THE RISE AND FALL OF ' THE MODEL REPUBLIC. 9 JAMES WILLIAMS, LATE AMERICAN MINISTER TO TURKEY AUTHOR OP 'THE SOUTH VINDICATED.' LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, PUBLISHER IN ORDINARY TO HER MAJESTY. 1863, LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFQRBUjS PAVIS TO THE FEIENDS OF EATIONAL LIBEETY AND TO THE ADVEESAEIES OF DESPOTIC GOVERNMENT, WHETHER ADMINISTERED UNDER THE RULE OF A SINGLE TYRANT OR OF A MULTITUDE, THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED BY THE AUTHOE. PREFACE. WHATEVER divergence of opinion may be found to exist between the author and the reader of the following pages, there will doubtless be an entire agreement in regard to the pertinence of the title by which the late Government of the United States of America is designated. If it had been described as the 'American Union/ the question might suggest itself to the well-informed reader 'What Union?' Because, in the country which forms the subject of this volume, three Federal Unions had followed each other, and two of them had been extinguished before the third was dissolved by the secession of the Confederate States. To have employed the term ' United States ' would equally have required an explanation, for they are not now what they were during the period concern ing which I have written, although there was a United States still in being at the date of our last advices from Washington. But when we say the i MODEL REPUBLIC,* none can mistake its signification. All the world will agree, that the words describe one, and but one, Vlll PREFACE. Confederacy, that has ever existed, and that they obviate the necessity of further explanation. It is not always that an adjective prefix, or a phrase employed to designate the quality of a party, or a State, or a system, is conceded by common con sent to be a truthful exponent of the thing described. American factions or parties are rarely permitted to wear unchallenged the names by which they designate themselves. Their adversaries employ other words to describe the same thing such as Barn-burners, Silver-greys, Loco-focos, or Copper heads when they refer to the Democratic party ; or, on the other hand, Woolly-heads, Negro-worshippers or Exterminators, by way of retort upon the Re- publicans. Nevertheless, these nicknames, which, however bewildering to strangers, are well under stood in the localities where they are employed, are all meant to imply a reproach, and are therefore not admitted by universal consent to be legitimate appellatives. In the present case we encounter no such diffi culty. When the proselyte of the vox populi vox Dei school of politicians desires to illustrate the practical advantages of his theory of government over all others, and at the same time to achieve a climax, he exclaims with an air of undoubting triumph, ' Behold the Model Republic ! ' and almost as though they were the returning echo of his own words comes back the response from his adversary, 4 Aye ! Behold the Model Republic ! ' Whether the one regards it as a model of perfec- PREFACE. IX tion and the other a model of deformity an example to be imitated, or an example to be avoided does not matter. They are agreed that 'it is a representa tion ' a something ' in imitation of nature ' a standard by which Democratic institutions 'are to be measured.' Congratulating himself, then, as its author does in having adopted a name by which to designate the Government concerning which he has written that cannot fail to be satisfactory to all parties, he fears that from this point of agreement there will be a divergence between the opinions he expresses and those which are entertained by the Eadicals of every political school, whether of monarchical or demo cratic tendencies. He has said too much, perhaps, to expect forgiveness from the one, and not enough to secure the approbation of the other. He trusts, how ever, that he may fall back for support and counte nance upon that larger and more practical class which, like truth, is found to exist between two extremes. The author would have been wilfully blind not to discover the seat of the disease which has afflicted the late Confederation, and dishonest, if he wrote at all, not to expose it. To have suggested a remedy too mild to be efficacious, or so violent that it would have been peremptorily rejected by the patient, would have been alike unavailing in the achievement of any desirable end. In his treatment of the subject the author has addressed himself only to the facts. Where these condemn he has condemned; where these commend X PREFACE. he has commended. If he has failed to clothe truth in the garb which will produce conviction, he trusts that abler pens will be employed in elu cidating the great problem, and that eventually some practical good may be evoked, which may serve as a counterpoise to the admitted evils which are incident to republican government. It may be thought, perhaps, that this volume should have been published in America rather than in England, where real liberty is enjoyed by all, and where there is no single element of power strong enough even to menace its overthrow. Yet, for reasons which are obvious to those who are familiar with the condition of affairs in America, this would have been impossible. The author nevertheless hopes that the subject, if not attractive to the great mass of European readers, will not be without interest to a few ; and that these, in estimating the merits of the volume as a whole, will give credit for the fidelity which has been observed in his statement of the facts of American history to which he has made allusion. LONDON : Oct. 30, 1863. CONTENTS, CHAP. PAGE I. Real and Assigned Causes of the Dissolution of the Federal Union 1 II. The Fact of the Rupture of the Union does not prove the Inefficiency of Republican Government Com parison of the Results of Democratic Institutions in the United States and other Portions of America Mexico : as She Is and as She May Be . . 17 III. The Framers of the American Constitution were Opposed to the Election of the President by a Popular Vote Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention in Reference to the best Means of choosing the Chief Executive of the Government . 32 IV. Party Conventions Their Origin Their Agency in Making the President Their Uses, and their Abuses ........ 53 V. Component Parts of a Northern Presidential Conven tion : Puritans, Atheists, Socialists, Abolitionists, &c 73 VI. Progress of the Canvass after the Conventions have made their Nominations Estimate of the Value and Extent of the Sovereignty exercised by the People . . . * . ... . . .94 VII. True Liberty is Incompatible with the Exercises of Sovereign Power, by a Single Will, whether it be vested in One Individual or in a Majority of the Xii CONTENTS. CHAP. rAGE People, acting as a Unit The United States Government was in Theory Free, in Practice a Despotism .... .110 VIII. Fatal Influence exercised by Presidential Elections upon the Morals of the People and the Integrity of the Government ...... 127 IX. Enumeration of other Evils resulting from Presi dential Elections . . . .134 X. The Institution of Slavery was not one of the Causes of the Dissolution of the Union . .144 XL The Influence of Slavery upon the Duration of the Union farther Considered . . . .170 XII. The Institution of Slavery retarded the Disruption of the Union 176 XIII. A Review of the Events connected with the For mation of the Federal Union, and the Opinions of the Authors of the Constitution, in regard to Sectional and State Sovereignty Questions . 189 The First Government of the United States . .190 Second Government of the United States . .191 Third Government of the United States . . 191 Provision for Rendition of Slaves .... 200 Mr. Madison's View of the Federal Compact . 216 Tabular Statement of Presidential Elections : Popular Vote in Presidential Elections from 1824 to 1860 220 Table of Elections by the Presidential Electoral Colleges, from Washington to Lincoln inclu sive 1788 to 1860 . . . . . 221 XIV. A Survey of the Presidential Elections from Washington to Lincoln considered in reference to the Appliances employed by the Parties and Factions to Operate upon the Public Mind . 222 First Presidential Epoch from 1789 to 1825 . 228 CONTENTS. Xlll CHAP. PAGE Second Presidential Epoch 1825 to 1860: Election of John Quincy Adams Inauguration of the New Era by the commencement of the * Bargain, Intrigue, and Corruption Mania ' Year 1825 235 Protective Tariffs as an Issue in Presidential Con tests 242 South Carolina Resists the Tariff by an Act of Nullification Year 1832 .... 259 Election of General Jackson : Continuation of the 'Bargain, Intrigue, and Corruption Mania ' Year 1828 . . 266 Martin Van Buren, of New York, elected President in 1837 273 The ' Log Cabin and Hard Cider Mania ' in the Canvass between Martin Van Buren, of New York, and William Henry Harrison, of Ohio Year 1840 . . . . . .274 Shadows of Approaching Evils . . . 286 Canvass between James K. Polk, of Tennessee, and Henry Clay, of Kentucky Revival of the Bargain and Corruption Charge Texas An nexation Consummated Year 1844 . . 289 Contest for the Presidency between General Taylor (Whig), General Cass (Democrat), and ex- President Van Buren (Free Soil) Year 1848 293 Canvass of 1852 Candidates, Mr. Pearce (Demo crat) and General Scott (Whig) Mr. Pearce elected President 311 Last Appearance of the Whig Party Year 1853 . 315 The 'Know-nothing,' or American Party . . 319 Missouri Compromise ...... 325 Protest of Southern Senators Year 1850 . . 335 Presidential Contest of 1856 An ti- Southern Mania Election of Mr. Buchanan .... 349 An ti- Southern Mania Sectionalism Triumphant Lincoln elected President Year 1860 . 355 XV. A Discussion of the Questions of Right and Wrong, and of Liberty and Despotism, involved in the Issue between the North and the South . . 375 XIV CONTENTS. CHAP. XVI. A Discussion of the Subject of Personal Ambition in its Relation to the Secession of the South . 386 XVII. Concluding Summary of the Defects and Merits of the Constitution as Illustrated in Practice . . 400 XVIII. A Plan suggested for Providing a President without an Election . . . . . .418 Conclusion . .... 422 RISE AND FALL OP CC THE MODEL KEPUBLIC. CHAPTER I. REAL AND ASSIGNED CAUSES OF THE DISSOLUTION OF THE FEDERAL UNION. THE American Union as it existed in the days of Washington is no more and will never be again. It is not surprising when a great Government is in process of dissolution, and is disappearing from the family of nations amongst which it had occupied a conspicuous place, that men should behold the spectacle, even from afar, with an interest deepened and intensified in proportion to the magnitude of the political edifice which is falling into ruins. The gigantic structure of the Federal Union has been broken in twain, and as mankind gaze into the yawning gulf which widens and deepens with each convulsive movement of the dissevered fragments, they wonder and seek to divine the cause and to fathom the future of the catastrophe. ' There are those now living who assisted in placing B Z THE AMERICAN UNION. the first foundation stone who aided in the con struction of its massive walls who watched its progress until the last tile was adjusted upon its roof and who are now in their old age gazing upon its ruins. Not the ruins of the great principles upon which the structure was reared not the ruins even of the dissevered fragments for though they may never again be re-united, each one, and it may be others constructed out of the abundant and sound material, may yet attain to a greatness surpassing that of the edifice from whose debris they sprang. But the overthrow of the Federacy, as a unit of power the wreck of that Government which pro claimed by its motto ' E pluribus Unum ' the nature of its powers, the source of its authority, and the limit of its duration, has been fully and irremediably accomplished. It was a magnificent structure, erected under the guidance of patriotic and wise counsels ; and even as men now contemplate its fallen condition, the philo sophical mind is more impressed with respect and admiration for its founders, than when in the fullness and completeness of its proportions it towered amongst us, the pride of every American, and the wonder of mankind. It may be likened unto a great ship, which the architects and machinists had constructed after a new model and upon an untried principle, whose mission it was to sail in hitherto unexplored seas. Eidiculed by those who could discover no merit in anything new, and in the estimation of whom even vices become sanctified by age into virtues feared by many who believed that such an innovation upon ITS RISE AND FALL. 3 established principles might exercise a dangerous influence upon the subjects of other Governments, and thus involve them in the ruin which they pre dicted would ensue when the vessel would be cast among the breakers opposed by the universal practice of mankind, and in contempt of previous failures where the same principles had been partially applied, the constructors boldly, though perhaps with some misgivings, launched their new ship upon the stormy ocean, and sent her forth upon the mission for which she had been created. And right gallantly did she buffet the winds and the waves, and to the multitude she seemed to grow stronger as she grew older. Her friends were buoyant with hope, and her enemies became less sanguine of witnessing her speedy destruction, while her successful voyages made a deep impression upon those who had hitherto been sceptical in regard to her powers of endurance. There were occasions when the more thoughtful of those by whom she was directed feared that a tempest might arise which would overtax her capacity for resistance ; but anon she passed on into smooth waters and confidence was again restored : and her friends believed that she could safely ride through any storm ; and her adversaries scarce dared to hope that she would ever encounter an overwhelming disaster. But notwithstanding all she was wrecked in the midst of what appeared to be her most prosperous voyage. Not because the model was imperfect, or the machinery too complicated to be kept successfully in motion not from any defect in the principle upon which she had been constructed but for the reason that a single simple detail, a solitary wheel was 4 RUPTURE OF THE UNION. misplaced, which by constant friction with another part finally wore them both away. She did not perish because she fell among the breakers while the pilot slept, nor from any external violence ; but because her crew who might have seen her defective element, and who, if they had so willed, could have substituted another which would have made it secure against every internal shock failed to see, or if seeing refused to provide the only remedy. The ship dashed madly on and perished. It is in the convul sions of her dissolution, even more than in the greatness of her brief career, that the world has discovered the magnitude of her power. No spectacle in the past has been exhibited to mankind which has absorbed more deeply the attention of the civilised world than that which is now being exhibited upon the American continent. Though the theatre of action is so remote from the great European centre of civilisation, the interest excited by the terrible struggle between the divided parts of the great Confederacy is scarcely less general than would be produced by a similar catastrophe to some long established European Power. In reference to the causes which have culminated in this conflict the minds of men have been variously affected. Some have regarded the event with satis faction, believing it to be a deathblow to the system of government upon which the States composing the Confederacy were founded ; while others, for the very same reason, are overwhelmed with mortification, grief, and dismay. Both are essentially wrong in the premises from which they derive their conclu sions, while both may be right in believing or fear- ITS CAUSES CONSIDERED. O ing that a long night of gloom may succeed to the bright sunlight of liberty which the establishment of the American Republics diffused throughout the world. Whatever may be the immediate results following the terrible conflict which the dismemberment of the Union has so unnecessarily produced, the lapse of time and an intelligent contemplation of the real causes by which it was accomplished will show that the origin of these results had nothing whatever to do with the fundamental principles of government upon which the Confederacy rested. It is difficult, I might almost say impossible, for a stranger who has not been himself an eye-witness to the operations of the American Constitution, or rather the Federal compact, to comprehend fully and be able to trace to their true sources all the currents and counter currents which, increasing in volume and in the rapidity of their movements with the lapse of time, have at length engulphed the Union. In considering a result already achieved, observers, even the least interested personally in the event, generally decide upon its causes according to their own peculiar prejudices or partialities, without following the thread of events by which it was achieved, and thus arriving at a truthful solution. It is unfortunately true that moral and political philosophers, who have exercised a controlling in fluence over the public sentiment of mankind, have generally sought to adapt events to their theories, rather than to correct their theories by events. They set out by assuming the correctness of certain general principles, to which they adhere under the most 6 RUPTURE OF THE UNION. diverse circumstances. They treat a political ques tion in the same manner that a mathematician would demonstrate a geometrical problem, without consider ing the material difference that in proving the truth of the latter the absurdity of any other result is at the same time established, while the former can only be shown to be true under a given state of circum stances. Mere theorists 'soon degenerate into parti sans, and partisans rarely state the cause of their adversaries with fairness. The events which are transpiring in America, and the causes by which they were produced, deserve to be considered from a higher platform than that which is occupied by the mere partisan. The interests of mankind are too deeply involved in a truthful solution of the great problem which has been at issue in the New World during three quarters of a century to accept the conclusions of mere partisans in regard to the causes which have led to the catastrophe. Sovereigns and their subjects, Conservatives and Liberals, may learn invaluable lessons from the ex perience of America, by comprehending clearly the truth ; but it cannot in the end subserve any worthy object to give to the events we are considering an interpretation which would lead to false conclusions. There is much in the career of the late Confederation which, if properly understood and wisely and frankly acted upon, ought at least to shorten the distance which divides the sincere adherents of the two great leading systems of government. If both would sink the partisan, and in good faith accept the lesson ivhich is now unfolded by the bloody drama which is being enacted by the American Republics, the terrible ITS CAUSES CONSIDERED. conflict would not have been altogether in vain. The history of the Government of the late United States proves much in support of and against the doctrines of both, and it is deeply interesting to decide aright upon which side the weight of testimony inclines. In the i SOUTH VINDICATED ' I set forth, in advance of the actual catastrophe, the material active visible causes which soon thereafter terminated, as it was manifest would be the result, in the disruption of the Federal Union. I think that I stated them fairly. I do not believe that I did injustice to the North, nor that I did more than justice to the South. But, being a Southerner, it may be that my strong convictions were in some degree influenced by my very natural desire to serve the cause of 'my own country. In attempting in that work to vindicate my countrymen against the cruel aspersions of their enemies, I did but utter the feelings and sentiments and opinions of the Southern people, though I had no authority to speak for them than such as I derived from my right of citizenship, a common interest, and a common danger. In discussing now the moral causes which led to and finally produced the rupture of the Union, I can have no personal, or party, or sectional interest to subserve, which is not shared alike by the citizens of both the North and the South. Whether or not my conclusions may be just, they cannot exercise any influence in deciding upon the question of might, which is now the only one at issue. Argument has been abandoned the sword has been tendered by the North and accepted by the South as the 8 RUPTURE OF THE UNION. arbiter, and by the sword alone may the material questions at issue be solved. However this issue may be settled, it cannot lead us to a correct appreciation of the causes which produced the con flict. What were those causes which have been attended with such stupendous results ? The adversaries of democratical forms of govern ment believe that the catastrophe to the Union origi nated in a radical defect or error in the fundamental principle upon which the Government was founded. These do not duly consider that all the various forms of government which have been devised and adopted have been subject to convulsions and revolutions, similar in kind and character to that which is now progressing in America. Such a solution might be accepted if conflicts of a like nature had not signal ised the history of the world ; but we may not justly apply a test to the Republic which would have to be exceptional, or which, if applied to other forms of government, would equally condemn them all. If, however, the fact of the war might lead the mind to such a conclusion, the events which have signalised the conflict the immense power and skill which have been displayed by both sections of the former Union the indomitable energy and zeal with which each pursues its object (the one for conquest, the other for independence) might well dispel the delusion that a Government which could display such quali ties and develope such enormous resources did not possess many of the attributes which make nations durable and powerful. The fundamental error of those who draw the conclusion indicated, from the disruption of the f ' ITS CAUSES CONSIDERED. 9 Union, consists in the fact that they regard the dis solution of the Federal compact as involving the principle of Republican government. The Federal Union was, in fact, but the creature of the States composing it. The Constitution, as justly interpreted by Lord Brougham and other distinguished com mentators, was a mere treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive. The States who were the parties to this league were and remained sovereign. That they were so is proved by the fact that they delegated certain defined sovereign powers, which they could not have conferred if they had not been sovereign. The real government of the country, in regard to its internal affairs, rested always with the States. The constitutions of all these embodied the principles of Republican government, and this fact caused the framers of the Federal Constitution to insert a clause guaranteeing to every State a Republican form of government. If this had been omitted, nothing remained which would have precluded a monarchy from becoming a member of the Federal Union. It would, therefore, be an error to suppose that the rupture of this league had anything to do with the Republican basis upon which the Governments of the States were founded. Others find a ready solution by attributing it to that prevailing disposition of the stronger to subdue the weaker, when unrestrained by countervailing influences. This may be admitted to be true in one sense, though false in another, since this active cause was itself in a great measure an effect proceeding from another and a more powerful cause. There are others still who find no difficulty in 10 KUPTURE OF THE UNION arriving at the conclusion that the Institution of African Slavery which existed in a number of the States was the prime source of all the evils which have befallen the country. This, too, may be said to be partly true and partly false. It is true just in the sense that the purse of the unfortunate traveller is the immediate cause of his being robbed upon the highway. But if he had not been possessed of a purse, his watch, or his horse, or his cloak, would have been quite sufficient to stimulate the highway man to the employment of his dagger or his pistol. Slavery may be said, more properly, to have been a pretext rather than the cause; but if the Institution of Slavery had never existed, other pretexts would have been employed to subserve a like purpose. There are others still who believe that the disaster which has befallen the Union had its origin in the fact that the powers delegated by the States to the Federal Government in the compact of union were too great; while the adversaries of these are quite sure that precisely the reverse is true. Even these adverse propositions may be partially true, and yet both are false. If the Government had been less strong, it would probably have given less cause to the States of the South to distrust its intentions. If it had been stronger, or if the rights of the States and their reservation of sovereignty had been less clearly defined, those who were aggrieved by the tyrannical application of its powers might have been deterred from attempting their own deliverance. After allowing due weight to the arguments upon both sides, and carefully considering the facts, we are constrained to conclude that even though the CAUSED BY PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 11 general Government had been shorn of some of its powers or, if upon the other hand, its authority had been more despotic the revolution could not thereby have been averted. The judgment of mankind may, to a certain degree, justly decide that some of the causes referred to exercised a powerful influence in producing the disruption of the Union. Yet these were but effects of a previously existing cause. The former were active, immediate causes, visible to the eye, palpable to the sense ; but they were only results of, or owed their developement to, a passive remote cause. There were physical living causes which were, however, only brought into mischievous action through the instrumentality of a latent moral cause, which slowly, silently, but not less surely, accomplished its mis sion. This great source of evil this cancer upon the body politic, which diffused its poison through out the whole sytem was the Presidential election. The fact was no secret to thoughtful citizens. Intelligent politicians knew that the presidential contests were undermining the foundation of the Government, and that sooner or later the destruction of the Federal Union would ensue. They could not if they would have concealed this knowledge from themselves, and yet none dared publicly to proclaim it. None had the boldness to suggest the only remedy. Amid all the various plans of compromise which were suggested with a view to avert for the time being the impending calamity, which com menced to develope itself upon the success of the North as a section in the presidential contest of 1860 it is fair to presume that not one of the 12 BUPTURE OF THE UNION intelligent movers thereof believed that the adoption of any proposed scheme would do more at most than postpone for a season the denouement of a foregone conclusion. There would have resulted at best but a truce of longer or shorter duration, because the same primary cause of disaster would have remained in full force, and sooner or later the Confederacy would have been obliged to succumb to that ever present, active, unaltered, irresistible first cause. It may be asked why did not some self-sacrificing patriot or statesman of the dominant section fear lessly define the nature of the evil, and point out to the people the only remedy? To this interrogatory it may be answered that the patriots and statesmen of the North, and to a lamentable degree of the South also, had long before been obliged to yield themselves as vanquished, under the irresistible influence of that very cause, by the mere demagogues and place-seekers who had been their rivals for the smiles of their Sovereign the people. Were the recipients of royal or popular favours ever known to subject themselves voluntarily to the frowns of their sovereign by suggesting unpalatable reforms, or by intimating that their master was not a proper or a safe custodian of power ? As an apology for the courtier it may be admitted that such exhi bitions of patriotism generally terminate in the discomfiture or disgrace of those who have the courage thus to speak. Few monarchs are willing to relinquish the pageantry, much less the substance of power, except under the pressure of an apparently overruling necessity. Courtiers and demagogues mutually laugh at and upbraid each other for their CAUSED BY PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 13 servility to their respective sovereigns. Each 4 would scorn to crook the pregnant hinges of the knee ' to the master of the other ; yet in the very act of depre cating servility towards any other description of potentate than the one to which they each respec tively proffer their devotion, they administer the most exquisite flattery. Both are doubtless sincere when they pronounce all other dispensers of honours and patronage and smiles to be less worthy of adulation, or of the unswerving loyalty and self- sacrificing devotion of loving subjects, than the particular one which they have the honour and the happiness to serve. Republicans are as wary about uttering unpalatable truths to their sovereign as other courtiers ; and hence, from the moment when the cloud, no bigger than a man's hand, first made its appearance upon the horizon of the ' Great Republic ' hour by hour, and day by day, and year by year, thickening and darkening, and expanding, until the whole heavens were shrouded in gloom, up to the very instant of time when the storm burst forth in all its terrible fury, spreading desolation and death throughout the land men witnessed it all foresaw the result knew there was one and but one place of shelter ; and yet of all those whose lust of place and power had precipitated the catastrophe, not one was found who possessed the moral courage to say to the people ' The independence of the individual States in all that concerns their internal relations being essential under our system of checks and balances to the preser vation of liberty ; and the election of presidents by a majority of the people of the Union being incompatible 14 KUPTUEE OF THE UNION with the sovereignty and equality of the separate members, besides being a perpetual fountain of bitter personal, political, and national animosities among the people : a perseverance in such a mode of designating the chief officer of the State can only end in the total estrangement of the different sections and the subver sion of the Government. Let us, therefore, consolidate and perpetuate the blessings of that freedom which we may possess by not abusing its privileges. Let us remove the temptation by relinquishing the power to destroy liberty. Let us surrender the empty honour of making and unmaking our four -year-kings, that we may be spared the heart-burnings, the jealousies, the convulsions, the enmities, the irreme diable dangers which follow, as the night the day, the struggle of conflicting interests in the settlement of an uncertain succession to the supreme power of the State. Let us take warning from the mutterings of that storm which is evidently approaching, and learn wisdom from that Past whose history has been written in characters of blood, and from whose dark pages we are taught that the epoch of greatest danger to Governments, and of disaster to the people, has been at the period of transition between the vacation of the kingly office, by the extinction of one line of monarchs and the permanent installation of another.' In declaring that presidential elections were the primary cause of the overthrow of the Government, I am uttering a truth which has been rarely, if ever, spoken by American politicians who occupied a posi tion or enjoyed a personal popularity which might have given force and effect to their opinions or CAUSED BY PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 15 advice. Yet I repeat, that while intelligent citi zens may have closed their eyes, and refused to read or interpret the hand- writing upon the wall, the conviction of the fact was indelibly impressed upon their minds. The hectic flush which mantles the cheek of the consumptive patient during the last struggle of the vital principle of life, to maintain itself against the slow but sure approach of death, is not more palpable to the sense of sympathising friends who watch by his dying bedside than, to the minds of thoughtful Americans, was that flood of evils springing from this source, which growing broader and deeper and darker, with the lapse of time, moved onward in its certain unvarying course to the gulf of dissolution. However this may be, the great Confederacy of Free States, which was developed into such vast proportions before even those who assisted at its creation had all passed away which still numbered upon its pension lists many who had fought in the war which called it into being as a nation which startled mankind by the exhibition of a gigantic in ternal power which has never been surpassed by any other nation, has indeed passed away for ever. There are few disinterested spectators of the events which have followed its dissolution who can believe, or hope, or fear, that its dissevered elements can ever again be re-united into a harmonious whole, either by the physical power of the one or by the volun tary assent of the other. A new nation has sprung forth from the ruins which has already been baptised in fire and blood, between which and its former con federates there is a broad, deep, impassable gulf, 16 THE UNION AS IT WAS CAN NEVER BE AGAIN. filled with the bodies of its slaughtered citizens. It can scarcely be believed that any tardy measure of redress, however comprehensive, would be accepted as an atonement for the horrors through which it had been forced to pass ; or that any feeling or senti ment of fraternal regard for the North, as a nation, can ever again animate the bosoms of the Southern people. How far the action of foreign nations may modify the natural course of events it is impossible to fore tell. The Governments of the civilised world may, to a certain extent, be regarded in the aggregate as a confederacy, bound together by certain laws tacitly recognised, which regulate their intercourse with each other, and define their respective rights and obligations. It could scarcely be possible, under the circumstances existing, for a single nation to main tain itself in that perpetual isolation which would be the consequence of a persistent refusal on the part of others to recognise its existence. If, therefore, the other Governments of the civilised world will not consent to treat with the Confederate States in any other capacity than as dependencies of a Government composed of their former confederates, until the assent of the latter is first accorded, it may not now be decided what influence it may exercise upon the future of the dismembered parts of the late Union, Left, however, to the operation of natural causes, uninfluenced by any repelling external influence, whether passive or active, the reconstruction of the Union, if not impossible, is altogether improbable. 