "Mr. Adams's last appointment, when he knew he was naming counsellors and aids for me and not for himself, I shall set aside as far as depends on me. Officers who have been guilty of gross abuses of office, such as marshals packing juries, &c., I shall now remove, as my predecessor ought in justice to have done. The instances will be few, and governed by strict rule, and not party passion. The right of opinion shall suffer no invasion from me."—"The remonstrance laments that a change in the administration must produce a change in the subordinate officers; in other words, that it should be deemed necessary for all officers to think with their principal. But on whom does this imputation bear? On those who have excluded from office every shade of opinion which was not their's? or on those who have been so excluded? I lament sincerely that unessential differences of opinion should ever have been deemed sufficient tointerdict half the society from the rights and blessings of self-government, to proscribe them as unworthy of every trust. It would have been to me a circumstance of great relief, had I found a moderate participation of office in the hands of the majority. I would gladly have left to time and accident to raise them to their just share. But their total exclusion calls for prompter corrections. I shall correct the procedure: but, that done, return with joy to that state of things, when the only questions concerning a candidate shall be, Is he honest? Is he capable? Is he faithful to the constitution?"[5]
As to his disrespect to Washington and Adams, it should be remembered what the party heats of the day were; how Washington's cabinet was divided between France, war, and general liberty; and neutrality, peace, and care of the people at home. With such a theme of quarrel, it would have been a wonder if hasty words had not been sometimes spoken on all sides. Jefferson's ultimate opinion of Washington, written in confidence to a friend, in 1814, has happily come to light. At the close, he says, "These are my opinions of General Washington, which I would vouch at the judgment-seat of God, having been formed on an acquaintance of thirty years." One extract is enough: "On the whole, his character was, in its mass, perfect; in nothing bad, in few things indifferent; and it may truly be said, that never did nature and fortune combine more perfectly to make a man great, and to place him in the same constellation with whatever worthies have merited from man an everlasting remembrance."[6]The friendship in old age between himself and Mr. Adams, and the moral and intellectual beauty of their closecorrespondence, are a spectacle in sight of which all prior party misunderstandings should be forgotten. There is one infallible test by which to try old men who have had much to do in the world. If their power and privilege of admiration survive their knowledge of the world, they are true-hearted; and they occasion as much admiration as they enjoy. Jefferson stands this test.
His great acts are much heard of. The reduction of taxes and correction of abuses with which he began his administration; his having actually done something against slavery; his invariable decision for advocacy or opposition, in accordance with the true democratic principle, are now spoken of more frequently than things less worthy to be remembered. His influence has been greater than that of any other President since Washington, exactly in proportion to his nearer approach to the national idea of a chief magistrate.
No great change took place during the administration of his two successors, Madison and Monroe. They were strong in the strength of his principles, and of their own characters. Madison's term of office would have been memorable in history, if he had not immediately followed his friend Jefferson. Their identity of views, put into practice by Madison, with the simplest honesty and true modesty, caused less observation than the same conduct immediately succeeding a federal administration would have done. Hence the affectation, practised by some, of calling Madison a tool of Jefferson. Those who really knew Mr. Madison and his public life, will be amused at the idea of his being anybody's tool.
The reason why John Quincy Adams's administration is little notorious is somewhat of the same nature. He was a pure President; a strictly moral man. His good morality was shown in thedevotion of his fine powers to the faithful conduct of evanescent circumstances. His lot was that of all good Presidents in the quiet days of the republic. He would not use his small power for harm; and possessed no very great power for political good.