17 CHAPTER II. *h THE FACT OF THE RUPTURE OF THE UNION DOES NOT PROVE THE INEFFICIENCY OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT COMPA RISON OF THE RESULTS OF DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES AND OTHER PORTIONS OF AMERICA MEXICO : AS SHE IS AND AS SHE MAY BE. SO far as it might affect the fortunes of the fallen Union, a decision in regard to the causes which produced its overthrow would be of no avail, yet a correct comprehension thereof cannot fail to be profitable to all who may have an interest in dis covering the faults, as well as the advantages, resulting from the system of government upon which the Confederation was established. I have said that the presidential election was the source of these evils. It was, as it were, a Pandora's box, which attracted and collected within itself the various elements of ill, only to expand, develope, and then scatter them broadcast throughout the land. It may not be said absolutely to have created the poisons ; but it intensified them, increased their viru lence, and administered them to the victims. It will not be denied that there existed other elements of destruction which would, at a later period, have developed themselves without the aid or stimulant of presidential elections. There were other causes c 18 GOVERNMENTS MUST BE ADAPTED constantly in operation which would, in all probability, have enforced the division of the country into smaller and more homogeneous States ; but these would have equally existed under any conceivable form of government, and might have been developed to their legitimate results according to natural and invariable laws, more potent in their efficacy in accomplishing their mission than any statutory enactments which could have been devised for the prevention of such a consummation. The presidential election prema turely developed these causes, and hastened the final catastrophe. It was the opportunity and the temp tation, inviting instead of repelling them ; cultivating instead of destroying them; and luring them on to crush out the life of the nation at the very moment when it appeared to be growing stronger and stronger. It hastened the dissolution, instead of allowing the confederacy to live on its allotted time, and then to pass away under the immutable natural laws which would have determined the limit of its duration. Many of the wisest politicians and statesmen of Europe believe that if the Government had been a monarchy the catastrophe would not have oc curred. I think it may be easily established that this was not necessary to the attainment of the end, even if a resort thereto had been practicable ; but its application under the circumstances was not only not essential, but impossible. It has been a misfortune to mankind that a large proportion of those whose genius or intellectual en dowments have enabled them to impress their ideas upon others have permitted themselves to be the TO THE WANTS OP THE PEOPLE. 19 slaves of theories which they have traced out to seemingly legitimate conclusions, without giving due consideration to the many causes, moving in opposite courses, which in the practical affairs of real life give a totally different direction to the ever-shifting current of events. They note the developement of certain principles or measures, under a certain ex isting state of circumstances, and within certain fixed boundaries; and having witnessed their suc cessful developement within that limited sphere, they conclude that all mankind would be gainers by being subjected to the same laws. Thus the theoretical monarchist would impose his favourite form of government upon the whole human family, while the radical democrat would abolish all distinctions of rank, and capacity, and race, and complexion, and bring all men, in theory at least, to the same social and political level. Each may be right, considered in reference alone to the isolated communities and within the limited circle from a study of which they have respectively imbibed the inspiration of their thoughts ; but both will be found seriously at fault when they attempt to generalise mankind, and apply to all the same fixed laws. The British Government may be admirably adapted to the British people. It may be admitted that it is scarcely pos sible to conceive any other system which could have achieved such great results. It is quite probable that any sudden and violent change, either in the direction of a monarchical or democratic despotism, would result in disaster, and perhaps the final sub version of a power which during many centuries has exercised a controlling influence over the destinies of c 2 20 OEIGIN OF REPUBLICAN mankind. Notwithstanding, however, the admitted adaptation of British political institutions to the re quirements of the British people, it may scarcely be believed that they could be put into successful operation, or if in operation that like results would ensue, if applied even upon the nearest neighbouring territory. They would be still more out of place in countries more remote, where the tastes, habits, and traditions of the people were formed under totally different auspices, and under the operation of oppo site causes. The people composing a nation may be imper ceptibly led to change their habits of thought by edu cation and by long training, yet a reverence for a particular form of government, or for the principles upon which a government is founded, are not the growth of a day, but of generations and ages. Eadi- cal changes in the constitution, or even in the pa geants of a state, cannot be effected to the advantage of its subjects by a coup d'etat, or a sudden revolu tion, unless the tastes and habits and minds of those to be effected thereby have been educated to the transformation by a long process of preparation. The mass of mankind are slow to adopt, and slower to revere, a new order of things suddenly and without due preparation brought into operation. The great changes which have been made in certain Govern ments of Europe, when the present is contrasted with some epoch in the past, have been accomplished silently and by such a slow and gradual process that no period can be assigned as the date of their com mencement or their consummation. If we consider and apply these same natural laws INSTITUTIONS IN AMERICA. 21 to the late Federal Union, it will be discovered that the successful establishment of a monarchy would have been, under the circumstances existing at the period of the formation of the Government, so nearly impossible as to have rendered it in every respect in which it might have been viewed wholly undesirable. The discovery of the American continent opened a new era in the history and habits, as well as in the go vernment of mankind. Emigrants from the Old World who flocked to its shores acted under the influence of the same general causes. They entered upon their new life having in view the same general objects. They did not go as kings and nobles and serfs, though all classes contributed to swell the population of the New World. A great continent was before them, abounding in all the elements of wealth, wholly unoccupied, save by roving savages who disappeared before the advancing tide of civilisation. In a contest with the wilderness and the wild Indian rank and title were of no avail. The strong arm, the resolute will, the superior sagacity, the greater capacity for physical endurance, constituted the qualities of mind and body which could alone secure preeminence. With an almost illimitable expanse of territory, of which each occupant might appropriate to his own use all that he could reclaim from the savages, and subdue by the arts and for the uses of civilised man, it was to be expected that he would soon forget or dis regard the habits of thought as well as action which prevailed amongst the overcrowded populations of the Old World from whence he had withdrawn himself, and to which he never expected to return. In process of time, kings born to the inheritance of 22 ORIGIN OF REPUBLICAN crowns were for him a historical incident of the past, and for his descendants a tradition of another hemi sphere handed down to them from their ancestors. The fact that monarchs still lived was only made palpable to his senses by their exactions through their agents and representatives; for he never beheld them with his own eyes, and was never captivated by the pageantry with which royalty is surrounded. When these isolated individuals grew into communities, and from communities into states, they organised democratical forms of government, under the operation of the natural laws which will govern the people of Great Britain when they assist at the coronation of a successor to the Queen. We may reasonably conclude that it would have been even more impracticable to have established a monarchy in the United States than to suddenly transform a long established European monarchy into a republic. The territory embraced within the limits of the United States had been divided, up to the moment when its history as an independent confederation may be regarded as having commenced, into a number of provinces of unequal extent and population, which were totally distinct from each other in regard to the administration of the laws by which they were respectively governed. These provinces, on entering upon the struggle for independence, very naturally joined themselves together in a league for mutual defence, but in doing so they carefully reserved their individual rights of sovereignty over all their internal affairs. They had been living under the operation of the British Constitution, divested of its kings and INSTITUTIONS IN AMEKICA. 23 its hereditary nobles. Hence their governments had been in fact republics, though tributary to a monarchy. When, therefore, the authority of Great Britain was withdrawn, all that was monarchical disappeared, and the thirteen provinces thereby became independent republics, united for certain defined purposes under a single head, deriving its authority from themselves. They were republics, but they did not become so by revolution : for in the very act of separation from the foreign power to which they had been tributary they were left in that condition. The monarchical element under which they had previously existed was not, and never had been, a feature in their own political institutions. Those who organised the governments may not therefore be properly said to have instituted the republican form, for it existed before, in letter and spirit. To have created a monarchy would have involved a revolution in the established order, and would moreover have been in discord with the prevail ing sentiments and established usages of the people. They wisely chose to create governments in harmony with the principles, tastes, and habits of those for whom they were instituted. Hence the transition from the condition of colonial dependence was un accompanied by any palpable change in the relation of the citizens towards each other, or the State. It is not my purpose to bring in question the rela tive abstract merits of different forms of government, but only to insist that, in the application of the general principles of political science, we find that a certain form may be proved to be best under a given state of circumstances and when applied to a 24 THE RUPTURE DID NOT RESULT particular community ; but under other circumstances, and applied to a different community, it may be that it would be the very worst. In general terms, it may be said that the form of government is best which secures for its subjects the greatest amount of hap piness. The source from whence the powers of a government should emanate depends upon the ca pacity, and habits and tastes : even the traditions and prejudices of the governed. It must be con ceded that, in view of all the circumstances, the form adopted by the people of the British provinces in America, upon the establishment of their independ ence, was for them the one best calculated to pro mote the legitimate objects for which governments are instituted amongst men. Yet it does not follow that in the arrangement of its details they may not have committed a fatal error, or that in practice it approached any nearer to the attainment of the legitimate ends of government than others con structed upon a different basis. So far as regards the real liberty of the subject, we may learn by the history of the United States since the year 1860, if the lesson had never been taught before, that there may exist as ruthless a despotism under the forms of democratic or republican freedom as could be developed under the absolute rule of a single despot. But it would be a grave error to conclude that the disruption of the Union, or the war which it has engendered, or even the gross violations of the principles of liberty which have marked the career of the United States Government, under its present rulers, have demonstrated the insufficiency of repub- FKOM THE NATURE OF THE GOVERNMENT. 25 lican institutions, properly organised, to accomplish within the limits of the late Union all the purposes for which governments are established. If such exceptional tests are to be regarded as conclusive against the republican principle, in a thousand fold stronger degree, because in a thousand instances similar results having signalised the career of monar chies, they also must be condemned. The partisan of other forms of government may prove, by a reference to the events now transpiring in America, that democracies, like monarchies, are subject to disintegration, to war civil war, if he chooses to give such an improper designation to the conflict between the North and the South that they may be diverted from their legitimate course by the exercise of a despotic power, which for the time being banishes every vestige of individual freedom from the land: he may prove that man's nature, his impulses, his actions, are governed or directed by the same natural laws, under the operation of the one as the other ; but he can establish nothing more. There may, or may not exist, substantial and con clusive reasons why the monarchical form of govern ment is the best ; but the proof is not furnished by the fact of the disruption, nor by the events of the war. While, however, it may be maintained that the republican form, guarded by a wise system of checks and balances, would be best adapted to the wants and interests and sympathies of the people composing the late Union, and that no other would have been likely to develope from the same materials such great results, it cannot be denied that in almost every 26 THE REPUBLICAN SYSTEM NOT other part of the American continent the experiment of democratical institutions has ended in complete and hopeless failure. Whether we cast our eyes over the little republics of South America, engaged in their ceaseless occupation of warring upon each other, or themselves ; or to Central America, where the degeneracy of the European race has been attended by physical as well as mental imbecility, and where the wandering tribes of aborigines are beginning to assert their supremacy over the soil ; or to the lovely plains and valleys and mountains of Mexico a land abounding in all the natural elements of greatness a prolific soil, a salubrious climate, and withal a brave people, characterised by many high traits of charac ter throughout the whole we discover, though in different degrees, the evidences of intrinsically bad governments, badly administered. Neither can there be discovered anything in their past history or their present condition which might give rise to even a glimmering hope that the future would not be under like auspices, but a repetition of that which has already transpired. Mexicans may well hail the establishment of different political institutions, founded upon a pro perly organised monarchy, as the turning point in their destiny the full stop in their downward career, the harbinger of a great future for the nation. It would be a grave error to suppose that the Mexican people have degenerated in the ratio of the decay of the political fabric by which they were governed. On the contrary, there still exists among a large portion of the population all the elements of character which distinguish the ADAPTED TO MEXICO. 27 European race from whence they sprang. There is a class of Mexicans, by no means small, who would do honour to any country. Their usefulness has been destroyed by the crushing incubus of a badly administered Government ; but upon the instant that a stable Government is established, they will at once show themselves to be fully competent for the task of regenerating the country. It is certainly true that a large proportion of the humbler classes have been thoroughly demoralised by the part they have been required to act in the ceaseless civil broils in which they have been en gaged by ambitious or factious leaders. It is also true that the blood of the ancient Spaniard has been much adulterated by admixture with the inferior races which inhabited their territory. We may account for a very large measure of the superior energy of the European races in the United States over those of Mexico, by giving due weight to the fact, that in the former they always maintained a social and political superiority, not only over the aborigines but over the multitudes of Africans who had been transported as slaves to their territory. The pride of race, which in the one forbade an amalgama tion, had no existence in the other, among; the great I 7 O O body of the people. The degeneracy of the latter was the inevitable consequence. No truth has been more clearly established by the test of experience than that Europeans, when brought into contact with the aboriginal or trans planted races upon the American continent, on terms of social and political equality, generally retrograde to the level of their associates ; while the latter rarely 28 THE KEPUBLICAN SYSTEM NOT ascend higher in the scale of civilisation than by the adoption and practice of its vices.* But this evil will doubtless to a great extent be mitigated by the influx of European emigrants, who will flock to Mexico as to a land of promise, when * A practical illustration of this fact was furnished a few years ago at the meeting of a ' Ladies' Association for the Civilisation and Ohristian- isation of the North American Indians/ which took place in Washington. A distinguished officer in the Indian wars upon the then frontier, Col. , of Tennessee, had in early life become enamoured of a beautiful Indian girl, whom he soon after married, somewhat to the annoyance of his friends. The domestic life he led was not, according to his own account, of the happiest character. Although he continued to feel for her a strong attachment there was but little accord between them. He was a man possessed of excellent understanding and a brilliant wit, which made him always a welcome companion for his friends, though unhappily his habits in regard to sobriety precluded him from the attainment of that station, and influence to which he might otherwise have aspired. He happened to be in Washington when the meeting referred to was called, and the fact being known that he had passed the greater part of his life among the Indians he was invited by the ladies to be present upon the occasion of their celebration. In the course of the evening the presidentess of the meeting called attention to the fact that the distinguished Col. , of Tennessee was present, and expressed the hope that he would favour the meeting with his views in regard to the best and speediest means by which the Indians might be taught the truths of Christianity and the arts of civilisation. In response to the invitation the Colonel arose, and said that a circum stance which had occurred to him in early life had directed his mind in the same channel, and had engaged all his energies in the accomplishment of the philanthropic purpose which animated the society in the formation of their association. He was familiar from constant association with the difficulties which might attend any general scheme for leading the Indians into the paths of civilisation, so he determined to accomplish the task if possible upon a smaller scale. He set to work with great diligence, and during twenty-five weary years he had laboured incessantly to lead a single one into the path of civilisation. He commenced this labour of love when he was in the prime of early manhood. ( My hair,' he con tinued, 'is now whitened by age my earthly career, in the ordinary course of nature, will soon be ended and now I am obliged to admit to you, ladies, that the result of my life-labour has been that, so far from civilising this one savage, she has made a savage of me ! I shall be most happy if you can turn my experience to profitable account.' ADAPTED TO MEXICO. 29 order and peace are restored by the establishment of other political institutions. Every philanthropist should rejoice in the prospect which is now held out for the establishment of a great and prosperous empire in that rich and beautiful country ; for if no external causes should intervene to impede its progress, it is not to be doubted that there are those now born who will live to see Mexico take her position as one of the first-class Powers, not only of the American continent, but of the civilised world. While the consummation of such a result could not work injury to any other nation, the whole civilised world have an interest in its realisation. Beside the advantages to Europe which would ensue in consequence of Mexico's increased productions and enlarged capacity to consume the manufactures of other countries, the establishment of a stable Govern ment would be a boon to the over-crowded popu lations of the Old World, for whom Mexico has been during many years as though it had never been discovered. There is not on the globe a country more diversi fied in its productions, or more prolific under proper cultivation than Mexico. In the yield of coffee it may be made equal to Brazil; in sugar and tobacco to the island of Cuba; in cotton it approximates more nearly than any other country to the planting States of the Confederacy ; in Indian corn and wheat to the States of the West. Its mines of silver and gold and iron and copper are rich and inexhaustible, and in the variety of its delicious fruits it is unsur passed by any other tropical country inhabited by civilised men. The climate is as various as the 30 THE AECHDUKE MAXIMILIAN soil in production, and under the benign influence of a stable government there would be no part of the continent which would present stronger inducements to the emigrant in search of a home in the New World.* In considering the past and present condition of this unhappy country, while it cannot be denied that it has been produced by a developement of vices which may be said to be incident to the repub lican system of government when applied to a people to whose wants they are not adapted, the diametrically opposite condition of the States compos ing the late Federal Union confirms me in the opinion that no other form of government could have been better suited to the circumstances of the people of the United States than that which they adopted, and under the operation of which they rose so rapidly from weakness to power. In short, if we may decide in reference to practical results, and not according to the requirements of theories, it would appear that in the late United States it is only necessary to amend or correct errors of mere detail, without abandoning the funda mental principle upon which the political institutions rested; while in Mexico the only hope of regenera tion consists in wiping out the past, and laying the foundations of future prosperity by the adoption of a monarchical Government. * This reference to the condition of Mexico, and the probability of a proximate change in the form, of government in that long distracted country, was suggested by the late interposition of the Emperor of the French to save Mexico from that state of hopeless anarchy to which she has been so long tending. There were few disinterested spectators who did not desire to witness the complete success of this truly philanthropic AND THE EMPIEE OF MEXICO. 31 enterprise. Even jealousy itself yielded to the imperious necessity of the actual circumstances ; and commendation was bestowed upon this great movement in quarters which had previously regarded with distrust anything calculated to add to the prestige or to increase the power or renown of the great and sagacious ruler of the French nation. The nomination of the Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian of Austria, brother to the present emperor, and a descendant of the former sovereigns who exercised dominion over Mexico when it was a province of Spain, is a most auspicious finale to the intervention of the French, and we may reasonably hope and expect that it is the harbinger of brighter days for Mexico. The selection of this distinguished prince was most fortunate. Not only will he carry with him, should he finally accept the crown of Mexico, the prestige of a scion of one of the most renowned of the royal families of Europe, which still rules over one of the greatest empires of the world ; but even more important than this, his intellec tual qualities, his great personal worth, his thorough appreciation of the true principles of constitutional Government, all designate him as the prince above all others who is most likely to succeed in accomplishing the great work which he has been called upon to perform. During forty years the energies of the Mexican people have been crushed out by the despotic factions which in the name of Democratic Liberty have constantly exercised the most odious tyranny. A great people has sunk into lethargy property has depreciated in value all the incentives to enterprise and the acquisition of wealth have been suppressed in consequence of the uncertain tenure by which property was held. The nation bowed to a despotism which they had not the power to shake off. But a people who were once great, and who would be so again under the operation of a good government a soil once rich and prolific, and which would once more yield abundantly under the stimulants of peace and security all await only the reconstructing hand of the enlightened prince, whose high destiny, let us hope, is with these ample materials to build up a great, a prosperous, and a happy empire. 32 CHAPTER III. THE FRAMERS OF THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION WERE OPPOSED TO THE ELECTION OF THE PRESIDENT BY A POPULAR VOTE PROCEEDINGS OF THE .CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION IN REFER ENCE TO THE BEST MEANS OF CHOOSING THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OF THE GOVERNMENT. A MERICANS profess and doubtless really enter- -LJL tain a deep veneration and profound respect for the opinions of their forefathers who established the American Union. These feelings are entertained in common with the friends of republican government in Europe. With the lapse of time many of the inci dents which gave a particular direction to their acts have passed from the public mind, and with them the special and exceptional reasons which often de cided them to do that which abstractly considered their better judgment condemned. This may be said to be true in regard to the plan which was adopted for providing a chief executive head for the Government. It was a subject of long and anxious discussion, and in the Convention which formed the Constitution there was, in regard to details especially, much diversity of opinion. By consulting the meagre records of the debates which have been preserved, we discover that the plan finally agreed upon was not in accordance with the wishes or the judgment of / r CONSERVATISM OF THE CONSTITUTION. 33 even a respectable minority of that distinguished body of statesmen. They were driven to its adop tion by the force of circumstances which they could not control; but the act may be almost said to have been done under protest. When we consider the times and the general state of popular opinion throughout the civilised world at the moment when this Convention assembled to frame a Constitution for a people without a king or a hereditary aristocracy, or a tradition which could serve as a rallying point for those/ whose judgment might lead them to oppose the prevailing radicalism, which in Europe sought to transfer to the people the despotic powers which had been hitherto exercised by their rulers, our wonder is that a frame of govern ment so conservative as that of the Constitution of the United States could have been the result of their deliberations. It was at a period when the strong passions evoked by the French Revolution had dethroned reason when the struggle which had been inaugurated by the people to overthrow tyrants had degenerated into a war against all who placed themselves in opposition to the despotism of mere numbers and when the desire for liberty which had stimulated the masses to rise in rebellion against their oppressors had been merged and lost in the still stronger passion of hatred. The American Constitution was a great concession on the part of the radical adherents of the then Rrench school, as well as of those whose opinions inclined towards a more conservative Government than that which was finally adopted. I propose to quote briefly the opinions of leading members of the 34 ALEXANDER HAMILTON. Convention upon the important question which arose in regard to the best means of supplying the office of chief executive head, in order to show that the prevailing sentiment was not only adverse to the system which was finally accepted as a settlement, but that in practice it failed utterly to accomplish their intentions. Alexander Hamilton, of New York, in a plan of a constitution submitted by him privately to Mr. Madison, and which in substance he subsequently brought before the Convention, proposed that the President should be selected by electors chosen by the citizens having an estate of inheritance, or for three lives in land, or a clear personal estate of the value of one thousand Spanish milled dollars, who should hold his place during good behaviour, remov able only on conviction upon impeachment for some crime or. misdemeanor. He likewise proposed that the senators also should hold their places during life, subject only to removal by impeachment. These propositions, however, were never submitted to a vote of the Convention. The actual state of public opinion precluded the hope of their ratification, even if it had been the part of wisdom to have adopted them. The remarks of Mr. Hamilton in support of his views, delivered in Convention, June 18, 1787, are worthy of special attention. He was in favour of a monarchy, and he had the boldness to avow it in the face of an overwhelming popular sentiment which imperiously demanded republican institutions. He was in favour of the abrogation of the State Govern ments, which in truth would have been essential to the successful operation of the Government he sug- HIS PLAN FOB A GOVERNMENT. 35 gested. But with all there is a clear admission that the States were not liable to coercion by the general Government, as it was in consequence of that very feature of independence and sovereignty on the part of the various members that he was opposed in the first place to the plan of a constitution which was adopted. A few extracts from the speech in question will serve to illustrate the view of a trusted friend of Washington, who was also one of the most prominent politicians of the day, and who represented the opinions of a large and respectable class of citizens. Differing from him as I do widely in his estimate of the efficacy of the remedy he proposed more widely still in regard to the influence of the State Govern ments, which I consider to have been the great bul warks of liberty in the American system, yet there are many points in which his views are worthy of con sideration and respect : Mr. Hamilton said (I quote from Madison's reports) he had been hitherto silent on the business before the Convention, partly from respect to others whose superior abilities, age, and experience, rendered him unwilling to bring forward ideas dissimilar to theirs. The crisis, however, which now marked our affairs was too serious to permit any scruples whatever to prevail over the duty imposed upon every man to contribute his efforts for the public safety and happiness. . . . The great and essential principles necessary for the support of government, are 1st. An active and constant interest in supporting it. This principle does not exist in the States in favour of the Federal Government. They have evidently in a high degree the esprit de corps. They constantly pursue internal interests adverse to those of the whole. . . . It may be remarked, too, that the citizens have not that anxiety to prevent a dissolution of the general Government as of the particular Governments. A dissolution of the latter would be fatal ; of the former would still leave the purposes of government attainable to a considerable degree. The sovereignty of the D 2 36 ALEXANDER HAMILTON. State Government is immediately before the eyes of the people ; its protection is immediately enjoyed by them ; from its hand distributive justice, and all those acts which familiarise and endear a government to a people, are dispensed to them. . . . How can military force be exerted (by the general Government) on the States collectively? It is impossible it amounts to a war between the parties. Foreign powers will not be idle spectators they will interpose. The confusion will increase, and a dissolu tion of the Union will ensue. Influence he did not mean corruption, but a dispensation of those honours and emoluments which produce an attachment to the Government almost all the weight of these is on the side of the States, and must con tinue so long as the States continue to exist.* All the passions then, we see, of avarice, ambition, interest, which govern most individuals and all public bodies, fall into the current of the States, and do not flow into the stream of the general Govern ment. The former, therefore, will generally be an overmatch for the general Government, and render any confederacy in its very nature precarious. Theory i in this case fully confirmed by experience. The Amphitryonic Council had, it would seem, ample powers for general purposes ; it had, in particular, the power of fining and using force against delinquent members. What was the consequence ? Their decrees were mere signals of war. The German Confederacy affords another lesson ; the authority of Charlemagne seemed to be as great as could be necessary. The great feudal chiefs, however, exercising their local sovereignties, soon felt the spirit and found the means of encroachments, which reduced the imperial authority to a nominal sovereignty. The Swiss Cantons have scarce any union at all, and have been more than once at war with one another. How, then, are all these evils to be avoided ? Only by such a com plete sovereignty in the general Government as will turn all the strong principles and passions before mentioned on its side. . . . The general power, whatever be its form, if it preserves itself, must swallow up the State powers otherwise it will be swallowed * A few years experience demonstrated the fallacy of this assumption. The facts were precisely the reverse. The patronage of the Federal Executive grew to be greater perhaps than that of any monarch upon earth, whilst offices under the State Governments were scarcely sought for by ambitious men, except as accessory aids to reach employment under the general Government. HIS PLAN FOR A GOVERNMENT. 37 up by them. Two sovereignties cannot co-exist within the same limits. If the State Governments were extinguished, he was persuaded that great economy might be obtained by substituting a general Government. He did not mean, however, to shock the public opinion by proposing such a measure. . . . He was almost led to despair that a republican government could be established over so great an extent. He was sensible at the same time that it would be unwise to propose one of any other form. In his private opinion he had no scruple in declaring, supported as he was by the opinion of so many of the wise and good, that the British Government was the best in the world ; and he doubted much whether anything short of it would do in America. The members most tenacious of re publicanism, he observed, were as loud as any t in declaiming against the vices of democracy. This progress of the public mind led him to anticipate the time when others as well as himself would join in the praise bestowed by M. Neckar on the British Constitution, namely, that it is the only Government in the world which unites public strength with individual security. In every community where industry is encouraged there will be a division of it into the few and the many. Hence separate interests will arise. Give all the power to the many, they will oppress the few give all the power to the few, and they will oppress the many. Both, therefore, ought to have the power that each may defend itself against the other. To the proper adjustment of this the British owe the excellence of their Constitution. Their House of Lords is a most noble institution. Having nothing to hope for by ex change, and a sufficient interest by means of their property in being faithful to the national interest, they form a permanent barrier against every pernicious innovation, whether attempted on the part of the Crown or of the Commons. No temporary senate will have firmness enough to answer the purpose. Gentle men differ in opinion concerning the necessary checks from the different estimates they form of the human passions. They sup pose seven years a sufficient period to give the senate an adequate firmness, from not duly considering the amazing violence and turbulence of the democratic spirit. When a great object of government is pursued which seizes the popular passions, they spread like wild-fire and become irresistible. As to the executive, it seemed to be admitted that no good one could be established on republican principles. Was not this giving up the merits of the question ; for can there be a good government without a good executive? The English model was the only good one on this 38 ALEXANDER HAMILTON. subject. The hereditary interest of the king was so interwoven with that of the nation, and his personal emolument so great, that he was placed above the danger of being corrupted abroad ; and was, at the same time, both sufficiently independent and sufficiently controlled to answer the purpose of the institution at home. One of the weak sides of republics was their being liable to corruption and to foreign influence.* What is the infer ence from all these observations ? That we ought to go as far in order to attain stability and permanency as republican principles will admit. Let one branch of the legislature hold their places for life, or at least during good behaviour. Let the executive also be for life. On the plan of appointing him for seven years he would be ambitious, with the means of making creatures, and as the object of his ambition would be to prolong his power, it is probable that in case of war he would avail himself of the emer gency to evade or refuse a degradation from his place. An ex ecutive for life has not this motive for forfeiting his fidelity, and would therefore be a safer depositary of power. I repeat that, however just may have been the views of this distinguished statesman in regard to the difficulties of the position in which the country found itself, yet his scheme was entirely impracti cable. Theory as well as practice are opposed to an elective monarchy where the duration of the term is * This eulogy upon the British Government by a member of the Republican Convention, however j ustly bestowed in regard to its more important features, is certainly historically inaccurate in the avowal that * the monarch is placed above the danger of being corrupted from abroad.' The reverse has been true in more than one instance. The prediction that the Government of the United States would be liable from its nature to be corrupted by foreign influence has proved to be an erroneous assumption. That foreign taste, habits, arts, interests and persuasions, may have and did exercise a powerful influence in widening the breach between the North and the South is doubtless true. But this was far from being the result of any corrupt influence brought to bear upon the Government itself. Whatever may have been the faults and errors of Presidents or other officials of the Government of the United States, we have no reason to believe that any corrupt foreign influence has ever been exercised in a single instance over any one of them, whatever may have been his station. CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. 39 for life. Germany, Home, and notably Poland, have proven that this mode of choosing an executive head for a government is of all others the most pernicious. Mr. Hamilton admits that a monarchy under the then existing circumstances would have been impossible, although he believed it to have been eminently desirable ; and yet he rather illogi- cally opposes the seven-year term as too long, because he feared that it might result in the per manent establishment of the President upon the throne of the Republic. It will be observed, how ever, that the prevailing fears of the framers of the Constitution were, that the President would become corrupted by the possession of power, and that he would endeavour to secure himself permanently in the position to which, by virtue of the Constitution, he could lay claim to but a brief tenure. There were few who seemed to apprehend that the means by which the executive power was established would corrupt the great body of those who assumed to act in the name of the people, rather than the individual who might be chosen to fill that station. Fewer still credited the probability that, in process of time, obscurity and insignificance would be a surer pass port to the presidency than the highest qualities of statesmanship. Many feared that the President might perpetuate his power by the employment of the appliances of office, yet none of the wise men who framed the Constitution had any apprehension that, before the lapse of half a century, the reelection of an executive chief after one term of service would be ren dered impossible by the determined opposition of previously disappointed or expectant office-seekers. 40 DEBATES IN THE Of all the various modes which were proposed in the Convention to provide for the appointment of the chief executive officer, it is worthy of observa tion that none were received with such universal marks of disapprobation as those which proposed that he should be chosen by a direct vote of the people. The committee to whom the subject was first referred reported in favour of the following : A national executive shall be instituted to consist of a single person, to be chosen by the National Legislature, for the term of seven years, with power to carry into execution the national laws, to appoint to offices in cases not otherwise provided for, and to be ineligible a second term. This proposition was debated during many days. In the report (by Mr. Madison) we find : Mr. Gouverneur Morris, of Pennsylvania,wa,s pointedly against his being so chosen. He would be the mere creature of the Legis lature. He ought to be elected by the people at large by the freeholders of the country. That difficulties would attend the mode he admitted. If the people should elect, they would never fail to prefer some man of distinguished character or services. Some man, if he might so speak, of continental reputation. If the Legislature elect, it will be the work of intrigue, of cabal, and of faction. Real merit would rarely be the title to appointment. He moved to strike out ' National Legislature,' and insert * citi zens of the United States.' Mr. Sherman, of Connecticut, thought the sense of the nation would be better expressed by the Legislature than by the people at large. The latter will never be sufficiently informed of cha racter. Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina, did not expect this question would again have been brought forward an election by the people being liable to the most obvious and striking objections. They will be led by a few active and designing men. The most popu lous States, by combining in favour of the same individual, will be able to carry their points. Mr. Morris. It is said that in case of an election by the CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. 41 people the populous States will combine and elect whom they please. Just the reverse would be true. The people of such States cannot combine. [The event fully justified at a later period the truth of Mr. Pinckney's prophetic warning.] Col. Mason, of Virginia, conceived that it would be as un natural to refer the choice of a proper character for chief magis trate to the people as it would to refer a trial of colours to a blind man. The extent of the country renders it impossible that the people can have the requisite capacity to judge of the respec tive pretensions of the candidates. [On the motion to make the President elective by the people every State voted ' No,' except Pennsylvania. This unanimity of opposition on the part of the entire Convention to the submission of the choice of President to a popular vote is conclusive proof that they did not foresee that such would be the practice under the system which they finally adopted]. The clause * for the term of seven years ' being taken up Mr. Broome was for a shorter term. Dr. Me Clung moved to strike out * seven years/ and insert < during good behaviour.' Mr. Gouverneur Morris seconded the motion. He expressed great pleasure in hearing it. This was the way to get a good government. He was indifferent how the executive should be chosen, provided he held his place by that tenure. Mr. Broome highly approved the motion. It obviate d all his difficulties. Mr. Sherman considered such a tenure as by no means safe or admissible. As the executive magistrate is now [by a vote just taken] rendered re-eligible, he will be on good behaviour as far as will be necessary. If he behaves well, he will be continued; if otherwise, he will be displaced on a succeeding election. [How entirely this expectation was disappointed has been shown by subsequent events.] Mr. Madison was not apprehensive of being thought to favour any step towards monarchy. The real object with him was to prevent its introduction. Experience had proved a tendency in our Government to throw all power into the legislative vortex. The executives of the State are in general little more than cyphers. The Legislatures were omnipotent. If no effectual check be devised for restraining the instability and encroachments of the latter, a revolution of some kind or other would be inevitable. Mr. Gouverneur Morris was as little a friend to monarchy as 42 DEBATES IN THE any man. He concurred in the opinion that the way to keep out monarchical government was to establish such a republican government as would make the people happy, and prevent a desire for change. Dr. Me Clung was not so much afraid of the shadow of monarchy as to be unwilling to approach it ; nor so wedded to republican government as not to be sensible of the tyrannies that had been and may be exercised under that form. He desired that the executive should hold his office ' during good behaviour/ On the question for inserting * good behaviour ' in place of * seven years/ New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia, four, voted ( Aye.' Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, North Carolina, Georgia, and South Carolina, six, voted 'No.' After long discussion it was decided that the election of a President should neither be made by the general Congress nor by the people. It will be necessary to my purpose to make only a brief refer ence to the various means suggested to attain the end proposed : Mr. Gerry, of Massachusetts, urged the expediency of the ap pointment of the executive by electors to be chosen by the State executors (that is, the governors of the several States). The people of the States would, he said, by this means choose the first branch of Congress, the Legislatures of the States the second branch, and the governors of the States the national executive. This he thought would form a strong attachment in the States to the national system. The popular mode of electing the chief magistrate would be the worst of all. If he should be so elected, and should do his duty, he would be turned out for it. Mr. Ellsworth, of Connecticut, moved that the President should be chosen by electors appointed by the Legislatures of the several States. Mr. Williamson, of North Carolina, had no great confidence in electors to be chosen for the special purpose. They would not be the most respectable citizens, but persons not occupied in the high offices of the Government. He was for a long term. If the elections are too frequent, the best men will not undertake the service, and those of an inferior character would be liable to be corrupted. CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. 43 Mr. Wilson, of Pennsylvania, moved, ' That the executive be chosen by electors to be taken by lot from the National Legislature, who shall proceed immediately to the choice of the executive, and shall not separate until it be made. Another great point of difference was in regard to the unity of the executive head: Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, strenuously opposed an union in the executive ministry. He regarded it as the foetus of monarchy. He had, he said, no motive to be governed by the example of the British Government as our prototype. He did not mean, how ever, to throw censure upon that excellent fabric. If we were in a situation to copy it, he did not know that he should be opposed to it ; but the fixed genius of the people of America required a different form of government. He could not see why the great requisites for the executive department could not be found in three men as well as in one man. Mr. Wilson, of Pennsylvania, said that unity in the executive, instead of being the foetus of monarchy, would be the best safe guard against tyranny. He repeated that he was not governed by the British model, which was inapplicable to the condition of this country the extent of which was so great, and the manners so republican, that nothing but a great confederated republic would do for it. Mr. Dickinson, of Delaware, said : In the British Government the weight of the executive arises from the attachment which the Crown draws to itself, and not merely from the force of its prerogatives. In place of these attachments we must look out for something else. One source of stability is the double branch of the Legislature. The division of the country into distinct States formed the other principal source of stability. This division ought, therefore, to be maintained. This was the ground of his consolation when contemplating the probable future fate of his country. "Without this, and in case of a consolidation of the States into one great republic, we might read its fate in the history of smaller ones. If ancient republics have been found to flourish for a moment only, and then vanish for ever, it only proves that they were badly constituted, and that we ought to seek for every remedy for their diseases. One of these remedies he conceived to be the accidental lucky division of this country into distinct States. A limited monarchy he conceived to be one of 44 DEBATES IN THE the best governments in the world : it was not certain that the same blessings were derivable from any other form. It was certain that equal blessings had never yet been derived from any of the republican forms. A limited monarchy, however, was in America out of the question. The spirit of the times, the state of our affairs, forbid the experiment if it were desirable. Was it possible, moreover, in the nature of things to introduce it, if even these obstacles were less insurmountable ? A house of nobles was essential to such a government: could they be created by a breath or by a stroke of the pen ? No ! they were the growth of ages, and could only exist under a complication of circumstances, none of which exist in this country ; but though a form of government, the most perfect in itself, be unattainable, we must not despair. The venerable Dr. Franklin moved that what related to the compensation of the executive be post poned, in order to substitute ' whose necessary expenses shall be defrayed, but who shall receive no salary, stipend, fee, or reward whatsoever for their services ' : Sir (said he), there are two passions which have a powerful influence on the affairs of men. These are ambition and avarice the love of power and the love of money. Place before the eyes of men a post of honour, that shall be at the same time a place of profit, and many will move heaven and earth to obtain it. The vast number of such places it is that renders the British Govern ment so tempestuous. The struggles for them are the true source of all those factions which are perpetually dividing that nation, distracting its councils, hurrying it sometimes into fruitless and mischievous wars, and often compelling a submission to dis honourable terms of peace. And of what kind are the men who will strive for this profitable preeminence through all the bustle of cabal, the heat of contention, the infinite mutual abuse of parties tearing to pieces the best of characters ? It will not be the wise and moderate, the lovers of peace and good order, the men fittest for the trust. It will be the bold and the violent the men of strong passions and indefatigable activity in their selfish pursuits. These will thrust themselves into your Govern ment and be your rulers ; and they, too, will be mistaken in the reputed happiness of their situation : for their vanquished com- CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. 45 petitors, of the same spirit and from the same motives, will be perpetually endeavouring to distress their administration, thwart their measures, and render them odious to the people. The proposition of the venerable sage was treated, says Mr. Madison, with great respect, but rather out of consideration for the author of it than from any apparent conviction of its expediency or practica bility. Though it may be said that he mistook the remedy for the evil to which he referred, yet expe rience has shown that he had a prophetic perception of the disease which would finally destroy the fabric of the Union. The manner of choosing the President, as finally prescribed by the Convention, and modified by a sub sequent amendment, was as follows : ARTICLE II. SECTION 1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his office for four years. . . . 2. Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors equal to the whole number of senators and representatives to which the State may be entitled in Congress. The third clause provides for the manner in which the votes of the electors in the different States shall be transmitted to the President of the Senate, and also for the manner of choosing a President. If a majority of the electors should not vote for one person, in that event, ' from the persons having the highest number, not exceeding three, on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately by ballot the President ; but, in choosing the President, the vote shall be taken by States the representatives from each State having one vote.' From the foregoing extracts from the proceedings of the Convention we deduce the fact that the clause just recited was acquiesced in as a settlement of a diificult point, rather than approved as an original 46 PLAN OF CHOOSING THE PRESIDENT proposition. It ended a most perplexing source of dissonance in the opinions of the members, but it does not seem to have been in accordance with the first preference of any. Still they believed it to be more conservative than in practice it turned out to be. They doubtless thought that it would protect the sovereignly of the individual States, and in furtherance of this purpose they gave to the States the privilege of making known their preference in regard to the presidency in such manner as they might themselves direct. They did not even advise the States to submit the decision to the popular vote. Still, in practice, the choice of the President was after the lapse of a few years submitted to a direct vote of the people in every State of the Union, except South Carolina. This State never did depart, in practice, from the spirit of the Constitution, but continued to the last to confide the choice of pre sidential electors to the Legislature. Consequently South Carolina was exempt from those periodical popular excitements which so often disturbed the tranquillity of the other States. For this cause, more than perhaps for any other, she was hated by the radicals of the North, and bitterly reproached for her persistence in such an ' aristocratic mode of electing the President ; ' but the great body of the citizens seemed too happy in their exemption from the evils which such excitements produced in the other States to have any desire to change their system. It would appear, moreover, that the authors of the Constitution had a clear perception of the danger of convulsing the nation every four years by a popular ADOPTED AS A CHOICE OF EVILS. 47 contest for the important office of chief magistrate. They endeavoured, by the agency of an electoral college, to provide a remedy which might at least break the force of its influence upon the popular mind, and I may add the public morals. But for the evidence which has been left upon record, that they entertained little doubt in regard to the efficacy of the provision, we could scarcely credit the fact that so wise a body of statesmen could have been so thoroughly deceived in regard to the result. But it is certain that even those who had the least confidence in the system of popular elections did not perceive that the Electoral College would become a nullity. Alexander Hamilton himself, if not satisfied with the result, supported it after its adoption with all his influence. In advocating afterwards the merits of the Constitution, while urging its adoption and ratifi cation by the States, he wrote (see ' Federalist ') : It was desirable that the sense of the people should operate in the choice of the person to whom so important a trust as the presidency was to be confided. This end will be answered by committing the right of making it, not to any preestablished body, but to men chosen by the people for the special purpose, and at the particular juncture. It was equally disirable that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analysing the quali ties adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favour able to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements that were proper to govern the choice. A small number of persons selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to so complicated an investigation. It was also peculiarly desirable to afford as little opportunity as possible to tumult and disorder ; but the precautions which have been so happily concerted in the system under consideration promise an effectual security against this mischief. The choice of several to form an intermediate body of electors will be much less apt to 48 PLAN OF CHOOSING A PRESIDENT. convulse the community with any extraordinary or violent movements than the choice of one, who was himself to be the final object of the public wishes. . . . Without corrupting the body of the people, the immediate agents in the election will at least enter upon the task far from any sinister views. Their transient existence and their detached situation afford a satis factory prospect of their continuing so to the conclusion of it. This process of election affords a moral certainty that the office of president will seldom fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualification. It will not be too strong to say that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters prominent for ability and virtue. Without multiplying evidences of the opinions of 4 the republican fathers/ touching the general subject we have been considering, it is clear that if the American people take their example as a guide, or if they really entertain that veneration and respect for their wisdom which they profess, they will speedily abandon a system of electing their presidents in a manner so opposed in practice to the unanimous judgment of the framers of the Constitution. They believed that they had provided a remedy against the evils of popular commotions by the interposition of the College of Electors. Yet, notwithstanding their sanguine hopes and expectations, experience soon demonstrated that this was the fatal error of their great work Even though its provisions had been carried out in good faith, if the plain intent and meaning had not been set at nought, it still involved in practice a clear violation of the fundamental principle of equal state sovereignty, which was the corner stone of the Constitution ; and the preservation of which was essential not only to the perpetuation of the Union, but to the security of liberty. Never- PERVERTED IN PRACTICE. 