General Jackson was brought into office by an overpowering majority, and after a series of strong party excitements. If ever there was a possibility of a President marking his age, for good or for evil, it would have been done during Jackson's administration. He is a man made to impress a very distinct idea of himself on all minds. He has great personal courage, much sagacity, though frequently impaired by the strength of his prejudices, violent passions, an indomitable will, and that devotion to public affairs in which no President has ever failed. He had done deeds of war which flattered the pride of the people; and in doing them, he had acquired a knowledge of the people, which has served him instead of much other knowledge in which he is deficient. He has known, however, how to obtain the use, though not the reputation, of the knowledge which he does not possess. Notwithstanding the strength of his passions, and the awkward positions in which he has placed himself by the indulgence of his private resentments, his sagacity has served him well in keeping him a little way a-head of the popular convictions. No physician in the world ever understood feeling the pulse, and ordering his practice accordingly, better than President Jackson. Here are all the requisites for success in a tyrannical administration. Even in England, we heard rumours in 1828, and again in 1832, about the perils of the United States, under the rule of a despotic soldier. The cry revived with every one of his high-handed deeds; with every exercise of the veto,—which he has used oftener than all the other Presidents put together,—with every appointment made in defiance of the Senate; with the removal of the deposites; with his messages of menace to the French government. Yet to what amounts the power now, at the close of his administration, of this idol of the people, this man strong in war, and subtle in council, this soldier and statesman of indomitable will, of insatiable ambition, with the resources of a huge majority at his disposal? The deeds of his administration remain to be justified in as far as they are sound, and undone if they are faulty. Meantime, he has been able to obtain only the barest majority in the Senate, the great object of his wrath: he has been unable to keep the slavery question out of Congress,—the introduction of which is by far the most remarkable event of his administration. One of the most desponding complaints I heard of his administration was, not that he had strengthened the general government—not that his government had tended to centralisation—not that he had settled any matters to his own satisfaction, and left the people to reconcile themselves to his pleasure as they best might,—but that every great question is left unsettled; that it is difficult now to tell any party by its principles; that the principles of such affairs as the currency, land, slavery, internal improvements, &c. remain to be all argued over again. Doubtless, this will be tiresome to such public men as have entirely and finally made up their minds on these subjects. To such, nothing can well be more wearisome than discussion and action, renewed from year to year. But the very fact that these affairs remain unsettled, that the people remain unsatisfied about them, proves that the people have more to learn, and that they mean to learn it. No true friend of his country would wish that the questions of slavery and currency should remain in any position that they have everyet occupied in the United States; and towards the settlement of the latter of the two, as far as light depends on collision of opinions, it is certain that no man has done so much, whether he meant it or not, as President Jackson. The occasional breaking up and mingling of parties is a necessary circumstance, whether it be considered an evil or a good. It may be an evil, in as far as it affords a vantage-ground to unprincipled adventurers; it is a good, in as far as it leads to mutual understanding, and improves the candour of partisans. For the rest, there is no fear but that parties will soon draw asunder, with each a set of distinctive principles as its badge. Meantime, men will have reason to smile at their fears of the formidable personage, who is now descending from the presidential chair; and their enthusiasm will have cooled down to the temperature fixed by what the event will prove to have been his merits. They will discuss him by their firesides with the calmness with which men speak of things that are past; while they keep their hopes and fears to be chafed up at public meetings, while the orator points to some rising star, or to some cloud no bigger than a man's hand. Irish emigrants occasionally fight out the battle of the Boyne in the streets of Philadelphia; but native Americans bestow their apprehensions and their wrath upon things future; and their philosophy upon things past. While they do this, it will not be in the power of any President to harm them much or long.
Never, perhaps, did statesmen begin their task of constitution-making with so much aid from preceding circumstances as the great men of the Revolution. A social neighbourhood of colonies, all suffering under colonial grievances, and all varying in their internal government, afforded a broad hint of the present system, and fine facilities for putting it in practice. There was much less speculation in the case than might appear from a distance; and this fact so far takes away from the superhuman character of the wisdom which achieved the completion of the United States' constitution, as to bring the mind down from its state of amazement into one of very wholesome admiration.
The state governments are the conservative power, enabling the will of the majority to act with freedom and convenience. Though the nation is but an aggregation of individuals, as regards the general government, their division into States, for the management of their domestic affairs, precludes a vast amount of confusion and discord. Their mutual vigilance is also a great advantage to their interests, both within each State, and abroad. No tyrant, or tyrannical party, can remain unwatched and unchecked. There is, in each State, a people ready for information and complaint, when necessary; a legislature ready for deliberation; and an executive ready to act. Many States, in other ages and regions, have been lost through the necessity of creating their instruments when theyshould have been acting. State organisation is never managed without dispute; and it makes the entire difference in the success of resistance to aggression whether the necessary apparatus has to be created in haste and confusion, or whether everything is in readiness for executing the will of the majority.