49 theless, the provision in regard to the electors was, as already stated, in effect a dead letter. The forms were complied with, but its spirit was utterly per verted ; presidential electors were chosen by the people in due form of law, but they were not permitted to assume the functions of a deliberative body. They did not sit in judgment and decide upon the relative merits of the different aspirants for the presidency. They elected the presidents, but simply as agents appointed to register the edicts of the people. They were mere clerks who were called upon to do a certain thing, under specific instructions from their employers. The people, or more properly the manag ing party politicians, put up a candidate for the presidency, and then electors were chosen who were pledged, in advance of their appointment, to vote only for the individual previously selected by the nomin ating party convention. This vocation required the exercise of no judgment, no deliberation nor discre tion, but simply fidelity in doing the particular thing in the particular manner pointed out by their em ployers. In truth, the announcement of the result of the contest for electors was the announcement of the name of the successful candidate for the presidency, although the form, or rather the farce, of a subsequent election by the Electoral College was a necessary antecedent to the entrance of the new chief upon the discharge of his official functions. Thus the election of a President was, in fact, accomplished sometimes by a majority, sometimes by a plurality, of the people of the States, but always in undisguised contempt of the plain spirit and intent of the Constitution a dangerous and demoralising E 50 MATERIAL AND MORAL EVILS. practice, which soon familiarised the public mind with the contemplation of still more fatal inroads, both upon the letter and spirit of the fundamental requirements of the compact of the Union. Thus, too, was created a fatal antagonism and a perpetual conflict between the theory and the practice of the Government. Thus the sovereignty of the States, the great con servative palladium of constitutional liberty, was, in effect, merged into that of the people of the States as a unit ; and the check of the one upon the other, which pervaded every other provision of the Federal compact, was practically annulled. Thus did the American people pursue the fatal policy of cheating the Constitution, and cheating the States composing the Confederacy, until finally, as in the instance of Mr. Lincoln's election, they cheated themselves by placing a President in power, in direct violation of their own will as expressed at the ballot-box. But greater even than the material injuries in flicted was the moral influence of these elections upon the popular mind. A majority, without refer ence to qualifications or integrity, or honesty, was endowed with the prerogative of conferring supreme power. The people were taught to accept the ex pression of the will of the majority as the will of Omnipotence. The voice of the people, thus an nounced, was the will of God. Constitutional limita tions were considered as. unwise and unjust restric tions upon the prevailing popular sentiment, and politicians and place-seekers more or less boldly or covertly announced the doctrine that the will of the people, as expressed by a majority, or even scruples of conscience in regard to certain con- OF PRESIDENTIAL CONTESTS. 51 stitutional obligations, justified a violation of the oaths of office which the elected official was required to take on entering upon the discharge of his duties. The demoralising influence of the system became more and more apparent as we receded from the days of Washington and the men of the Revolution. It is true that the violence and rancour of party spirit displayed itself at a very early period ; but each party had its adherents in every State. They were not bounded by geographical lines, but by political principles, by measures of public policy, or by per sonal predilections. There was exhibited in these party contests much bitterness, often coarseness, but rarely the reckless frivolity which attended the later struggles between individuals and parties. If they wrangled about the possession of power, they at least brought forward their greatest men to lead them. As time passed away, however, the presidential contests degenerated more and more upon every Te- curririg election into mere scrambles of office-seekers and run-mad extremists and radicals in religion and politics. The nation became divided, as it were, into hostile camps, acting upon the principle that 4 all is fair in war which wins/ and each led by chiefs who stimulated their followers to desperate efforts, by the unblushing announcement that ' to the victors belong the spoils/ The people were, in effect, taught by their accepted leaders that the only legitimate object to be attained by the election of a President was to open the way to office for his adherents, and to enable them to lay hands upon the public treasure. Under such circumstances, it soon became impossible E 2 52 ENTIRE FAILURE OF THE SYSTEM. to elect a President for a second term, because the 'outs,' who were looking forward eagerly to the enjoyment of places and spoils, were numbered by hundreds of thousands, while the 'ins' could only be counted by thousands. The result of an election did not possess, however, the merit of representing the will of a majority of the people ; for, as the Constitution had been cheated by the abrogation of the duties appertaining to the Electoral College, so in turn were the people cheated by the party politicians and place- seekers, who usurped the prerogative of naming the candidates of their own selection. The people were virtually obliged to accept, and adopt, and elect, those only who were appointed to be candidates by irresponsible, irregularly-constituted 'conventions,' composed for the greater part of the most selfish, the most corrupt, and the least trustworthy citizens. These assumed to themselves this duty, or privilege, without being- subjected to any legal restraints, and, we may fairly conclude, in a majority of cases for the sole purpose of compassing their own private purposes. It is only necessary to consider somewhat in detail the progressive steps which finally conducted the obscure or the distinguished citizen, whichever it was thought would for the moment best answer the ends of the party, to the high position of chief executive officer of the Republic, to satisfy the intelligent mind that sooner or later the Government would be obliged to succumb under the pressure of such a great and frequently-recurring evil. 53 CHAPTER IV. PARTY CONVENTIONS THEIR ORIGIN THEIR AGENCY IN MAKING THE PRESIDENT THEIR USES, AND THEIR ABUSES. TT is more easy to comprehend the good or evil of * a system of government by noting the stages of its actual development in practice, than by abstract reasoning founded upon general principles. The latter sometimes leads to correct conclusions; the former, always. It is a sage axiom, often employed by American politicians, that c Power is always stealing from the many to the few.' Certainly the truth of the aphorism has never been more fully verified than in the late Federal Union, if we regard the monosyllable ' few ' as a relative term employed in contradistinction to the multitudes who, in theory, were the custodians of the powers of the Government. No nation of the world, having the semblance of a constitution, was ever so completely subjected to the despotic rule of the few as the late United States of America. Unhappily, it may be added, that, as a rule, though they always professed to govern in the name of the people, there was no element in the character of those who thus usurped the powers of the many which commended them to the full confidence or regard of any other citizens than those composing the faction to which they belonged. 54 PARTY CONVENTIONS Foremost amongst the appliances which were set in motion to achieve this purpose were the party conventions. They were unknown to the Constitu tion ; yet by these caucuses the Government of the United States was kept in motion. They were, of a truth, a power behind the Throne, greater than the Throne. They had more influence in managing the affairs of Government than the Congress, whose policy they dictated, or even the people, in whose name and in obedience to whose prerogative of sovereignty they professed to act. They were greater than the President, for they made him, and, before confiding into his hands the reins of govern ment, they dictated the policy of his administration, and obtained his solemn promise to carry out the programme to the very letter.* They were a great but an unavoidable evil growing out of the system, for which there was no antidote. They usurped all power, and, though they were known to be usurpers, there was no practicable resource against submission to their authority. They constituted an irresponsible despotism, for whose crimes no punishment could be inflicted; but the alternative of repudiating their acts was anarchy. All the world bowed to their dictation, because to rebel was to lag behind in a * A forcible illustration of the despotic influence exercised by party conventions over the President may be found in the published Messages of Mr. Lincoln, when he was confronted with the reality of secession and the alternative of war. When urged to pursue a policy of peaceful conciliation, he always replied, in effect, ( I cannot depart from the plain letter and spirit of " the Chicago Platform." I am bound by a solemn pledge to carry out its doctrines, and I would be a dishonoured man were I to violate its requirements. Come what may, the Chicago Plat form must be the rule of my actions.' AN UNAVOIDABLE EVIL. 55 powerless minority, while those who submitted marched on to victory. In the very nature of things, it was impossible to dispense with them; and yet, to yield up cherished partialities or honest con victions at their command was one of the least of the evils connected with the system. They were a consequence, flowing naturally and unavoidably from the system of electing Presidents by the popular voice, over such a great number of States of diversified interests, pursuits, and tastes. By no other means could the strength of a party contesting for the presidency be concentrated. There was a natural tendency among the people to divide into two parties. There were sometimes third parties ; but the great mass of men prefer to be the real contestants for political power. Hence we find from the beginning of the Government two great parties. One of these parties, in order to settle the rival claims of different aspirants, calls a convention of its friends, to decide which one shall receive the support of the party. If they divide their votes amongst a number of their adherents they will suffer defeat. Eather than submit to this, the people prefer to submit to the dictation of a con vention, which is informally invested with the power to decide upon the merits and availability of the respective claimants. One party having nominated a single candidate, and agreed to give him an un divided support, what must their adversaries do? Give up the contest, by supporting each one his own particular favourite? There would be no necessity for going to the polls under such circumstances. Defeat would be inevitable. There is no help for it. 56 PARTY CONVENTIONS: They, too, must call a ' convention.' The delegates meet, and there decide upon the man who is to be who must be chosen by the people as the President. We may denounce conventions as incompatible with 1 our birthright of sovereignty.' We may prove that by such a system the ruler of a great nation is, in effect, chosen by an irregularly-constituted caucus, called together without the authority or the re straint of law ; but no man in the United States may ever hope to cast his vote for the successful con testant unless such candidate has passed the ordeal of a ' National Convention.' It was a long time before the people would submit quietly to such an infringement upon what they were at the same time taught to believe were their prerogatives. They always had a vague perception of the truth that it virtually took the election of President out of their hands; and a suspicion, amounting almost to conviction, pervaded the better informed, that they had not surrendered their high privilege into trustworthy hands. They grumbled, rebelled in fact caused two elections to be thrown into the House of Representatives became dis gusted with that mode of solving the difficulty, and, being obliged to choose between two bad systems, at last adopted the Convention as the least of two very enormous evils. It is difficult to discover in what manner they could have done better, although it would not be easy to tell how they could have done worse. It was a cruel mockery, under such circumstances, to tell the people (meaning the great body of citizens) that they were the real sovereigns of the Republic ; and it is still more incomprehensible that they THEIR USES AND ABUSES. 57 should have credited so transparent a fallacy, and have clung with such tenacity to a system which not only made them mere puppets, but which vir tually conferred all power upon the very class who, of all other citizens, were least to be trusted. Let us now glance at the process by which the Convention was brought into being. At least two years before the period of an election, the party leaders begin to shuffle the political cards for a new deal. The opposition to the ruling party is joined by the disappointed politicians and office- seekers, who have made up their minds to go over to the enemy ; and the incumbents of stations, high and low, beginning to feel uneasy and insecure, in view of the brief and feeble tenure by which they hold their places, are also on the alert. The contest for a year longer is kept up by secret caucuses, management, and intrigue. At this early period none of the factions dare openly to announce the names of their favourites. If they should be so rash, whatever might be their merits as men or as politicians, long before the day of nomination arrived their characters would have been so picked to pieces, and their real or assumed weak points so thoroughly exposed by their adversaries, that they would be sure to be re jected by their partisans as 'unavailable candidates.' It may be here stated that, in the later days of the Confederation, the actual occupant of the presi dential office, long before that epoch of the 4 canvass' of which I now speak, would have rendered himself so odious to his own party, by his ' very injudicious and improper appointments to office, 7 that his name would be rarely spoken of as an aspirant to be his 58 PARTY CONVENTIONS: own successor, except by those who wished to ridi cule his pretensions. In the early days of the Re public, a President was almost always chosen for a second time. In fact, all the Presidents, except the two Adamses, up to 1837, served two terms. But it was at last decided to be of evil influence, and ex ceedingly inconvenient to outside expectants, to retain Presidents in office for so very long a period, and it was never done from that date. At the stage of the proceedings referred to there are two important points for the attainment of which the leaders of the numerous factions embraced within the great parties labour night and day. They are most difficult of accomplishment, as may well be imagined, for they involve at the same time the disclosure and the concealment of the name of the candidate they propose to bring before the Con vention. First, by private correspondence, and by the em ployment of such other appliances as may serve to aid them in their plans, they seek to secure the co operation of prominent local politicians throughout the various States; and secondly, to keep back the name of their favourite from the great body of 'the people. The last is important, for reasons already stated, and the first from considerations which will readily suggest themselves, when we consider the process by which the ' National Nominating Con vention ' is brought into being. About six months before the stated period of election, some irregularly sometimes self-consti tuted bodies such, for example, as the ' Central Committees ' in the several States announce through THEIR USES AND ABUSES. 59 the newspapers that upon a certain day, and at a place named generally the State Capitol there will be held a State Convention of the representatives of the people, for the purpose of nominating delegates to the National Convention, which is to assemble two or four months thereafter, c to discharge the high and responsible duty of nominating a candidate to be supported (by the party calling the convention) at the approaching presidential election.' The next step follows soon upon the heels of this. The local newspapers of the various electoral dis tricts call upon the people to assemble at some central town, in order to comply with the requisition of the central committee. The appointed day arrives. A few of the initiated leaders, together with a smaller number of really earnest patriots, inter spersed with stragglers attracted by curiosity, as semble in the public hall. The number present is quite small. The people are not sufficiently excited at this early period to quit their avocations in order to join in this seemingly unimportant service. Those who are present, however, organise the meeting by the appointment of a president, a vice-president, and a secretary. After a short pause, some gentleman rises, and, having delivered ' a few eloquent and ap propriate remarks/ proposes that Messrs. A. B., C. D., and others, be appointed to represent the people of that district in the State Convention. The proposition is seconded and carried nem. con., and the meeting is adjourned sine die. Thus ends the 'primary con vention, 7 and here closes the agency of the people in the selection of a candidate for the presidency. Henceforth, they have no other duty or privilege 60 PARTY CONVENTIONS: than to do as they may be commanded. With thirty millions of people from whom to choose their ruler as they say behold the ' sovereigns of America/ not only virtually denied a voice in the matter, but obliged to adopt and register their votes for the one man who may be suggested to them by others ! At the appointed time, the delegates thus chosen assemble at the respective State Capitols. At this stage the plots and counterplots begin to manifest themselves more palpably to outsiders, After the organisation is completed, numerous discourses are pronounced, in which the speakers declare that their adversaries are hurrying the country on the road to ruin, and proclaim that there is but one means left open to avoid such a catastrophe ; that is, of course, to place their party in power. At length delegates are chosen to represent the State in the ' grand National Convention ' of the party. It is perhaps needless to add that the ' wire-workers ' employ great activity in securing the appointment of such persons as will support the man of their choice for the Presidency. Thus ends the ' State Convention.' At last the great day arrives for fighting the battle for the candidacy in the National Convention, preli minary to the final struggle before the people. Delegates from all the States assemble, and, if they represent the stronger party, the result of their deliberations will decide who is to be the President, although they will shift the responsibility upon the shoulders of the people, who can alone give legal effect to their proceedings. Vast crowds of anxious citizens follow in their wake, to mingle as outsiders and lobby members in the exciting contest. Then THEIR USES AND ABUSES. 61 comes the tug of factions. The names of statesmen and distinguished citizens are sometimes presented by earnest and sincere patriots ; but the very prominence to which they have attained by means of their supe rior abilities constitutes an almost insuperable barrier to their success. These are, for the most part, sum marily rejected, upon the ground that they have had a public career, and hence it might be troublesome satis factorily to explain or define some of their acts. There may be also another reason for the indisposition to adopt them as candidates. Such men are rarely willing to bargain away the offices and the spoils, even to secure the countenance and support of the multitudinous place-seekers. There is sound philo sophy, however, in the opposition of the partisans to the selection of a citizen who has already been for a long period of time before the public. His history is already known ; and however brilliant may have been his past political career, however important a part he may have enacted, there are of course some weak or assailable points in his character. The greater his pretensions and fame, the more likelihood there is that the contest before the people will be made to turn upon the personal merits of the candidate rather than upon the party or sectional issues prepared and set forth by the professional politicians. His party, instead of being the assailants, are kept constantly upon the defensive. This position has been found to be even more untenable in politics than in war; and hence in modern times the rule has been, with rarely- occurring exceptions, to consider great qualities and a long public service as a bar to the presidency. The fact has been a source of deep regret and 62 PARTY CONVENTIONS: mortification ; but, like the conventions themselves, it was deemed an unavoidable evil, growing spontane ously out of the system. This may be said to a certain extent to have been the policy of all parties, but, for the reason that the radicalism existing in the United States was, on account of certain local or special causes, more characteristic of the Northern than of the Southern States, I will assume that the Con vention whose proceedings we are now considering is the representative of the Northern sectional party. The political drama progresses. The various cliques establish 'club-rooms/ in which, during the recesses of the Convention, they assemble to discuss the probabilities growing out of c the situation.' Here propositions for compromise are made, bargains are proposed, agreements are entered into, and the principle upon which diverging interests may be adjusted and harmonised are laid down, and accepted or rejected according as the terms offered coincide with the relative strength and importance of the factions. Again the Convention assembles, and the balloting is recommenced. The excitement grows apace; and as the uncertain contest progresses, the interest increases to an absorbing passion. All is noise, bustle, confusion. Anxiety is depicted upon every countenance, and an accession of strength to a candidate from among the wavering or the indifferent, or the development of an agreement entered into at the 'club-room/ by which a large accession of strength is added to the supporters of a particular candidate, is received with loud cheers of approbation upon the one side, and murmurs and hisses upon the other. f THEIR USES AND ABUSES. 63 By means of the telegraphic wires, the varying fortunes of the day are flashed to every town and city throughout the country. The excitement within the hall of the Convention itself is now scarcely greater than that which pervades every class and occupation of the people. Every avenue of approach to the telegraph offices is crowded to suffo cation with eager citizens, who shout back the news to those who are unable to get within reach of the bulletin board. The whole American people are now aroused; and no subjects of a royal line of kings in danger of becoming extinct ever listened with more eagerness for the first gun which announces the birth of a hoped-for prince than they to the voice of that caucus to which they have transferred the right of appointing their chief ruler. And well may the people feel a degree of excite ment in awaiting the momentous announcement. At all times it has been a deeply interesting event, but now a hundred fold more absorbing, because, in all human probability, he who will be then appointed to be the future President will become the commander- in-chief of an army whose mission it will be to lay waste the homes of millions of those who are now awaiting the announcement of his name, and to spill the life's blood of many tens of thousands of the noblest citizens of the Kepublic. The people whose liberties are thus menaced on both sides of the dividing line, and before whom the place-hunters of the Convention bow down and worship with the self-abasement and apparent devotion of Eastern courtiers, can only look on from without ! For less 64 THE SUCCESSFUL CANDIDATE. than a mess of pottage they have given up their boasted birthright ! It would be profitless to record in detail all the incidents which fill up the interval between the open ing and the close of the deliberations of the caucus. They may be readily imagined by considering the materials of which the body is composed, and the grave interests which are involved in the final result of their deliberations. At an earlier or a later period, depending upon the obstinacy with which the friends of the different candidates adhere to their favourites, some one receives the requisite majority of votes. A resolution is then offered, and adopted by a majority, declaring that the fortunate individual is 'unanimously accepted and nominated as the candidate ' of their party for the ofiice of the presi dency; and the nominee may from that instant consider himself to be the heir apparent to the throne of the Great Republic. Three times three noisy huzzas welcome the advent of the incipient sovereign. ' Who the devil is he, anyhow ? ' asks an intelligent and anxious lobby member, in whispered though excited accents, of his nearest neighbour. 4 Oh ! Do n't you know him ? ' responds the ques tioned individual, with a beaming and satisfied ex pression of countenance. ' He is justly regarded as one of the most promising and prominent men in his neighbourhood ! ' c But how are his antecedents ? Are they of the right kind? Are they of a character to satisfy the " sovereigns " ? ' ' Splendid ! Magnificent ! Glorious! They couldn't SPEECH BEFORE THE CONVENTION. 65 possibly be better,' responds the well-informed gentleman. 4 Yes, yes ; there is no doubt of that : but what are they?' 4 He lias n't any \ The Convention could not pos sibly have hit upon a more available standard-bearer for our great and glorious party ! ' 4 Capital ! capital ! Thank Heaven,' murmurs the now satisfied enquirer. 4 We '11 be able to put him through to the White House despite the machi nations of our wicked spoils -seeking adversaries; and the country will be saved,' he adds, with an earnestly patriotic intonation, accompanied by a moistening of the eyes, and a convulsive grasp of his neighbour's hand. These evidences of patriotic weakness are soon, however, displaced by a* movement which indicates that something important is about to be said or done, and in common with the vast crowd of spectators he turns his eyes and his thoughts upon the floor of the Convention. The shouts, the cheers, the buzz, and the murmurs which followed the important announcement have subsided. All eyes are turned in the direction of a gentleman, a bosom friend and companion of the nominee, who rises to thank the Convention in the name of his absent friend and fellow-citizen for the 4 distinguished and unsolicited honour which had been by their action bestowed upon one of the purest patriots and most eminent statesman of this or any other age.' A highly wrought and elaborately pre pared eulogy is pronounced by the orator, in which he traces the history of the future President from the 66 CONGRATULATORY ADDRESS cradle to the present day. Not the least interesting among the characteristic incidents of his life are those concerning his early years, when he was dis tinguished above all the stalwart youths of his native country as ' an unrivalled " rail-splitter ! " ' In fact/ continues the orator, warming with his subject; 'only a little more than a year ago, our candidate What did I say? Our next President (loud cheers) he, who in the Providence of Heaven and by the fiat of the American people will be shortly called to fill the most exalted station ever occupied by man upon the green surface of God's footstool (tumultuous and long continued applause), having been informed that a poor widow residing in his neighbourhood had met with the heavy mis fortune of having had her fence burned to the ground, shouldered his axe, and marching straight into the forest, set to work, and scarcely paused to take a long breath until he had actually split two hundred rails, which he forthwith caused to be conveyed to the afflicted lady (immense sensation). I will not attempt/ he continues, 4 to describe the joy and gratitude which penetrated the bosom of that bereaved and almost heart-broken lady, when the generous and noble action was made known to her. But the monarch who vainly seeks beneath his golden canopy a feverish rest, to fit him for the joyless pageantry of the morrow, might well envy the peaceful slumbers and the happy dreams which we may suppose welcomed our future President to his humble couch upon the night of that most memorable day/ After a pause of sufficient duration to allow BY A FRIEND OF THE NOMINEE. 67 order to be restored, the audience having given vent to their feelings upon the conclusion of the foregoing narrative by long continued and spontaneous bursts of applause, the orator continues in something like the following strain : ' My fellow-countrymen, what a glorious spectacle is presented to mankind this day by this august Convention of the delegates of the real people, the bone and sinew of our mag nificent Republic. What a sensation will it create among the monarchs and their courtiers, as well as among the down-trodden millions of the Old World, when they receive the momentous intelligence that he who will soon be the greatest and the loftiest of all earthly rulers has been selected from amongst the sturdy hard-fisted wood-choppers of the back woods of the Far West! (great applause). But, my friends, 7 he continues, in a more subdued tone, ' we should look more in pity, than in anger or exultation, upon the rest of the unhappy human family who, ground down under the iron heel of ruthless des potisms, may scarcely dare to hope for the dawning of that auspicious day when they, too, may have the honour of being ruled over by a statesman springing directly from the very humblest ranks of the people. But in the midst of our exultation it may not be unprofitable for us to cast our eyes back over the history of our own country during the dark period of the last few years, and survey the frightful abyss which through the misrule of the corrupt faction which has so long governed this great country yawned before us ! c Yes, my countrymen, we have passed through a long and heart-rending season of gloom, in the midst F 2 68 THE SPEECH CONCLUDED. of which the stoutest hearts commenced to throb with painful apprehension, and many were ready to exclaim, " The Eepublic is lost." Even yesterday I confess that my own heart almost sank within me, when I remembered that the aristocratic slave oligarchy of the South still shared with us the manage ment and control of this great and glorious land of the free and home of the brave. Now, how all is changed peace, prosperity, happiness, and freedom for all, loom up before us, as one of the first results of the glorious work we have this day accomplished. This is the day of doom for the aristocrats. The nation speaks in thunder tones and says, " The en croachments of the slave power will no longer be endured." And though the battle may be fierce, as sure as election- day dawns, victory will perch upon our standard; while the high bird of liberty will scream through the air, bearing in its beak our glorious motto -free soil, free homes, free speech, a free press, and free men ! ' 4 Wind up with free niggers/ shouts a jocose individual, in a voice loud enough to be heard above the din of approval which greeted the closing flight of the speaker. The suggestion is received with a round of laughter, in which the greater part of the audience as well as the members join. c Do n't do any such stupid thing, 7 responds another in the same strain ; ' coloured individuals have no votes in my State; and besides, the Northern sove reigns can swallow any other nauseous dose with fewer contortions of visage than free niggers,' 'You are quite right,' exclaims a ithird; 'say down with the slave-ocracy as much as you please ; PUTTING UP THE 'PLATFORM.' 69 but do n't say up with the nigger, if you expect to get any white men's votes in my neighbourhood.' The eulogy is finished, and other speakers have addressed the Convention in a somewhat similar strain; but the labours of that important body do not terminate with the nomination of a candidate. It is necessary that he and they should go before the country upon a ' platform.' The putting together of the ' planks ' in such manner as will satisfy all the factions is a most difficult, delicate, and dangerous duty, and requires the exercise of the most consum mate skill. It is an axiom of the old party-leaders that one may speak what he pleases, because what he says may be explained or denied ; but he must beware of what he writes, for it remains a perpetual and unchangeable record against him. The Con vention whose proceedings we are considering repre sents the ' outs,' and consequently their work is ren dered more easy. They may find fault with all that has been done, or omitted to be done, in the past administration of the affairs of the Government. On other subjects, however, they are obliged to express themselves in such vague and ambiguous terms as will bear one interpretation where the measure is popular and another where it is unpopular. Upon the vexed question of the tariff upon foreign mer chandise (the Convention being composed in part of Northern manufacturers and Western wheat-growers) they declare that the party entertains precisely the same views that it has hitherto announced. They are in favour of such a tariff of duties as will ' protect all the great interests of the country at large. 7 Upon the eternal negro question they are not 70 PUTTING UP THE 'PLATFORM.' restrained by any considerations of policy from the employment of the coarsest language of invective against the people of the South; for they do not expect or desire a single vote in a Slave State. This subject is the chief burthen of their platform. Male dictions and imprecations may be uttered without stint against the ' slave-ocracy,' for they do not thereby give offence to any one of their friends. They may indulge in the wildest flights of rhetorical denunciation, so that no word is whispered about elevating the free negroes of the Free States to a higher social and political status than they at present occupy. Their party supporters are even urged to give all needful encouragement to slave- stealers, and to make liberal contributions to the managers of the underground railroad. They may speak of wel coming the 'panting slave 7 under their hospitable roofs, always provided the occupant thereof is not denied the privilege of kicking him out of the house and beyond their State borders when he ceases to be a slave and becomes a 4 free nigger/ The platform generally winds up with a brief summary, couched in vague generalities, which closes the labours of the Convention. They announce that, if they are successful in obtaining the control of the Government, they will favour the adoption of a 'judicious tariff, a sound well-regulated currency, the dispensation of equal and uniform justice, eco nomy in administering the affairs of the Government; and finally, that "whether successful or defeated," they will always cherish a lively sentiment of regard and sympathy for the people generally; but more DEMAGOGUES AND COURTIERS. 71 especially for the hard-fisted yeomen, who till the soil or delve in the mines, and who they pronounce to be of all others the least fallible in their judgment, and hence the most competent to govern the State/ One may smile while listening to the exaggerated language of adulation and flattery addressed to the multitude; and yet it is but the developement of a principle of man's nature. The American demagogue is governed by the same feelings or instincts, and adopts precisely the same means for the attainment of his purposes, as the devotee of royalty under other forms of government. He has a great favour to ask of his most gracious sovereign, which none but that sovereign can confer. He has fixed his heart upon the attainment of his object. His future prospects in life and his happiness depend upon his success. He prostrates himself before the only power which may dispense the favour he asks. Nor would it perhaps be altogether just to say that either the demagogue or the courtier is insincere in his pro fessions of love, respect, and devotion to his sove reign ; for there is a halo around the brow of him who holds supreme power, which to the eye of one whose life or prosperity depends upon his smiles, softens the most repulsive aspect smoothes the wrinkles of age makes a halting gait seem the per fection of grace discovers in the dullest common place utterances the most brilliant sparks of genius and wit and in all his acts and words the unerring marks of an enlightened statesmanship. Such are the relative positions of the dispensers and the would-be recipients of bounties the world over; and 72 DEMAGOGUES AND COURTIERS. whether the sovereign be a single despot or a multi tude, while the courtier and the demagogue may contest with each other the point of merit between their respective masters, neither can justly taunt the other for the exhibition of a subserviency which is alike common to both. 73 CHAPTER V. COMPONENT PARTS OF A NORTHERN PRESIDENTIAL CONVEN TION : PURITANS, ATHEISTS, SOCIALISTS, ABOLITIONISTS, ETC. T)EFORE adjourning sine die the Convention which U has just completed its labours it may not be uninstructive to glance at the different elements of which it is composed. It is indeed a motley crowd, differing as widely in their occupations and pursuits in life, as in the objects for the attainment of which they have congregated. There is one point, and only one, upon which they all agree ; and each is willing for the time being to forget all other differences, that by their united efforts they may prosecute to a successful end that one common object. They agree in the belief that the overthrow of the Southern States as an element of political power would pro mote their respective plans or interests. It may readily be conjectured that a majority of them look to this result only as a means by which they may obtain possession of the coveted places which are within the gift of the President. It would be a matter of extreme indifference to those whether they were upon a pro- slavery or an anti-slavery platform. All they want is to be on the highway which leads to power. The national party to which they are opposed is neither the one nor the other. The Free 74 COMPONENT PART OF THE CONVENTION. States have the greatest number of votes, and hence the class of politicians to which I refer are ' anti- slavery/ The platform is constructed, therefore, in such manner as will be most popular in the North. But it must not be supposed that there are not a number of delegates who are governed by other con siderations than those named. There are earnest men there who do not seek any purely personal ad vantage. Slaves of a particular idea or an abstrac tion their fanaticism stimulated and kept at fever heat by the often recurring presidential elections they avail themselves of this means to secure poli tical influence by making themselves a part of a great party. It serves at least to bring themselves, and often their ideas, into general notice. Poverty, it is said, makes strange bed-fellows ; but not less strange and incongruous are the associations which are created through the instrumentality of a Convention for the nomination of a President. There is scarcely a political, moral, or social theory of the radical school which is not represented by its advo cates. Each is willing to concede everything which may be demanded by the others, provided it does not conflict with his own particular hobby. They do not come to this Convention to discuss the merits of their theories, but merely to combine as many as can agree upon a single point. The part enacted by the office-seeker, and the partisan politicians who care not a tittle as to what the platform contains, so it will have the effect of placing their party in power, we have already considered. We may also include within the number of these the 4 Protection ists ' those who advocate high duties upon the im- DESCENDANT OF THE PURITAN. 75 ports of foreign merchandise, for the avowed purpose of ' protecting American industry against the pauper labour of Europe.' But all these may be appeased, at least for the moment. Give the one the place he seeks, and the other the protection he demands, and they would be quite content to see the slaves of the South doubled in number by fresh importations from Africa. Give them what they ask, and they have no inclination to trespass upon the rights or even the prejudices of others. The great difficulties have been that the offices are too few in number to satisfy all the claimants ; and the creation of a high tariff only stimulates them to hope that, by perse verance, they may obtain a higher. But, as I have said, there are others more honest as the word goes, and therefore more intractable more earnest, and therefore more formidable more impracticable, and therefore more dangerous. Each is the advocate of a system founded upon a single sentiment. He has traced it all out according to mathematical rules. He has thought of it, dreamed of it, and brooded over it, until it has absorbed his whole soul. It constitutes his very existence. It is his God. Admit that he is right, and he may love you. Deny or oppose him, and he will hate you. Behold the descendant of the Puritan ! Two hun dred years have wrought many changes in the moral, political, and social world. Kings have become plebeians, and plebeians kings. Empires have passed away, and others have been created. Old systems have been superseded by new ones, and whether or not the world has grown better and wiser its whole aspect has been altered. But the Puritan of the 76 POLITICAL PARSONS. type we are now considering has remained un changed in the harsh features of his nature, however much he may have been obliged to yield to the force of public opinion in the outward manifestations of his ruling passion. He is no more a regicide, because in the land where his lot is cast there are no more kings to kill. He no longer drowns or burns witches, for his ancestors exterminated them long ago. He no longer buys and sells savages in order to c bring them to a knowledge of the true and living faith/ for the last Indian of all the tribes which peopled the wilderness has perished before the unrelenting des potism which was enforced against them by his fore fathers. He no longer hangs other Christians, nor inflicts upon them the more lenient chastisement of stripes and banishment, for non-conformity to his peculiar doctrines; but he would exterminate the Southerners with fire and sword, because they are not willing to submit to his dictation in the management of their domestic affairs. He would enslave, or if need be, slay twenty millions of freemen in order to confer upon four millions of Africans what he calls freedom ; but he would re-enslave these again if they transgressed one jot or tittle of the moral law as expounded by himself. He whom we are now considering is not only a parson an ' expounder of God's word,' and a teacher of morals, but he is a politician. He does not preach to-day in the pulpit against the sins denounced by Christ and his apostles, and deliver a stump speech to-morrow upon the party politics of the day; but in either place and in all places he blends the duties of the two together. His sermon is always a politi- POLITICAL PARSONS. 77 cal harangue, interlarded with phrases originating in the rum-shop his political harangue a sermon abounding in scriptural quotations. He may only be properly described by the appellation of * political parson.' You search in vain over the lines of his strongly marked countenance, and gaze into his cold calm eye, to find some trace of human sympathy or of human weakness. His features are never relaxed into a smile, except when he contemplates the con summation of some event which would make others weep. He feels no sentiment of compassion for the slave, but he hates the master with all the ferocity of his nature. His brow grows darker when he is told that the African slave is happy and contented with his lot ; but his soul is filled with a joy unspeakable as he listens to the recital of the bloody deeds of a John Brown ; and he straightway falls upon his knees and gives thanks to God that * he has vouchsafed to his servant this great boon.' You may respect him for the strong points in his character; but you would never seek to be his boon companion. He may ex cite an emotion of fear, but never a sentiment of love. Whether engaged in stealing slaves from the coast of Africa, or assassinating the white men to whom he sold them, for the sin of being slave-holders, he always professes to be ' doing his duty as a servant of the Lord.' When the work of the day is finished he sings a psalm, reads a chapter in the Bible, says a prayer, and retires to the enjoyment of tranquil slumbers. He is the master spirit, not only of New England, but of the entire North. He is hated, but he is 78 POLITICAL PARSONS. obeyed. He has but few followers out of the ranks of the strong (or "weak) minded women, and no friends; but his iron will controls the multitude. He is often hissed, sometimes pelted from the lecture- hall, even by a Boston mob, yet they go to the polls and vote as he dictates. A public meeting of the citizens of Pennsylvania resolves that the North is not and will not be ruled over by the fanatical priest - politicians of New England; yet in the very agony of the effort to shake off the incubus of their influence their dominion is recognised and acknowledged. Pro fessing to be guided in all things by the Word of God, he announces from the pulpit that a far better and more effectual moral agency than the Bible is the bullet or the dagger. Such is the man who sits cairn and unmoved amid the crowd of excited office- seekers about him. He despises the selfish time serving politicians by whom he is surrounded, but he accepts them as instruments necessary to the accom plishment of his purpose. Their thoughts are directed to the inauguration day, and the brighter days which will follow, during which their eyes will be blessed with a sight of that golden treasure which has so long eluded their grasp ; or when they will fall heirs to those honours and distinctions which the possession of office and power always confer. His thoughts rest not for an instant upon these vain objects, but penetrate into that dark future which he hopes lies but a little way beyond. His soul revels in the anticipation of the glorious consum mation which is to crown all his labours. When in the contemplation of the bloody butcheries and deso lated homes of those whom it would seem in mere FOREIGN-BOKN CITIZENS. 79 mockery he denominates his fellow-countrymen, he may He down upon his bed and say, c Oh, Lord, thy servant having finished his appointed work is now ready to die ! ' He looks forward to that epoch l when the black man, with torch, and bayonet, and dagger, will make desolate the hearthstone, and leave in ashes the dwelling of the white man. When the conflagra tion of the homes of the Southern masters will be to the down-trodden the beacon light of liberty and regeneration. And/ he adds, in softened tone, and with upturned eye, 'though I may not laugh at their calamity, and mock when their fear cometh, yet I will hail the event as the dawning of a political millennium.'* Sitting in close proximity to the New England Puritan may be seen another character no less ear nest, no less fanatical, no less honest, and no less anxious to bring the South under subjection to his particular theory. He speaks with a strong foreign accent; but he is an American citizen. Despising the institutions of his native land, where men are born kings and nobles and plebeians, just five years and a day ago he placed his foot for the first time upon American soil in search of that social ' equality and fraternity ' which had been the dream of his discontented life. He discovers that white men and black men occupy a different social rank, and that they are endowed with unequal political privileges. * The expressions here quoted are derived from the speeches of Aboli tion orators, The reader will find the substance of the above in the published speeches of Joshua K. Geddings, a 'political parson/ who was during many years a member of Congress from Ohio. He is now one of Mr. Lincoln's consuls in Canada. 80 FOREIGN-BORN CITIZENS. He is disappointed, but the presidential election holds out to him the hope of regenerating and perfecting the Republic, so that in practice as in theory all men may be made equal. Though now assisting in making a President, he hopes in the end to abolish the presidency, because it assimilates to the kingly office of the Old World. He would also abolish the Senate, because he would simplify the Government in order that there might be no impediment to the prompt enforcement of the people's will.* But it is , not alone upon the continent of America, or within the narrow boundaries of the great Republic, that he proposes to limit the developement of his idea. He desires to witness the establishment of a democratic power so great that it may be wielded for the regene ration of the whole world, but more especially for the overthrow of the Government of his fatherland. It is one of his most cherished doctrines that the mis sion of the Republic is to 4 intervene in favour of all peoples who are struggling to be free. 7 It is not alone moral, but physical aid which he claims from the Republic for what he denominates the ' oppressed peoples and nationalities/ In short, the purpose nearest his heart is to employ the great Republic as an instrument for the regeneration of mankind, and the destruction of all government which is not founded upon the absolute power of the majority. But that majority must, nevertheless, be guided ac cording to his theory. He has witnessed the hypo crisy and wickedness of priests and parsons, and he avenges himself against them by denying the truth * See Platform of the 'Free Germans} < South Vindicated,' p. 75. THE PURITAN AND THE ATHEIST. 81 of the religion which they teach. He considers God a hobgoblin invented to frighten the timid, and he hates the Bible, because it does not teach what he denominates the creed of nature. He does not know the slave-holder, for he has never seen him; but he dislikes him because he believes that being a master he must be an aristocrat. He does not hate him, nor does he love the slave; but he would reduce the one to a level with the other, in conformity with the inex orable requirements of his theory. He contemns the Puritan with all his heart ; he detests his cant, and denies the truth of his religion ; but he consents to unite with him in supporting the same candidate for the presidency, because he believes that in the end it will be his doctrines that will acquire the ascen dancy. Nevertheless, it is not here, in the ' great council of the nation,' that he would proclaim outright his atheis tical sentiments. Even his socialistic principles must be couched under the form of vague generalities ; for were he in sober earnestness to claim an equality of political and social rights for the negroes of the North, he would not long be allowed to occupy the speaker's stand. In this Convention, as I have before said, the great point is to avoid the saying or doing anything that might be personally offensive to any of the various cliques or ' isms ' into which society in the Free States is divided. That which may be done or said which is calculated to stimulate the passions, and especially the hatred of the people against the South, is welcome, because they do not expect to obtain a solitary vote south of the geographical line upon which their party is based. It is upon other G 82 THE PURITAN AND THE ATHEIST. fields and in other conventions, more local and special in their character, where the atheist and the socialist and the political parson give full and free expression to their sentiments. The two characters which we thus find side by side in the Convention are the representatives of the two most powerful moral ingredients of which the Northern sectional party now called the ' Ke- publican ' party is compounded. To one unfamiliar with the influence and operation of an election of a new king for a great empire every four years such an association might seem unnatural and inexplicable. Even those who have watched most closely the pro gress of events in America cannot fail to be some what startled at such a conjunction when they are brought face to face with the seeming anomaly. The Puritan and the Atheist ! The appointed and recog nised teacher of God's Holy Word, and the scoffer at all things which the Christian holds most sacred, are sitting together in the same political body, harmonis ing their differences upon such minor points with a view to the accomplishment of a common purpose. The first proposes to deal out death to the slave holder in this world, while he consigns him to the horrors of eternal punishment in the next in obe dience, he says, to the precepts and commands which he finds written in the Inspired Book. The other rejects and repudiates the Bible as an exposition of the Divine will, because he discovers in it the recognition and toleration of a principle that man may buy and sell his fellow-men, and hold them as a possession for ever. The former admits that to the natural eye and to the common sense this reading of the Scrip- THE PURITAN AND THE ATHEIST. 83 ture may seem to be the true one. But he thinks that during the period which was chosen by the Almighty in which to make known his commands to men it would have been imprudent to have com municated clearly his will in this particular, as it would have been in direct conflict with the prejudices and habits of God's chosen people, and might have driven them back to the worship of idols. The atheist responds, that if the Almighty Ruler of the world had made a revelation to man, He would have communicated His will without any fear of the con sequences; and that He would not have left mankind in ignorance of the law for so many thousands cf years only to be enlightened at last, he might add, through the instrumentality of their passions or their personal interests, rather than their sober judgment. It is not my province here to settle the point in con troversy : I leave that to their respective friends and followers. This, however, is not the only point of difference. The one boasts of his descent from the c Pilgrim Fathers,' who long years ago, from the heights around Plymouth Rock, looked abroad upon a vast wilderness of forest, which, hitherto undisturbed by the footsteps of civilised man, they could claim and occupy for themselves and their posterity for ever. The other did but yesterday, as it were, place his foot for the first time upon the shores of the New World. But in their characters the dissimilarities are not less striking than in the antecedents of their genealogy and history. The one is cold, calculating, and repul sive ; the other is often generous, always genial. The one acts under the promptings of the darker passions o 2 84 THE PUIUTAN AND THE ATHEIST. and instincts of the soul; the other is directed, in part at least, by an exaggerated sentiment of love for all mankind. The one would always command ; the other would sometimes persuade. The one would prefer to accomplish his purposes by harsh and cruel means; the other, who is ready to employ the same weapons, if occasion demands it, would not object to win his adversary by an appeal to reason. The one claims the right to enforce his laws upon the American continent, for the reason, amongst others, that his ancestors peopled the wilderness, and afterwards wrested it from the political dominion of a foreign potentate ; the other rests his claim to be heard upon the broad principle that the law of nature has decreed a like interest for all mankind in the earth and its fruits ; and that no man, or community, or state, may justly lay claim to any part thereof as his or their own exclusive property. The one would govern a& a member of an isolated body, acting by Divine authority, as the peculiar exponent of the will of God ; the other, as an atom in the family of man, regarded as a unit as a child of the same first parent, who, though for a season despoiled of his rightful in heritance, has come not only to possess himself of that which has been unjustly withheld, but to enforce the recognition of the rights of other mem bers of the human family, who do not know or have not the power to assert or to maintain their own claims. In fine, the one is the Marat in priestly robes; and the other the Anacharsis Clutz of the Kepublic. There are other representatives of distinct ideas who do not usually play their parts upon so THE SOCIALIST. 85 large a theatre. Individually they exercise but small influence except in isolated communities ; but collectively their power is formfdable. See that thin-visaged nervous individual, sitting in a corner, from whence his eye wanders curiously, but with a gratified expression, over the scene before him. His plain drab coat, home-spun pantaloons, and yellow silk pocket-handkerchief give a quaint aspect to his general appearance, and attract towards him many a furtive glance, amidst the occasional pauses or during the dull harangues of some of his fellow members. It is not wonderful that he should become somewhat excited when he beholds that sea of human heads, which crowd to the point of suffoca tion every spot from whence may be heard and witnessed the proceedings of that body which has assembled from every part of the country ; and who within a few brief hours will announce to the world the name of the next President of the United States of America. I say it is not strange that he should be excited by the scene, and that the big drops of perspiration should gather upon his forehead, for he has but just withdrawn himself for a brief space from the depths of a solitude where, during weary months, he had, in common with a number of other followers of the same idea, withdrawn from the gaze of the world. He is a member of a community of socialists, or 4 Fourierites,' as they are sometimes denominated. It may be that one month before it had been his regular turn to serve as boot-black for his companions, the next week to be cook's assistant, and the week following to discharge the more arduous and delicate functions of chef de cuisine. It 86 THE SOCIALIST. is possible that during the seven days which preceded his departure for the fulfillment of the service in which we now find him engaged he may have been permitted to play the part of gentleman for the society to sit in the library and read the papers. He would be thus enabled to make some preparation for the performance of his duties as a delegate to the fc Grand National Council of the North.' He must make the most of this season of ' enjoyment,' for notwithstanding all his protestations of a desire to withdraw from the world and its pomps, it is easy to discover that he is for the moment the happiest man in the whole assemblage. Next week, by the laws of his community, it may be that his turn will have arrived to serve as man or rather maid of all work. The * idea ' of the class of which this man is a representative is not altogether new in America, although older in Europe. According to the theory which has been developed from it, mankind ought to be divided into small distinct communities, living together and cultivating in common the same grounds, and sharing alike in the proceeds of their joint labour. To suppress even the germ of an aristocracy, they require each member by turns to perform all the menial oifices of the association. Nothing is more natural than that they should sympathise with any movement having for its object the eradication of the social distinctions between the different races in the South. Strange as it may seem this idea has fixed itself in the minds and hearts of many men of intelligence in the North, and while repeated failures have opened the eyes of some, FKEE LOVE. 87 there are others who still adhere to it with all a father's fondness for his unworthy offspring.* It would not be proper to overlook another remarkable individual of the motley assemblage, who is also both an actor and a spectator. He likewise is the representative of an ' idea/ the signification of which is properly explained by its title of 'Free Love. 1 They mean precisely what these words import. They propose that the two sexes should only 'be united by the spontaneous action of their own free will/ and that, when united, ' they should be per mitted to separate and form other similar connections if the old relation offered fewer attractions than the new one which suggests itself as a substitute/ Let us not, even in thought, do injus^ce to the motives which prompt the adherents of this idea to break through the conventional trammels, called the marriage ties, which society and religion have en forced upon mankind. However misguided, like all the other fanatics with whom he is now acting, he is no doubt sincere, and I was going to say honest, with a reservation and explanation but instead, I will say unselfish. He who sits before us as the representative of ' free loveism ' is an old man whose locks have been whitened by the frosts of three-score years and ten. He is bowed down by the infirmities of age, and his voice is tremulous when he speaks. He left a wife at home an enthusiast like himself in the same cause with whom he has lived in happy contentedness from early manhood. He has a kind * The New York Tribune, edited by Horace Greeley, now the chief organ of the Republican party, has been the reputed organ of this peculiar phase of socialism. 