Under no other arrangement, perhaps, could the advantage be secured of every man being, in his turn, a servant of the commonwealth. If the general government managed everything, the public service would soon become the privilege of a certain class, or a number of classes of men; as is seen to be the case elsewhere. The relation and gradation of service which are now so remarkable a feature in the United States commonwealth, could never then happen naturally, as they now do. Almost every man serves in his township in New England, and in the corresponding ward or section elsewhere; and has his capability tried; and, if worthy, he serves his county, his State, and finally the Union, in Congress. Such is the theory: and if not followed up well in practice, if some of the best men never get beyond serving their township, and some of the worst now and then get into Congress, the people are unquestionably better served than if the selection of servants depended on accident, or the favour of men in power. Whatever extraneous impediments may interfere with the true working of the theory, every citizen feels, or ought to feel, what a glorious career may lie before him. In his country, every road to success is open to all. There are no artificial disqualifications which may not be surmounted. Allhumbug, whether of fashion and show, of sanctimoniousness, of licentiousness, or of anything else, is there destined to speedy failure and retribution. There is no hereditary humbug in the United States. If thehonest, wise man, feels himself depressed below the knave, he has, if he did but know it, only to wait patiently a little while, and he will have his due. Though truth is equally great everywhere, and equally sure ultimately to prevail, men of other countries have often to wait till they reach the better country than all, before they witness this ultimate prevalence, except with the eye of faith. The young nation over the Atlantic, is indulged, for the encouragement, with a speedier retribution for her well or ill doings; and almost every one of her citizens, if he be truly honourable, may trust to be fitly honoured before he dies.
Another conservative effect of the state governments is the facilities they afford for the correction of solecisms, the renovation of institutions as they are outgrown, and the amendment of all unsuitable arrangements. If anything wants to be rectified in any State, it can be done on the mere will of the people concerned. There is no imploring of an uninterested government at a distance—a government so occupied with its foreign relations as to have little attention to spare for domestic grievances which it does not feel. There is no waiting any body's pleasure; nobody's leave to ask. The remedy is so close at hand, those who are to give it are so nearly concerned, that it may always, and, for the most part, speedily, be obtained, upon good cause being shown. No external observance is needed, except of the few and express prohibitions which the general and state governments have interchanged.
It is amusing to look over the proceedings of the state legislatures for any one year. Maine amends her libel law, decreeing that proof of truth shall be admitted as justification. Massachusetts decrees a revision and consolidation of her laws, and the annihilation of lotteries. RhodeIsland improves her quarantine regulations. Connecticut passes an act for the preservation of corn-fields from crows. Vermont decrees the protection of the dead in their graves. New York prohibits the importation of foreign convicts. New Jersey incorporates a dairy company. Pennsylvania mitigates the law which authorises imprisonment for debt. Maryland authorises a geological survey. Georgia enlarges her law of divorce. Alabama puts children, in certain circumstances, under the protection of chancery. Mississippi decrees a census. Tennessee interdicts barbacues in the neighbourhood of camp meetings. Ohio regulates the care of escheated lands. Indiana prohibits a higher rate of interest than ten percent. Missouri authorises the conveyance of real estate by married women. And so on. It seems difficult to imagine how many abuses can reach an extreme, or be tardy of cure, where the will of the majority is not only speedily made known, but where the division of employment is so skilfully arranged that the majority may be trusted to understand the case on which they are to decide.
It has always appeared to me that much misapprehension is occasioned by its being supposed that the strength of the general government lies in the number of its functions; and its weakness in the extent of its area. To me it appears directly the reverse. A government which has the management of all the concerns of a people, the greater and the smaller, preserves its stability by the general interest in its more important functions. If you desire to weaken it, you must withdraw from its guardianship the more general and important of its affairs. If you desire to shield it from cavil and attack, you must put the more local and partial objects of its administration under other management. If the general government ofthe United States had to manage all legislation and administration within their boundaries, it could hardly hold together one year. If it had only one function, essential to all, and impossible to be otherwise fulfilled, there seems no reason why it should not work prosperously till there are fifty States around it, and longer. The importance of the functions of the general government depends partly upon the universality of the interest in them; and partly upon the numbers included under them. So far, therefore, from the enlargement of the area of the United States being perilous to the general government, by making it "cumbrous," as many fear, it seems to me likely to work a directly contrary effect. There are strong reasons why an extension of her area would be injurious to her, but I cannot regard this as one. A government which has to keep watch over the defence, foreign policy, commerce, and currency, of from twenty-five to fifty small republics, is safer in the guardianship of its subjects than if it had to manage these same affairs for one large republic, with the additional superintendence of its debtors, its libellers, and the crows of its corn-fields.