88 WOMAN'S RIGHTS. benevolent aspect; but his eye is wandering and is a little brighter than men's are who do not brood much upon a single thought. Peculiar circumstances have no doubt directed his mind to the consequences of ill-assorted matrimonial alliances. He has witnessed the unhappiness and misery which often result from the marriage relation, and he has set himself earnestly to work to correct or to eradicate the evil. He thinks that he has dis covered the means, and all that remains for him to do is to induce mankind to adopt the scheme which he has devised. By a very natural community of ideas he finds himself a member of a Convention which has assembled for the purpose of dealing a death -blow to what he conceives to be the most formidable remnant of feudalism which yet lingers in the laws and customs of a number of the States of the American Confederacy. It would seem invidious were I to close this refer ence to the incongruous atoms which compose the harmonious whole of a Northern nominating conven tion, were I to omit a brief notice of one who repre sents an idea which has shaken the foundations of Northern society to its very centre. He is a stout, robust gentleman, whose hair, sprinkled with occa sional patches of grey, indicates that although he has passed the meridian of life, he is still in the full vigour of manhood. He speaks in a bold, resolute tone, except when the subject under consideration refers to that better half of creation most generally denominated by college youths and bachelors the 4 gentler sex/ Upon such an occasion there is per ceptible a slight tremulousness of voice and a lowering STRONG-MINDED WOMEN. 89 of the eye, and an abatement in the vehemence of his manner, which might tempt the close observer to believe that at home he was a hen-pecked husband. In fact, at the very moment of time when the Con vention we are considering is occupied with its labours, there is another assemblage, in another city and in another State, whose members are derived chiefly from that growing class not inaptly denomi nated ' strong-minded women. 7 The wife of our delegate is one of the leading members and orators. Her nether limbs are dressed in trousers of ample dimensions, and her scanty skirts scarce reach below her knees. It may be seen at a glance that she is not a ballet-dancer by the absence of the crinoline, if not by her unprofessional gait and rather Amazonian dimensions. She wears a rakish-looking head covering, resembling rather a gentleman's hat than a lady's bonnet, it being com pounded of the two in somewhat unequal proportions. The coquettish style in which it is adjusted to its place is in striking contrast with the massive strongly -defined features of her by-no-means femi nine countenance. When she rises to address her audience her manner is not at all diffident, though by no means immodest. She speaks boldly and earnestly, and vehemently of the rights which are withheld from woman by the odious tyrant man, and of the wrongs which she is made to endure. Amongst the latter is the despotism which the husband is permitted by the laws to exer cise over his wife ; and amongst the former are the legal prohibitions against her voting in elections, or filling the post of foreign ambassadress, or a seat in 90 STRONG-MINDED WOMEN. Congress, or even the office of Chief Magistrate of the Republic. She is always ready at repartee if any rude representative of the sterner sex should have the temerity to interrupt her by an impertinent question or remark ; and though nothing could cause a blush to mantle her cheek, she leaves no impression upon the mind which would lead to the conclusion that she could by any possibility be anything else than an exemplary woman and wife. She is the type of a large and intelligent class of her countrywomen, distinguished as much for the cultivation of their minds as for the boldness and vigour of their assaults upon the most strongly-cherished principles, opinions, and customs of civilised nations. But however potent her influence within a certain sphere, in shaking the foundations upon which society has been built, she is not yet permitted to sit as a delegate in a national presidential caucus. Hence we find her husband duly installed as the representa tive and advocate of ' woman's rights.' It is as easy to discover in his case, as in that of his colleagues to whom I have before referred, the sentiment common to all which has drawn him into that great vortex, entitled a national Convention for the nomination of a candidate for the presidency. The assembly whose proceedings and whose mem bers we have been considering has closed its labours never again to be resumed under like auspices. Forming only a section of that great Confederacy, they usurped the right to dictate laws and customs and even manners to the whole. They took their measures well, so far as they involved a triumph at the ballot-box over those whom they seemed CLOSE OF THE CONVENTION. 91 resolved to destroy. It was not in the power of human reason to protect society against such an avalanche of cupidity, and madness, and folly, and fanaticism, uniting within itself so many opposing ingredients, but which adjourned all other differ ences, and combined and harmonised themselves into one compact mass for the accomplishment of a single purpose. In the very act, and at the very instant of gaining all, they have lost all, and a similar body of men, acting as the representatives of the same consti tuency, and having in view the accomplishment of the same objects, will assemble no more for ever. To those against whom their fury was directed there remained but a single resource. Entreaties, prayers, self-abasement, would have availed them nothing. As had been already often demonstrated, concessions would have been followed by increased demands, and present submission by more degrading humi liations. The South fell back within her own ter ritory, and said to those who had been her colleagues, ' You will not agree that we shall live with you upon terms of political equality : let us then part in peace. You will not consent that we shall dwell together as brethren of the same political family : let us therefore separate as friends. The great continent we occupy is wide enough for us both, and millions more : leave us in the peaceful possession of that which we and our fathers before us have occupied, and which we may justly claim as our own, and we will be con tent/ The response of the North to this fair demand has been witnessed in the conflagrations which have marked the march of her invading armies, 92 CLOSE OF THE CONVENTION. and in the enactment of those bloody scenes which have made every Southern home a house of mourn ing. The North and the South have made for them selves a new history, which, though embraced within a brief period, will demand a larger space to detail its incidents than would the entire annals of the American continent from the period of its discovery to the commencement of the great struggle. What ever may be the decision of impartial posterity in regard to the merits of the conflict, the glory of the one will be the eternal shame of the other ; and we may not doubt that the record of their deeds will form a perpetual barrier to the re-establishment of any political union. I have enumerated only the more prominent of the many subdivisions of parties into which Northern society is divided, all of which mingle actively and earnestly in the employment of president-making. During a long period of time they were to a certain extent in opposition to each other, and the one, acting as a counterpoise to the other, delayed for a season the disasters which their combined action has at length brought upon the country. But it may be readily conjectured that if there had never been a presidential election such a concentration would never have been brought about, because, even if possible, it would have been without an object and without a result. In an evil hour the sagacious place-seekers discovered that by the concentration of a larger against a smaller section this object could be achieved. Hence all these different elements were cultivated, and their influence was enlarged with the enlargement of the sphere in which they MISAPPLIED PHILANTHROPY. 93 were called to operate. The zeal of eacli was aug mented in a degree commensurate with the im portance of the uses to which it might be applied. Zeal was developed into fanaticism, and fanaticism into a blind hatred against all who opposed any resistance to its dogmatical demands. Even virtues were exaggerated into vices, and vices were cherished and nurtured into . crimes. There resulted an un healthy enlargement, a kind of moral pate defoie gras, for the growth of which the presidential election furnished the unnatural aliment. It left no moment of repose to those who were once drawn within its ever circling current ; and that current grew broader and swifter, until it drew everyone within its vortex. Disappointment to day did but serve to stimulate the desire for a more fortunate issue on the morrow ; and the grave of one cherished hope w r as but the cradle of another which sprang into existence at the moment when the first disappeared. However much we may lament the sad uses to which these enthusiasts applied their energies how ever much we may loathe and abhor the conclusions to which their 'ideas' and their theories were de veloped, who can say that but for the influence of presidential elections they might not have been worthily employed in the interests of humanity? Who can say that instead of deluging the country in blood, they might not noiselessly and in a legitimate way have accomplished much which, in the estimation of real philanthropy, would have assigned to them a high rank among the benefactors of their country. 94 CHAPTER VI. PROGRESS OF THE CANVASS AFTER THE CONVENTIONS HAVE MADE THEIR NOMINATIONS - ESTIMATE OF THE VALUE AND EXTENT OF THE SOVEREIGNTY EXERCISED BY THE PEOPLE. two national conventions representing the JL two contesting parties having assembled nomi nated their respective candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency, and adjourned. The two chosen ' standard bearers ' are fully before the country, and then for the first time the people are called upon by the circumlocution of ' electors ' to exercise ' the high and noble prerogative of choosing their own ruler/ by deciding which one of two citizens, whose names have been thrust upon them by two irresponsible caucusses, shall be their monarch for the next four years succeeding the expiration of the term of the then incumbent ! This ' glorious privi lege of sovereignty, won by the valour and trans mitted by the patriotism and statesmanship ' of their ancestors, at last resolves itself into the unrestricted privilege of exercising a right of choice between two citizens only, of whose qualifications they perhaps know nothing for whom, in many instances, they have no personal sympathy who have not perhaps a solitary claim to their gratitude, or their respect, or their confidence, beyond that which may be set up with equal propriety by half a million of their fellow- COUNTERFEIT OF SOVEREIGNTY. 95 countrymen ; and whose chief passport from the cot tage of the rail-splitter to the palace of the President, was the obscurity and insignificance which had previously concealed their acts from general public scrutiny ! And it is for the privilege of enjoying this empty honour this miserable pageant this childish bauble this tinsel livery of sovereignty this base counter feit of real power that the country is now deluged in blood : that vast armies of fiercely fanatical and mercenary soldiers, headed in many instances by worse than savage chieftains, are now desolating with torch and sword the fairest region of that once happy land; and that liberty itself lies prostrate and bleeding, crushed to earth beneath the iron despotism which the people themselves had erected and consecrated as the embodiment of all that was excellent in government, and deified as a direct emanation from the very fountain and source of human liberty ! One scarcely knows whether to be most surprised at the absurdity of denominating the part played by the people as an act of real sovereignty, or at the infatuation which accepted and vaunted it as a reality. The stump orator, perhaps one of the lead ing wire-workers of the late Convention, preludes his eulogy upon the candidate of his party by a brief reference to the unhappy condition of the rest of the entire human family who, having the misfortune to be compelled by inexorable fate to dwell beyond the boundaries of the happy Kepublic, have no right to participate in the glorious privilege of choosing the sovereign who is to rule over them ! ; While all 96 COUNTERFEIT OF SOVEREIGNTY. the other nations of the world are limited in the selection of their monarchs to one candidate] he facetiously remarks, 4 to you my fellow-citizens is reserved the right to select from the great body of the nation the President who is to rule over you! Glorious privilege of a free people ! ' He addresses a listening and a believing audience in the main, and yet there is not a word of real sub stantial truth in what he says. For when the c pri vilege ' is fairly stated when it is divested of all superfluous adornment, and sifted of the superabun dant chaff, how very light is the little grain of seed that is left. Other nations have only one candidate from whom to choose their sovereigns,while the citizens of the great Republic have TWO ! Yes, two ; but they had no more real influence in the selection of these two than the subjects of the Emperor Alexander will have in the choice of a successor to the throne of Russia. And where was the power behind the people which imposed this limitation upon their sovereignty? It was a caucus of irresponsible citizens, most generally under the guidance of men who intended, after the people had performed the part assigned to them, by placing their candidate upon the presidential throne, to take him all to them selves, and through his agency and connivance rig themselves out in the trappings of office and riot on the plunder of the people's treasure. But what is the character of the two gentlemen between whom the choice must be made? If we are to give equal credit to the representations of both parties during the excitement of the contest, never in all time were two more graceless scamps permitted to go at large, COUNTERFEIT OF SOVEREIGNTY. 97 at least without being submitted to the surveillance of the police ? If we are more charitable, and believe only the half of what we hear and read, we tremble for the fate of the nation which every four years is subjected to a hazard of at least one chance in two to be ruled over by one of the most insignificant and incom petent, if not one of the very worst men of the thirty millions of people who inhabit the Republic. But if we are disposed to be censorious, and refuse abso lutely to believe what is said upon either side, we will probably be much nearer the truth; but it im presses upon the mind a sad record of the degrading influences of presidential elections upon the public manners, if not the public morals. If I and my fellow-countrymen in sober reality might exercise the right to which, by the letter of law, we seem to be entitled, at least after a manner, we might bear with equanimity even an occasional failure to exercise it aright. It would be some con solation to know that if our President was not as we would like to have him, he was at least our own. We might, as the loyal subjects of a line of sove reigns, regret their occasional short- comings and be loyal still. But to be cheated and hoodwinked to be told that the citizen who demands our suffrages is the man of our choice, when we ought to know that the only part of the performance assigned to us is to register ourselves as his faithful subjects, and place upon his shoulders the robes of sovereignty to be told that that king who sits upon the throne of the Republic is one of our own beloved line of monarchs, when we know that he is a bastard, a foundling, who has by schemes and tricks of selfish partisans been H 98 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES placed there in despite of our prerogative to be told all these things by those who have cheated us is bad enough ; but then to have them told to us in such a flattering way, and with such a deferential manner, and with so much seeming reverence for our au thority, that we absolutely lock and bar the door of our senses, and believe it all is almost beyond en durance. Let us, however, take courage and conso lation by contemplating the sufferings of those who have the misfortune to dwell in countries where they have only one candidate to choose from when they make their king? The citizens of the great Republic had two \ I said in the outset that the two National Con ventions had met, made their nominations, adjourned, and that their candidates were fairly before the people. I was, strictly speaking, in error when I made the last announcement. I omitted to refer to the intermediary part played by the electors in the drama about to open. In truth, this provision of the Constitution, although it has always been com plied with to the letter, has been, as I have said before, so utterly disregarded and perverted in prac tice, that for the moment I had forgotten that we were not permitted to place the name of our can didate upon the tickets which we deposited in the ballot-box. It is only necessary, however, to say that, either after or before the Conventions have made their nominations, each party, by means of another series of State Conventions, nominate the number of electors to which they are by virtue of the number of their inhabitants respectively entitled. They are, however, pledged at the time of their BEFORE THE PEOPLE. 99 appointment to vote, if elected, for the candidate of the party who had been or was to be nominated by the General Convention. Thus the constitutional electors that body of sages whom our forefathers intended should meet together, ponder deeply, judge wisely, and then select a President from the whole body of statesmen throughout the country have descended in practice to serve as the mere auto matons of the people. Just as the people are the mere registrars of the edicts of the Conventions, and the Conventions but too often the mere expo nents of the will of the intriguants and office- seekers, who may be regarded as the real king-makers of the Kepublic, through the complicated machinery we have thus briefly examined. Although I was, therefore, in error when I said that the candidates were fairly before the people, it was rather in theory than fact ; for the transparency of the electors may be scarcely said to obstruct the vision of the people, who can see with perfect clear ness the future President beyond them. The con sideration accorded to the electors as such may be measured by the very insignificant and subordinate part they are given to act. It does not, of course, matter who or what they are; and they are never thought of in any other light than as mere mes sengers, whose duty is limited to the bearing of a sealed letter to head quarters, with an account of the result of the battle, as indicated by the count of the ballot-box. With this explanation, I will say again that the candidates are fairly before the people, and the party press and party orators are engaged in the double H 2 100 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES work of building up and pulling down characters. And the giddy height to which they can elevate their own candidate, and the profound depths to which they can consign that one whom they oppose, is only a little less remarkable than the credulity which closes its eyes to all probabilities, and accepts with a trust that knows no wavering, whatever may be written or spoken which exalts their own, or lowers the candidate of their adversaries. The mar vellous celerity with which they can metamorphose an ordinary wood-chopper into an unrivalled states man; or a military gentleman of the most modest pretensions and capabilities into a hero, to whose name the monosyllable great would but feebly ex press the magnitude of his military genius, is only paralleled by the transitory impression thus created upon the public mind. If the reputation which presidential candidates acquire among their friends for the possession of all the great and glorious qua lities which a man of the most profound natural capacity may, by dint of enormous mental and physical labour acquire, had only been a little more enduring than the brief space occupied in its acquire ment, it might have been worth the pain of suffering many hard knocks from the other side. But unfor tunately, or fortunately, it departs as it comes in a tornado. If he be unsuccessful, he leaves no more impression upon the public mind in his enforced seclusion from the public service than a retiring footprint on the sandy beach, or a puff of wind upon the cheek, or a ship upon the waves of the ocean, or anything else that comes and goes in an instant. If, on the other hand, he receives the requisite BEFORE THE PEOPLE, 101 number of votes in the Electoral College to carry him into the Presidency, his reputation retains its pristine glory, until he shall have exhausted all the places he has to bestow, and then if not always, certainly oftentimes he falls never to rise again. But I have gone on too rapidly. We were only in the middle of a presidential canvass, and, without intending it, I have already finished the melancholy career of the aspirants. To describe fully the scenes and events which have characterised the progress of at least a few of those contests would be almost impossible : certainly it would occupy a larger space than I propose to bestow upon them in this chapter. A little later, however, I will refer to these struggles more in detail and in their regular order. It is not wonderful that an event of such im portance should in its progress produce immense excitement, when we consider the great interests involved in the issue. The future well-being and happiness of many tens of thousands of office-seekers, who have abandoned all other pursuits and whose bread is dependent upon the result, as well as the ambitious aspirations of nearly as many more, are all at stake. I will add, even at the risk of being esteemed an 4 old fogey ' for indulging the obsolete thought, that the great interests of the nation were also involved in the uncertain struggle. There are, of course, very many citizens who, from really worthy and patriotic considerations, mingle in the strife, and endeavour to give to it such a direction as they believe will conduce to the general weal. But the great body of the people are stimulated by the exciting appliances which are employed to the 102 THE UNITED STATES wildest pitch of phrenzy, and the voice of sober reason is seldom listened to, and more rarely heeded. Some of these canvasses have been signalised by great dignity during their progress; others have been equally remarkable for their frivolity ; but there has been a wild excitement, amounting almost to an insanity, distinguishing nearly all which have occurred during a long series of years, utterly incon sistent with the sober realities of the duties the people were called upon to perform. The voice of reason was drowned amidst the wild passions engen dered by the conflict; and the very earnestness with which they entered upon the discharge of the duty unfitted them for its judicious performance. None may doubt who have been attentive observers of the conduct of American affairs that the great body of the people seek to do right. It comports with their wishes and their intentions, as well as their duty and their interests, to perpetuate a good Govern ment. If they were left to their own guidance they might often err in their judgment, as other sovereigns do, but in the end no serious mischief would be likely to result ; for a due regard to their own well-being would always be a sufficient guarantee of their fidelity. They would be loyal, if from no higher consideration than that their own happiness and in terests would be promoted by the faithful discharge of their duties. But, unhappily, the peculiar struc ture of the American Government, in reference to the distribution of offices and contracts, afforded a con stant temptation and invitation to enterprising citizens to abandon their ordinary vocations, and, together with all the idlers of the Republic, to engage as GOVEENED BY THE FEW. 103 an occupation in the business of president-making. If the presidential office could by any means have been divested of its patronage, the election might possibly have rested with the people without exciting any well-founded cause for apprehension. But, un fortunately, this was in its very nature impossible; and the consequence was that those who had a greater and more immediate interest in the success of a party leader, than in the general good government of the country, were enabled by their superior activity to usurp the prerogatives which properly belonged to the body of the people. I have said that no nation having a constitution was ever more essentially under the government of the few than the United States. This may seem to be at variance with the prevailing opinion that the people were the masters. But it must be borne in mind that as soon as the people placed their favourites in power, the latter immediately appropriated to themselves and their particular faction all the offices and emoluments of the Government. Though these might be displaced by a change in the popular mind, yet their successors followed closely in their foot steps, and the result still was that the few kept the control of the Government in their own hands and for their own special uses. Are there any means which might be employed to avert this evil? Is it possible to devise any plan by which the real sober voice of the people may be heard in a presidential contest? In short, is there any process by which the demagogues and office-seekers may be rooted out, or reduced to their proper level? If there be, I confess that I have not the discernment 104 CAPABILITIES OF to discover it. So long as presidents or kings, or whatever you may denominate the chief dispenser of the honours and patronage of the State, are elected by the popular voice, there may be a struggle of longer or shorter duration a chance success may inure to the honest sober sense of the people, yet sooner or later the direction of public affairs will pass out of their hands, and the chief power is always in danger of being usurped by that class of citizens who are least worthy of confidence and least capable of discharging aright the functions of rulers. Notwithstanding, however, the palpable faults and manifold evils of the system, it would be an error to suppose that the Presidents thus chosen have been, as a rule, bad men, or even incompetent to the dis charge of their ordinary executive functions with a reasonable degree of success. In truth, the less ob jectionable the candidate may be, the stronger are the probabilities of a fortunate issue to the struggle ; for although the people are restricted in their choice within so limited a range as two citizens, yet there are many thousands of voters who are bound so loosely by the party tie that they will give their sup port to the opposition candidate if they believe him to be the most worthy man. Hence, while the con ventions are generally inclined to pass over statesmen who have a national reputation, 'for reasons which will readily suggest themselves to the mind, yet it redounds greatly to the advantage of a party if the Convention can present a man upon whose private or public character there rests no stain of reproach. It will not, perhaps, be said by any, except the uncompromising partisan, that we have ever had a THE PRESIDENTS. 105 President who employed his high position to subserve his own personal interests ; and it would probably be conceded by even those who entertain the strongest prejudices against American institutions that the average capabilities of the Presidents have been not only equal to the tasks which devolved upon them, but in all qualities of statesmanship they will rank with the most distinguished of those who, under other forms of government, have occupied corre sponding stations. It may be true, also, that the indisposition of purely party leaders to place the great statesman in the executive office might be attended with compen sating incidental advantages. These could be pro fitably employed in the Congress ; and, in fact, a very large number who may be thus designated have occupied seats in the Senate, the conservative body, as well as in the popular branch of the National Legislature. Such were Mr. Calhoun, of South Caro lina; Mr. Webster, of Massachusetts; Mr. Clay, of Kentucky ; of whom it was the boast of their friends to say they were too great to be Presidents. In the long run liberty might be all the more secure under the guardianship of men of moderate attain ments and less brilliant qualities, than under the sterner rule of greater and may be more ambitious leaders, occupying the station of chiefs of the Confederacy. Experience has fully established the truth that the element of evil in the American Constitution did not consist wholly in the fact that under its operation wicked or incompetent men were, as a rule, called to fill the public stations. Certainly many of the very best men in the country were deterred from entering 106 FAVOURITISM COMMON the lists as competitors for the prize of popular favour, and many unworthy men were chosen to fill public offices; but still it may not with justice be said that there was less ability among the officials of the United States Government, as a whole, than distinguished corresponding officials under other forms of govern ment. It is undoubtedly true that the President was obliged, by an inexorable necessity, to discriminate in the dispensation of the offices in favour of mem bers of his own party. Often he was influenced also by his private friendships, and may be enmities. Nevertheless, it would be difficult to discover evidence in the history of any nation in the past, or in the practice of any existing Government, that merit has been or is regarded by any of them as the only quali fication requisite for public station. Favouritism is, and in the nature of things will in all probability con tinue to be, the ruling principle upon which men are selected from among their fellows as the recipients of the honours and emoluments of office. True merit may sometimes compel the dispensers of patronage to honour its claims; the exigencies of a country in times of peril may call it forth, and engage it in the public service; an urgent public necessity may induce rulers to relax somewhat the rigid enforce ment of the rule. Exceptional cases may and do arise, but merit, without patronage to sustain it, may never hope to exercise a controlling influence with those who conduct the affairs of Government. In this respect the United States constituted no exception to the other nations of the world. If there were no other evidence to establish the claims of those who filled public stations under the Government TO ALL GOVERNMENTS. 107 of the Union to the possession of the requisite quali fications for the discharge of the duties appertaining to their position, it is furnished upon every page of the history of the Republic, and in the unparalleled growth of the nation in wealth and power. It is certainly true that the foundation for this immense and rapid augmentation in all that constitutes the greatness of nations rested in the enormous and hitherto wholly undeveloped internal resources of the country. It would not, therefore, be fair to institute a comparison in this respect between the Govern ments of the United States and those of Europe, without giving due weight to the important advan tages possessed by the American Government. But we may compare America with itself. We may com pare the relative progress made by that portion of the continent embraced within the limits of the late Union with Mexico, with Central America, with the Empires and Republics of South America; or with the identical country itself during the long period of time in which it constituted colonial dependencies of European kingdoms. That it has outstripped any other nation upon the American continent or elsewhere in its rapid march to greatness will not be denied, and we may therefore conclude that those in whose hands its political desti nies had been placed were not deficient in some of the qualifications requisite for conducting the affairs of Government, however objectionable may have been the manner in which they attained to power. But it proves more than this. It establishes the fact that the general influence of American institu tions has been to develope in the private citizen those 108 GOOD AND EVIL qualities which are requisite for the advancement of the nation. It proves, moreover, that the Govern ment was, in principle at least, adapted to the wants of the people, and was in accordance with their sym pathies. It is impossible that any nation could have advanced so rapidly under a radically bad political organisation. Evil may have existed it did exist; but good must have been mingled with it in large proportions, or such results never would or could have ensued. But it was not alone in the developement of the material interests of the nation that the value of its po litical institutions was manifested. They developed in the individual many of the best qualities which adorn human nature; they stimulated his pride by increas ing his importance. He was important because he was a part of the sovereignty of the State. The higher qualities of courage, and constancy, and fidelity to their engagements in private life emi nently distinguish a very large portion of the people of America in every rank of life. I do not, of course, mean to say that a very unusual proportion were characterised by the possession of these quali ties ; but that in these respects they will not, as a whole, suffer in comparison with the people of any other nation engaged in similar pursuits, I think will not be questioned by those who have had opportuni ties to know them, and to study their characters and characteristics. If this view may seem to conflict with a proper appre ciation of the barbarous manner in which the present war has been conducted by the Northern Govern ment with those atrocities of individual commanders INFLUENCES. 109 and soldiers, which, though met by the universal reprobation of civilised nations, have been apparently approved and sanctioned by the public opinion of the United States it is only necessary to consider, upon the other hand, the magnanimity, humanity, courage, and constancy which have marked the conduct of the South as a nation, as well as of the individuals com prising it throughout the terrible scenes of the cruel conflict. Other causes, it, is true, have tended to increase this divergence between the North and the South ; presidential elections have been employed to cultivate and to develope the stronger and baser passions of the human heart, such as envy, hatred, malice ; local causes have contributed to magnify those evils in the North, and to soften their harsh ness in the South ; yet, apart from the demoralising influences of presidential and other popular elections, which were by no means necessary to a proper admi nistration of the Government, I do not believe that I have misconstrued the effects produced by the political institutions of America upon the great body of the people comprising the nation. 110 CHAPTER VII. TRUE LIBERTY IS INCOMPATIBLE WITH THE EXERCISE OF SOVEREIGN POWER, BY A SINGLE WILL, WHETHER IT BE VESTED IN ONE INDIVIDUAL OR IN A MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE, ACTING AS A UNIT THE UNITED STATES GOVERN MENT WAS IN THEORY FREE, IN PRACTICE A DESPOTISM. WHEN the authors of the American Constitution met to establish a Government they had only two elements out of which to construct those checks and balances which are essential to the permanent security of liberty. These were the citizens of the States, all of whom were invested with the same political rights ; and the States as sovereignties. The delegates composing this Convention were not the representatives of the people of the United States, but of the States individually. They were not authorised to merge the sovereignty of the States into that of the Union, but merely to delegate certain powers to a common agent : hence, in the construc tion of their league, they endeavoured to provide guarantees not only for the freedom of the citizens, but the sovereignty of the States Therefore, in the distribution of the legislative powers of the Govern ment, they invested the representatives of the people with one moiety, and the representatives of the States, as independent sovereignties, with the other. Neither could complete any act without the assent DIVISION OF POWER. Ill of the other. In principle they represented two distinct interests -just as the Parliament of Great Britain is composed of a House of Lords and a House of Commons deriving their immediate au thority from totally distinct sources. Upon these two divisions of power the whole fabric of the American Government rested. Whatever may be the fundamental principle upon which the political institutions of a State may be founded, such principle must be recognised and respected in the administration of the Government. If there be two or more distinct and independent sources of power, to assail either one directly or indirectly, with a view to diminish its relative strength, is incipient revolution. To impair or to overthrow the one or the other, is revolution accom plished. The democratic principle may be admitted as a coordinate power in a monarchy, and the two may be made to act in perfect harmony. Such a combination exists in the Government of Great Britain. But if in practice the democratic principle should be permitted to act independently of the monarchical and aristocratic element the Govern ment ceases to be a monarchy. If either one assumes to itself, and exercises supreme power, the Govern ment may become a democracy or an unmixed monarchy, but it is revolution. The change may not be accompanied by outward violence, as has been the result of the conflict between the two elements of power in the American Confederacy; even the forms and the exterior semblance may remain unaltered, but the substance will be wanting; the Constitution will have ceased to exist, the Government will be no 112 THE STATES AND THE PEOPLE. longer what it was before. Even the partial exer cise of sovereignty on the part of either, without the cooperation of the other, under the forms and with out any palpable violation of the letter of the com pact, would create an antagonism between the two elements which would inevitably, sooner or later, lead to fatal consequences. The encroaching power would become arrogant and tyrannical; the other would sink in the public esteem; a conflict would ensue, in which one or the other would become supreme. Or, as has been illustrated in the history of Great Britain, the struggle would result in a reorganisation on a firmer basis of previously existing checks and balances by which neither is left supreme, and the country is thereby restored to the enjoy ment of real freedom. In the plan of Government of the United States, the States in their sovereign capacity, and the people as individuals, constituted jointly the power by which the Government was administered. It is manifest, from the internal evidence furnished by the Consti tution itself, that the framers of the Government perceived the danger of collision between these two elements in the matter of choosing the President; and, in their efforts to avert it, they unfortunately furnished the readiest and surest means for pro ducing it. The scheme they adopted, even if it had been carried out in good faith and in accordance with its spirit and intention, would not completely have accomplished their design. But, as we have already seen, its directions were complied with to the very letter, while its spirit was set at naught. The people may not justly be blamed for this usurpa- DISTINCT ELEMENTS OF POWER. 113 tion, for it was a result originating in causes which they could not control. The machinery of party conventions, as practically applied, had not been in the contemplation of the framers of the Constitution ; and while they could not have foretold what would be their influence, the people could not have been expected to put away the ripe fruits which the party conventions caused to fall at their feet, and for which there were no other claimants. But this constitutional provision proves that it was not the design of its authors that the election of a President should be decided directly by a vote of the people. Moreover, it is equally clear that they did not intend that it should be exercised in the first place by the States. Hence they attempted to steer a middle course, and confided that duty to another agency which they created for that sole purpose. We find still further proof that the framers of the Constitution intended that the election of the Presi dent should be conducted in harmony with the Federal princip]e, in the provision made for the performance of this function in case the Electoral College should fail to make a choice. In such a contingency it was provided that the election should be transferred to the popular branch of the Congress, which body was required to vote by States ; that is, the representatives of the people of each State decided upon their choice and cast one vote. The candidate receiving the votes of a majority of the States was to be declared the President. Thus both the elements of power which entered into the groundwork of the Constitution were duly honoured. The immediate representatives of the people of the States were 114 THE STATES AND THE PEOPLE entrusted with the prerogative of electing a President ; but in the very act of discharging that function they were transformed into representatives of the States as sovereignties. It is probable that the framers of the Constitution believed that the presidential succession would be often settled by this contingent method, but they had not considered of the all- powerful despotism of party caucusses, in not only perverting the legitimate operation of the first trial to secure a choice, but also to avoid the necessity of resorting to the pro visional expedient of a reference to the House of Kepresentatives. The party conventions divided the nation into two parts, and the machinery was so perfect that it rarely failed to settle the question in the Electoral College. By this means the important function of electing a President, and incidentally the dispensation of the enormous patronage of the Government, devolved upon one only of the two elements of power created by the Constitution. The States had no voice except in the rarely-occurring contingency when a majority of the Electoral College failed to agree. Practically, the presidential election was achieved in direct antagonism to the fundamental principle of the Constitution, which required both the assent of the people and the States in the completion of any act. The consequences which followed were inevitable results flowing from the cause. The one element of power grew stronger and the other weaker in the public esteem. The natural conclusion was to elevate unduly the influence of the one, and correspondingly DISTINCT ELEMENTS OF POWEE. 115 to reduce the other. The multitude of office-seekers, and their name was legion, worshipped at the shrine of real power; and, as is usual under like circum stances, they sought to make favour with that one which was in the ascendancy by depreciating that other element of the Government which had no patronage to dispense. The influence of these, on account of their numbers, their zeal, and their acti vity, stimulated by their personal interests, was very powerful. They sought to create in the public mind an interest adverse to the existence of those checks and balances which were wisely designed to protect and preserve liberty. Having dispensed in so impor tant a particular with one of the principal of these checks, the disposition gained ground to throw off all restraints which might serve as a foil to the exercise of supreme power by the dominant element. Many, very many, were led astray by the most egregious fallacy that the rule of a majority was synonymous with the enjoyment of liberty that a country must be free which is governed by the people. Fatal error ! which has done more to retard the developement of real freedom among the civilised nations of the earth than all the impediments which despots have been able to interpose against its pro gress. Many in America have no doubt become satisfied of their error in view of recent events ; but there are still millions throughout the world who have faith in the delusive phantom. True liberty can never exist in a State where a single element may exercise absolute power. It matters not where that power may be deposited, whether in a single monarch, in an oligarchy acting 1 2 116 THE RULE OF A MAJORITY as a unit, or in a majority of the people, it is still des potism. In point of fact the last-named is the worst, and the first the least objectionable. Both have equal facilities for the exercise of tyranny, but it is far more easy to satisfy the demands of a single despot than many. To punish one may be accomplished, because a single hand may do it ; and this fact being ever present to the mind of him who may, if he so wills, oppress his fellow-men, operates at least as a restraint upon the practice of tyranny. To punish the many is impossible, and therefore no fear of the consequences which may follow an act of oppression can deter the multitude from its commission. A slight concession from each may satisfy the demands of one supreme ruler, while the acquirement of all which a minority possesses cannot satiate the cupidity of a majority. One man naturally shrinks from the responsibility of doing a great wrong : the division of that responsibility amongst a multitude leaves so small a portion to each, that the deed is done without creating in the minds of any a feeling of moral responsibility for the act committed. At the least, there are so great a number who do not feel the influ ence of this restraining cause that the minority is overborne. When mankind learn that real freedom is not to be found, and cannot exist under the rule of a power deriving its authority from a single element, what ever may be the form in which it exists however plausible or attractive may be the garb in which it presents itself to the merely speculative mind a greater battle than has ever yet been waged for real liberty will have been fought and won. But so IS NOT LIBERTY. 117 as the adversaries of that which they denominate 'the one-man power 7 seek to eradicate one species of despotism, in order to substitute another and a worse one, the contest will continue ; or, if decided at all, the victory will almost always inure in the end to the single despot. The one man has nothing else to do but to watch the shifting tide of battle, and to shape his course in such a manner as to avoid the breakers which menace his destruction. The great body of the people are, upon the other hand, obliged to occupy themselves with other pursuits. They may, during a season of profound excitement, concentrate all their force upon the acquisition or maintenance of their power ; but either reverses or successes have a tendency to cool their ardour. Sooner or later they must fall back into the channel to which the ordinary duties of life imperiously demand their recall. They entrust the management of their cause to agents, who betray them, and all is lost ! If we may believe his tory if we may trust the dictates of common reason this result sooner or later is inevitable. Those who absorb in their own hands all the powers of a State in which the principles of liberty have taken root, must live in a perpetual conflict : for the very instincts of a public sentiment, in the smallest degree enlightened in regard to the principles of freedom, are opposed to such a concentration of power. But on the other hand, where one recognised element of power is held in check by another, or by others, of coordinate force, the necessary evils inci dent to all government are softened, even though they may not be wholly obliterated ; while the com munity may reasonably hope to enjoy the blessings 118 THE RULE OF A MAJORITY which attend a good one. The one being jealous of the encroachments of the other protects itself by perpetual vigilance, and in guarding its own rights incidentally protects the whole community. There is a strong incentive operating upon each to confine its action within a legitimate sphere, for the reason that it is not only under the perpetual surveillance of the other, but its moral force is thereby enhanced. If one or the other is crushed, or overshadowed, these restraints are removed, and despotism naturally and necessarily ensues. These checks and counterpoises upon the action of the Government may sometimes retard, or even wholly prevent the accomplishment of that which may in itself be right; but they much oftener prevent the consummation of evil. When a conflict of opinion arises, they may retard progress ; but they leave the Government in as good a condition as they found it. After all, the power of prevention is the surest guarantee of a good Government, for there is no axiom more true, however much it may conflict with the theories of those who believe that all poli tical and social evils may be remedied by the action of the State, than that the best governed country is that one which requires to be least governed. It is conceded by the wisest statesmen that the laws by which a nation is governed should be few and simple, easy to be comprehended, and just in their application. The safest mode which may be adopted for the attainment of these objects consists in such a division of the powers of the Government as enforces the cooperation of different elements and interests, as a condition precedent to the passage of IS NOT LIBERTY. 119 all laws, so that one may negative the act of the other. The fact that laws are enacted under such auspices affords the surest guarantee of their strict observance. The art of government is not necessarily a mys tery, though it may be made so by the arts of state craft. So, in passing through the mazes of a laby rinth, one may, after various windings, find himself again at the point whence he started; but if the object be simply to go over the ground necessary to be traversed in order to pass through, it is easy to make a straight road. The entire scope, spirit, and tendency of the American Constitution was to secure this coopera tion of the diverse interests which existed within the limits of the Confederacy. The whole tendency of the presidential election was to destroy that equi librium which the Constitution sought to establish. The manner in which the President is practically chosen is in direct conflict with the Federal principle which is the foundation of the whole political edifice. The President, as we have seen, is chosen by a ma jority of the people of a majority of the States, containing a majority of the people of the United States. This is even worse than if it had been a consolidated sovereignty. Whereas the Government of the Union, being but the common agent of a number of sovereign States, cannot with impunity overlook or disregard the existence of the power by which it was created. In effect the President is chosen by a power, not only foreign to the States composing it, but which is absolutely unknown to the Constitution in the form in which it presents 120 THE RULE OF A MAJORITY itself. The Government created by the States the common agent of the States is ruled over by a chief whom they had no agency in electing, and whom they have no power to depose. But even considering that the people of the States respectively, in the exercise of this power may be regarded as representing the sovereignty of the States, still the principle of sovereignty is violated, because the larger States are thus permitted to ex ercise a control over the choice greater than the smaller ones, in the proportion of their superiority in population. Hence the influence of New York, or Pennsylvania, or Ohio, or Virginia even, is equal to that of half a dozen of their colleagues. This is utterly incompatible with the sovereignty of the States, because all sovereigns are and must be equals. When the Emperor of France and the King of Belgium make a compact they are considered and treated as equals. How absurd would it be to say that in case of a disagreement in regard to the terms, it should be decided according to their re lative strength of numbers ? When several sovereigns enter into a league, it would be impossible and absurd to give to one an influence over the other coinciding with the additional greatness of his do minions, unless there should be at least some negative check which would protect the weaker. Sovereignty is in its very nature complete, perfect, and entire. It can neither be augmented nor diminished. All other sovereignties are its equals, but none can be its superior. Sovereigns may make compacts, by the terms of which each may serve as a check upon the other, but never by which the one may have the IS NOT LIBERTY. 121 right to control the other; for in that case the latter would cease to be sovereign. Strictly speaking, the President, as I have before said, was elected by the sole agency of a power unknown to the Constitution. Neither in its spirit nor letter does it confer any right of sovereignty upon the people of the United States, acting as a unit, by the voice of a majority. At a superficial glance it may be difficult to discover any practical difference between an exercise of sovereignty on the part of the people, as members of separate com munities and as members of the whole community as citizens of each of the several States, or as citizens of the United States employing the latter term according to its popular signification, for pro perly speaking there could not be a citizen of the United States. But a clear comprehension of the subject will satisfy the intelligent mind that the difference between the two is as vast as the difference between a good and a bad Government. There is just the difference that would exist in the usefulness of the British House of Commons, if the members, in stead of being chosen by the respective districts into which the kingdom is divided, were each and all elected by the joint vote of the whole nation. The greatest foe to liberty in any country em bracing a wide extent of territory, and a consequent diversity of local interests, is centralisation, which consists in establishing one great controlling centre of power, from whence the country is governed in accordance with the requirements of one prevailing interest. Whatever may be the form of the Govern ment, the natural effect of such a concentration, in 122 THE RULE OF A MAJORITY a country so vast as the late United States, is to reduce the more remote sections to the condition of mere dependencies. It is susceptible of easy demonstration that in so far as political institutions had any agency in developing the greatness of the country that result was due, in a great measure, to the State Governments. As long as the sove reignty and independence of these were recognised and protected and cherished, the country continued to be prosperous, contented, and happy. But the moment the public sentiment of the North, under the impulse of its superior numbers, began to favour the idea of establishing a central despotism, which should govern the whole, the conflict of the two elements of power commenced. The presidential election being resolved into a mere contest of sections, to be decided by mere num bers, afforded the temptation and the opportunity to give to the idea a practical significance. National questions, or subjects of general and common interest, were at length entirely superseded by a controversy in regard to a purely local domestic institution con fined entirely to the Southern States. In regard to this question, the North had not as much right to intervene as France or England, because the former had entered into a constitutional league by which all interference was especially interdicted. In such a contest there could be but one issue at the ballot- box, for the North was numerically the strongest; and but one result following upon their success, for the South was strong enough to resist. It seems to be almost self-evident, when we consider calmly all the facts, that the presidential election was IS NOT LIBERTY. 123 not only the principal cause of the disruption of the Union at the time it occurred, but of the war which followed the dissolution. First, it afforded the occa sion to develope the power of mere numbers, and its frequent recurrence stimulated the majority to the pursuit of objects which were constitutionally be yond its reach. At one time it was only claimed that a majority of the people of all the States might be justified in the exercise of supreme power, to the exclusion of the element of State sovereignty. It was discovered, however, at a later period, that the same object might be as readily accomplished by means of a majority of a dominant section. This was rendered easy of attainment by the adoption of what was known as the general ticket system. That is, all the people of each State voted for the number of electoral candidates to which they were respec tively entitled. New York, for an example, being entitled to thirty-five electoral votes, each party nominated thirty -five candidates. In the last presi dential contest the electors favourable to the election of Mr. Lincoln received each 353,804 votes. Those in favour of his adversary received 303,329 votes, consequently all of Mr. Lincoln's thirty-five friends were chosen, and he received the entire electoral vote of the whole State ; just the same as though every citizen of the State of New York had desired his suc cess ; thus stifling entirely the voice of the minority. In the entire North Mr. Lincoln received 1,831,180 votes, represented by 180 electoral votes, being a majority of the electoral votes of the Union. There were cast against him in the same States 1,554,191 votes, represented by only three electoral votes. 124 MR. LINCOLN IS PRESIDENT But the general result of the popular vote makes the point still more clear : Majority for Lincoln in the North . . 276,989 Majority against Lincoln in the South . 1,277,049 Majority against Lincoln in the whole Union 1,000,060 The entire popular vote for the Lincoln electors in the fifteen slave States, including Maryland, Dela ware, Kentucky, and Missouri, was only 26,430; while in ten of the fifteen they did not poll a solitary vote! The foregoing figures give the result of the votes actually cast in the election. The Southern States were further entitled, by express provision of the Constitution, to a Federal representation equal to two-thirds of the slave population. This could not, of course, J)e made to appear in the popular vote, although it was duly credited to their account in assigning their quota of electors in the Electoral College. If, however, we estimate these numbers, and add them to the popular vote against Mr. Lincoln, we find that the present President of the United States holds his oifice by virtue of the sup port of 1,857,610 votes, represented by 180 votes in the Electoral College ; and against the wishes of 3,157,670 (estimating 300,000 as the additional strength of the South for the slave population), re presented in the Electoral College by only 123 votes ! Is it wonderful that professional president-makers, and party leaders should have struggled hard to bring the presidential elections to a contest of sections, when such results could be thereby achieved ? Need we be surprised that under such circumstances the AGAINST THE POPULAR WILL. 125 geographical division line between the North and the South should have been made to mark also the boundaries of parties? Cannot even the European Abolitionist of the sternest type imagine that there might have been a stronger impulse than love for the slave which suggested the policy of a Northern pre sidential party? The concoction and successful accomplishment of this complicated scheme of treachery to the people's sovereignty, of which they were themselves the instruments and the victims, affords one more striking proof of the power of mind over matter of brains over muscle of those who think over those who delve. Happy, indeed, will it be for the people if they will profit by the bitter lesson : if they will discover that, in the effort to perform within themselves all the functions of Govern ment, they will be first cajoled and then betrayed by those in whom they most trustingly confide. The people never have been and never will be an equal match for the demagogues. Mind alone can meet and overcome them. Mr. Lincoln was elected in direct conformity with all the specific requirements of the Constitution, yet it will scarcely be said that there could have been a more flagrant violation of its spirit and intention. A power unknown to the Constitution usurped all power, and a section triumphed upon an issue which was in direct conflict with the provisions of the in strument under the forms of which it was achieved ; while a President was actually chosen by a minority of the only element of power which participated in the election! Presidential elections were not only accomplished in 126 SUMMARY OF RESULTS. violation of the spirit and intentions of the clause under the forms of which they were conducted in viola tion of the principle of a division of power between the States as sovereignties, and the people and in discord with the Federal principle but in utter con tempt of the will of that very power which was in voked to usurp the prerogative of undivided sove reignty. The Constitution was cheated the Federal prin ciple was cheated the States were cheated the majority of the people were cheated and he who, by means of all this cheating, now sits upon the throne of the Kepublic sends forth a million of soldiers to enslave eight millions of freemen, after having cheated eighteen millions of his own subjects of their liber ties and all for what? That greedy cormorants might riot and fatten upon the public plunder, amidst the dying groans of hundreds of thousands of their fellow- men! and oh, dearly -bought shadow of true sovereignty ! that the people might exercise the right of selecting one of two men to rule over them ! 127 CHAPTER VIII. FATAL INFLUENCE EXERCISED BY PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS UPON THE MORALS OF THE PEOPLE AND THE INTEGRITY OF THE GOVERNMENT. presidential election was an enormous in- JL cubus upon the proper developement and peaceful progress of American institutions. It subjected the nation every four years to the perils of revolution. It created and perpetuated irreconcileable feuds and animosities among the electors. The injuries inflicted were manifold : first, in its influence upon the public morals; next, in its influence upon the integrity of the Government; and, not the least, in its influence upon the policy of the individual States. Although these evil effects were of themselves sufficient to have produced a dissolution of the Confederation, yet this conclusion might have followed without a war, but for their influence in creating and fostering a feeling of unkindness, or, more correctly speaking, of reciprocal hatred between the two sections. The contests were of such frequent recurrence that the animosities which were cultivated by the partisan leaders during one canvass had scarcely time to sub side ere the period for another arrived. With each return thereof the whole country was convulsed from centre to circumference. There was no perceptible 128 FATAL INFLUENCE pause when men's minds might be disposed to reflect calmly upon the probable consequences of such terrible convulsions. Nearly the entire period of a presidential term was consumed in preparations for, or active participation in, that which was to ensue. Thus, when the inevitable day of dissolution arrived which event might naturally have given rise to sentiments of profound regret and even grief, but which should not have been the occasion of an angry emotion in the North where they had, in effect, but the moment before announced a desire for separation men's minds were already ripe for war and subjugation. The North, as a section, had seized upon the Government they held the purse and sword of the whole Union; and, in defiance of the very essence of the constitutional compact in subversion of the fundamental principle upon which their own separate Governments were founded, and as if in very mockery of their own solemn declara tions to mankind, that ' any people have an indu bitable, inalienable right to alter, reform, or entirely abolish their Government, whenever they believe that its existence is incompatible with their interests or their happiness' they invaded the territory of the South, in order to compel eight millions of freemen to become their subjects. This revolution in the public sentiment of the Northern States startled the world by the suddenness of its announcement ; but it would be a great error to suppose that the feeling which produced it was only of an hour's growth. The public mind had undergone a radical change ; but the revolution had been accomplished by a silent and slow, though a OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 129 sure process. The results of presidential elections had taught them that, notwithstanding the checks and balances and compromises of the Constitution, a mere majority of a section of the people, acting as a unit, could make themselves masters of the Federal Union masters of its immense and constantly aug menting patronage masters of all its honours, great and small, from the President to the petty postmaster in the smallest village but, above all, masters of what had been hitherto sovereign States, and of the free citizens who inhabited them. Numbers, mere numbers, became the god of their idolatry. Pro perty, wealth, not only ceased to be regarded as worthy of protection, but its possession became almost a bar to political promotion. The mere animal which walked erect upon two legs was con sidered the only legitimate source of power. The voice of these was the ' Vox populi,' and the ex pression of their will was the c Vox Dei/ It was recognised as a power from whose decision there was no appeal. It was the rising sun, whose brightness dazzled every eye, and whose golden beams won every heart, and before whose opening splendours the hosts of office-seekers fell down and worshipped. The brilliancy of the light which it emitted, un- dimmed by a cloud, hid from the sight the blood-red tinge by which it was environed. Far away, just sinking beneath the horizon, was that declining lumi nary whose morning beams had once cheered the hearts of millions whose noonday splendours were the admiration of multitudes of worshippers in every land whose fading colours and whose dissolving form were seen and lamented by a few; but the K 130 EVIL INFLUENCES multitude of whose former worshippers did not per ceive or did not heed its rapid decline. Is it wonderful that, in view of the immediate rewards which this new sovereign offered to his votaries, that they should regard with impatience all impediments to his undisputed sway? Were they not acting in accordance with the promptings of a principle which animates the mass of mankind which fills the halls of the monarch and which occu pies every avenue of approach to his person with the votaries who would bask in the sunlight of his smiles ? As this power which controlled the presidential election developed its capacity to exercise the prero gatives of a despot, the natural result was that the many not only found that to support its pretensions was to be in the high road to preferment, but that to sustain the declining fortunes of the ' States' rights counterpoise' was to give mortal offence to that rising monarch who, with the prestige of present and prospective successes, would show no mercy to those who might be found in the ranks of its rival. The ingenuity of man could not devise an ordeal which would submit the political institutions of nations but more especially of a confederacy to a severer test than to subject them every four years to the necessity of choosing a new chief, whether presi dent or king. For after all president in America means nothing more nor less than emperor or king in Europe, except that the former is, probably from necessity, invested during his short reign with a far greater amount of patronage and power than falls to the lot of any other constitutional sovereign. The OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 131 duration of the term seems to have been the worst that could have been adopted. If it had been longer the shock might possibly have been greater, but for the fact that the passions of the people would have had time to subside. If it had been shorter, the ex asperation arising from defeat would have been less acute, because the c outs ' would sooner have had the opportunity of again trying their fortunes. If the Government had been consolidated into one, instead of being composed of many sovereignties, although liberty would have been the loser, the danger of disaster might have been less, because it would have been more difficult to create political parties in reference to geographical lines. Each community would have been divided into more or less unequal parts ; but always there would have been a portion of the population, partisans of the successful candi date, whose influence might have served as a check upon any attempt of the opposition to concert a movement for the overthrow of the Government. But in a confederacy of States, exercising unre stricted sovereignty by the terms of their compact over their internal affairs having widely different interests containing populations rendered to a cer tain degree antagonistical by their diverse pursuits the whole covering a vast expanse of territory the presidential elections invited and enticed the party leaders into the dangerous expedient of constructing their parties upon sectional issues bounded by geographical lines. These lines once thoroughly established as a permanent basis of party organisa tion, an inevitable estrangement of the two sections would follow. The division line would grow broader K 2 132 EVIL INFLUENCES and deeper. A feeling of reciprocal unkindness would take the place of that fraternity which should exist, and which sometimes does underlie the ebul litions of party animosities in nations having homo geneous populations. This ill feeling, by being constantly fomented to suit the exigencies of party leaders, would grow into unappeasable hatred, ready upon occasion to supplant the ballot-box by the cart ridge-box. But why multiply arguments to show what might be expected to occur under a given state of circumstances? The result is before us in once happy and peaceful America ! The Land of Promise has been deluged in the blood of those whose ancestors through scenes of peril and hardship first introduced the arts of civilisation, as well as of the emigrants of a later period, who sought its shores that they might bask in the enjoyment of the bless ings of peace, prosperity, and presidential elections. But for the last-named cause, the political insti tutions of the country could never have been sub jected to such a shock. No occasion could have arisen for a general and simultaneous movement of the people. Dangerous excitements of the entire population could not have occurred at the same instant of time, or if they had, there would have been no opportunity for their developement. They would have had their day, but would soon have sunk into impotent insignificance. The sober sentiment of the nation might have been slowly and deliberately expressed through the hundreds of communities into which it was divided; and its matured will thus announced would have been honoured and obeyed. The monarch could never have worked himself up OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 133 into a rage, and have executed his will, at the moment when disqualified by passion to judge aright, or to execute judgment with mercy. The nation could at least have appealed from Philip drunk to Philip sober, with a well-grounded hope that their appeal would not have been vainly made. 134 CHAPTER IX. ENUMERATION OF OTHER EVILS RESULTING FROM PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. TO the mind of an intelligent stranger, unfamiliar with American customs, and institutions, and passions, the desperate expedients resorted to by the president-makers to increase the numbers of their adherents at so heavy a probable cost seems alto gether inexplicable. This apparent anomaly may be, however, understood, if the observer takes an inside view of the structure of political parties growing out of the ceaseless struggle for the impor tant post of commander-in-chief of the army and navy, and dispenser of the vast and growing pa tronage of the nation. The 'immense spoils' of the Government, which, according to theory and practice, had come to be regarded as the rightful and legitimate rewards of the victors, had utterly perverted the principle upon which all government should be administered. Offices are, or ought to be, established solely for the public good. Practically, they were only held and deemed as so many prizes to be rendered for partisan ser vices. These ever present temptations, inviting the citizen to enter into the scramble and take his PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 135 chance for winning, brought into the political field, upon each recurring presidential contest, a con stantly augmenting host of mere adventurers and place-seekers, who having abandoned all other avo cations relied for a support solely upon the success of their respective parties. One half of these or thereabouts were sure to be disappointed by the defeat of their favourite, while the vast majority of the others were obliged to submit to a similar dis appointment when the spoils were divided out, and it was found that the supply was utterly insignifi cant as compared to the demand. It would probably be no exaggeration to assume that a quarter of a million of citizens devoted them selves wholly to the presidential canvasses, and an equal number participated less actively, every one of whom expected some personal reward in the shape of an oifice, great or small, for himself or friend, or a government contract, in the event their party was successful. He who could succeed in arousing the people to the highest point of excitement possessed a double claim upon his party on the arrival of the day of reckoning. Such topics as did not enlist the passions were regarded as too tame to be made ' available/ and they were supplanted by others which might tend to stimulate the people to the wildest enthusiasm. To keep up the agitation the most dangerous issues were evoked, and thus the public mind was kept in a constant state of tension and vague uneasiness about the probable conse quences. These agitators did not seek the over throw of the Government, but their immediate wants made them callous in regard to probable or possible 136 EVIL INFLUENCES results. ' Let us save the election, and God save the country,' was the rule by which their actions were guided. For reasons elsewhere explained, the Southern States were, to some extent, exempt from the in fluence of many of the causes which produced excitement and agitation in the North; but the madness which attended the progress of presidential campaigns prevailed to a deplorable extent all over the country, both in the North and the South. It would not be proper to say that all who were engaged in conducting the public affairs of the country should be ranked with the class of politi cians above referred to. Many eminent men and patriots mingled actively in these contests, and for a long period of time were instrumental in softening the asperities which were the natural results of the prolonged and constantly renewed struggles of parties. There was an occasional lull when the country, wearied by unceasing agitation, seemed to seek repose ; but these pauses were rare and of brief duration. They were as the fitful and transient slumbers of the maniac, resulting from mere ex haustion, who is only strengthened by his brief repose to renew his acts of violence. A new source of excitement would be opened up, and again would be resumed the never-ending, still-beginning turmoil and strife of a whole legion of Warwicks and their followers. As a rule, to which, however, there were many exceptions, the better class of citizens withdrew themselves altogether from mingling in public affairs, where they were of less importance than the meanest OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 137 grog-shop brawler, who drank rum and spouted politics to companions even more unworthy than himself. They voted they were excited they min gled to a certain extent in the turmoil of the contest ; but only as passive actors, rarely as active agents; and when the contest was over, they buried them selves in more congenial pursuits, with the thought in their hearts if the words did not rise to their lips ' May God save the country, for we cannot.' Not only were the offices distributed as prizes, under the inexorable rule that ' to the victors belong the spoils/ but the claimants, many of whom could establish about equal pretensions, were so much more numerous than the places, that the favoured recipients of the public bounty, before entering upon the dis charge of their official functions, were in many cases pledged to surrender their positions after a given amount had been abstracted from the public crib, in order to provide for other hungry expectants for whose services no remuneration had been rendered. The powers and patronage entrusted to the Presi dent were enormous. To him was confided the appointment of judges of the Supreme Court, and all the officers necessary in the execution of the laws. All foreign ministers, secretaries of legation, and consuls were named or removed according to his own will. The only restriction upon his power consisted in the requirement that his nominations had to be confirmed by the Senate. But a refusal to confirm his nominee in one case had only the effect of substi tuting another of like character. Although this great amount of patronage increased the evils of presidential elections, yet the power of 138 EVIL INFLUENCES appointment could not well have been confided to other hands. To have entrusted it to the Congress, or to either branch thereof, would only have aggravated the evil by diverting the tide of place-seekers from the avenues of the White House to the halls of the Capitol, with the addition of a vast increase to its volume. The temptations to corruption would have been multiplied a hundred fold, and to the excite ment of the presidential elections would have been added the party struggles in the congressional dis tricts to secure the disposal of the patronage of the Government. When we consider the vastness of the spoils to be distributed, the vastness of the population, and the vastness of the temptation, we can begin to compre hend something of the vastness of that army of place- seekers who filled the country with the noise of their endless clamours. When we add to these that great number who love excitement for excitement's sake, only held in feeble check by that smaller body of citizens who mingled in the fray in order to extract some little good out of the mass of evil, we may com prehend something of the pressure which was con stantly brought to bear upon the vitals of the Government. The presidential contests drew hun dreds of thousands into the vortex of party politics, who might otherwise have occupied themselves in useful pursuits. It made office-seeking a trade which men followed for a livelihood, as a husband man follows the plough to gain his bread. There was more money and time wasted in electing one President than would have paid the yearly allowance of half the potentates of Europe. At every moment OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 139 when we are considering these enormous sacrifices of time, and wealth, and public morals, the interrogatory again and again springs up to the lips 'And all for what?' There was still another evil flowing from the pre sidential elections, which was not only seriously detrimental to the public interests, but was the occasion of much annoyance and trouble to the President. It made him at the same time a tyrant and a slave. He ruled a great and rapidly-growing nation, which already numbers thirty millions of people. He was entrusted with a larger share of power and patronage than was held by any constitutional monarch in the world, and yet the merest political charlatans the denizen of the pot-house, the vulgar declaimer, the active electioneerer who led ignorant foreigners up to the polls to vote all were his masters. He entered upon the discharge of his duties as the mere drudge of the party-leaders, great and small, through whose instrumentality he had won his crown of thorns. He was bound by the inexorable law of necessity to eject the greater number of those whom he found in the occupancy of the public offices, with out regard to public interests or private claims, in order that he might provide places for his own expectant partisans. I would be doing injustice even to the later Presi dents, if I did not add that they often broke the bonds of party in which they were bound, and de voted themselves, as far as was in their power, to the service of the country ; but the moment in which they assumed the prerogatives of President of the whole people was too often the signal for the revolt of their 140 EVIL INFLUENCES followers. Their inclinations of course coincided with their duty to select from amongst the best of those to whom they were indebted to fill the public stations ; but in many instances they had no discre tion or choice but to bestow the offices upon those whose chief qualification or claim consisted in their preeminent services in securing the election of the chief. It was impossible, however, under the most fa vourable circumstances, for the President to supply one in a hundred of the claimants with the offices they demanded. And yet he was bound to discri minate amongst them, each one of whom believed his claim superior to that of the others. The successful claimant accepted the position as his due for services rendered, and consequently considered that the President and he were made even by the operation. The other ninety-nine were disappointed, chagrined, mortified, angry with the President, and at least a goodly number of them ripe for revolt upon the occurrence of the first favourable oppor tunity. As soon, therefore, as he had finished disposing of all he had to give, a faction of the dis appointed, having nothing farther to hope or expect from the present chief, commenced vaguely or more openly, according to circumstances, to hint to their fellow-citizens that the President was 4 unworthy the confidence of a free people ; ' and begun to organise an opposition within his own faction or party. The irritations engendered by the distribution of the offices upon the commencement of every new pre sidential term were the natural and inevitable results of the system of president-making, which during the Y i OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 141 later years of the existence of the Union became the general practice. The same cause created the neces sity for the expulsion from office of all those who held over, by appointment of the preceding Presi dent. These were deplorable evils; but under the operation of such a system there was no remedy. The rigid rules of party warfare, which announced as leading ideas ' rotation in office,' and ' to the victors belong the spoils/ were popular just in the propor tion which the ' outs ' bore to the ' ins : ' that being something like a thousand to one, silenced every murmur of opposition. The c ins ' were in fact obliged to be silent witnesses of all the preparations for their own execution. They had obtained their own places by the application of the party guillotine to those who had preceded them, and after all, there was an appearance of fairness in the arrangement which satisfied the consciences, while it kept open the avenues of hope to multitudes who were looking with longing eyes to the enjoyment of perquisites which had been long sought for; but which somehow or other had always eluded their grasp. 4 Kotation in office ' was a rule adopted to apply to a party which might succeed in establishing itself in power during two or more consecutive terms. It was founded upon the idea that since there were not enough places for all, they should like brothers make a fair distribution amongst the greatest possible number by curtailing the term of tenure. ' To the victors belong the spoils ' was only the application of one of the harsher rules of war to party politics. Upon the instant when one contesting party placed itself upon this 'platform,' its adversary was 142 EVIL INFLUENCES obviously obliged to do the same thing, so that politicians were compelled to acquiesce in the practice by an unavoidable necessity. It grew naturally and inevitably out of the system by which the head of the Government, who held this patronage at his dis posal, was placed in power. But it was not alone upon the Government of the Union that these presi dential elections exercised their baneful influence. The State Governments were corrupted by the example. If the President should be elected by the people, why not officials of lower grade the judges of the courts of justice, the sheriffs of counties, the constables of civil districts? If the great ruler over all should only hold his office for four years and then be turned out, why should his subordinates and inferiors be suffered to linger in their places during even so long a term? The fountains of Government were thus corrupted at their very source, and the whole cry of the country was for Change ! change ! change ! Rotation in office ! If we may not believe that all these results were but consequences of the influence of presidential elections ; and that the eradication of the great evil would be followed by a corresponding reform in the minor offices, then must we despair of establishing a permanent Government based upon the republican principle. If there is to be no change if, when peace is restored, the people of America perpetuate the same fatal faults in their Governments which have hitherto characterised their administration then will the history of the terrible events now transpiring describe with equal truthfulness the conflicts which will follow after. The country will only move with OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 143 an accelerated pace upon that downward road which leads through anarchy to hopeless despotism. But if ' the sober second thought of the people 7 should after their terrible experience induce them to cast away the great sin, then may the friends of good government indulge reasonable expectation that minor reforms of a like character will follow. All they have to do is to look to the spirit of the Con stitution of their fathers, and behind that to the sentiments, and opinions, and desires of its framers interpret in good faith the former by the latter, be guided in all things by the spirit which animated them and all may be well. 144 CHAPTER X. THE INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY WAS NOT ONE OF THE CAUSES OF THE DISSOLUTION OF THE UNION. IN order to prove that certain results are conse quences of a specified cause, it is often useful to show that other assigned causes did not, or could not, have accomplished the results named. In decid ing upon the moral causes which produced the disso lution of the Union I have ranked one as a principal, and all others as accessories. More properly speak ing, this one leading cause has furnished an occasion for the developement of all the others. There are those who take an adverse view of the subject who assign the effect to a cause which I think, was not only innocent, but which, in fact, re tarded the consummation, although it may have served as a pretext for the final overthrow of the ' Model Kepublic.' I am not going to discuss the rights or the wrongs, either abstract or actual, of the Institution of African Slavery, but simply to investigate its influence upon the duration and destiny of the late Federal Union. Whether the objections which are raised by foreigners against the Institution of Domestic Slavery in the American Confederacy are well or ill founded, INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 145 their opposition is most natural. Although the system was not long since almost universally adopted by the Governments of the world, yet it is now amongst civilised nations confined to a very small number. The perceptive faculties of mankind are never so acute as in discovering blemishes in the character of their neighbours, and men are never so indignantly virtuous as in the condemnation of those vices which it is no longer their interest nor within their power to commit. Notwithstanding this, I can understand, and ap preciate, and honour the opinions and sentiments of that large class of intelligent philanthropists who are opposed to the existence of a political institution which recognises property in man. Still this con stitutes no valid reason for supposing that the ex istence of such a relation is an unmixed evil. The good may or may not be sufficient to counteract or atone for the evil, when considered as an established fact with which we have to deal ; yet I cannot believe that any intrinsically worthy cause can be promoted by refusing to see anything but evil in all that opposes it. To the candid and frank adversaries of the Institution of Slavery in America I therefore address the observations which follow, in the belief that their better judgment, if not their candour, will induce them to admit the logic of undeniable facts, even though they may prove that it is possible for a little good to be mingled up with that which they consider to be in the main a very great evil. I am well aware that, even within the narrow limits to which I propose to confine myself, there may be found those who will dissent from my con- 146 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. elusions, simply because they have made up their minds already that nothing but evil can spring from such a source that none but bitter waters can flow from such a fountain. They have interpolated the sentiment into their religious creeds. Religions are necessarily, and in their nature, dogmatical. They allow of no discussion they are unalterable their foundations are laid in faith upon the evidence of things not seen. To doubt is to be damned. Their dogma is true, because it is in their creed their creed is not to be questioned, because it is an emanation from an Infallible Power. Although their faith may have been born but yesterday, they none the less demand its unquestioned recognition to day. The zeal of a new convert is stimulated by the desire to atone as quickly as possible for the sins of a life time. I may not hope to win these to my opinions, but I trust that I will say nothing to shock their sensibilities. When the independence of the British American Colonies was achieved, it became necessary to esta blish a permanent Government to take the place of that one which had been repudiated. There were two classes of inhabitants namely, Freemen and Slaves. They were of distinct races, and were as different in their physical aspect as in their origin. Their natural intellectual endowments were as dis similar as their races or their social conditions. Many, perhaps a majority of the white inhabitants, believed, as did their ancestors, that it would have been better for them if the Africans had never been brought into the country. Others went so far as to suggest the idea that, if any means could be devised INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 147 by which the two races could be separated, it would be the better policy to adopt it. Others, and vastly the greater number, considered that the system which had been inaugurated without their consent, and prosecuted by their European sovereigns against their protest, had already assumed proportions which rendered its eradication by a system of coercion im possible, even if it were desirable. They thought that they might wisely direct, but that they could not with impunity destroy. None proposed that the slave should become a citizen. The new Government was established in accordance with these views. The freemen remained freemen the slaves remained slaves. Men's minds were not wholly of one accord in reference to the policy of the Institution of Slavery, regarded as an abstract pro position, though they generally agreed in the deter mination to preserve the statu quo. There was an absolute and unqualified unanimity in denying to the negro the rights of citizenship, or the privileges of a social equality with the whites. The white men of that day may have been very wicked thus to have ignored the inalienable rights of man they may have but imperfectly comprehended the truths of Divine Revelation, as expounded to-day by a Cheever or a Beecher they may have been less pure and less holy than white men of the present day; but it is not of these things I speak, nor do I mean to defend them : I only refer to facts as they existed. The Government was established upon a principle differing fundamentally from that on which all the other Governments of the world then rested. That principle involved a recognition of the equal political L 2 148 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. rights of all men. It was, of course, meant to be applied only to themselves ; and, in constructing the details of their Government, they gave to it that specific application. They announced, as the theory upon which their political institutions were founded, that 'all mankind were created equal/ and that they were 4 endowed by nature with certain inaliena ble rights,' amongst which was ' liberty.' Practi cally they applied it only to themselves, and entailed it only upon their own posterity. The Africans they left in slavery to be transmitted as an inherit ance to their descendants. This may at first view seem to have been inconsistent with the theory of the Government, but nevertheless the two were in perfect accord. Certainly the application of the principle, at the very moment of its announcement, proves at least their own interpretation of their duty. It may or may not have been unjust, or unwise, or both, but there was no inconsistency between the de claration and the deed. In announcing certain general principles they meant to indicate the manner in which they proposed to govern themselves their own race not others. They did not mean to say that England or France should be governed in the same way. They did not even mean to say that Englishmen or Frenchmen who might come amongst them should enter upon the enjoyment of the same political rights which they had conferred upon them selves. Much less did they mean to say that Afri cans should be permitted to participate with them as equal partners, because they belonged to the human family. There does not exist to-day a Government of the civilised world which does not reserve to itself INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 149 the right to decide whether the inhabitants of other nations, or the people of other races, should come amongst them and enjoy the political rights accorded to their own citizens. No Government could exist during a long time which had not the right to en force this exclusion. Nevertheless this superficial appearance of inconsis tency afforded room for cavil, and was a source of dis quiet to many of the citizens, who desired that their free institutions should be above reproach. The enemies of the Republic in Europe insisted that the Govern ment could only be brought into accord with the principle upon which it was founded by abolishing slavery elevating the African to a political equality with the citizens, and amalgamating the races. The abstract justice of the principle that all men were by nature equal, and therefore ought to be endowed with the same political rights, won the hearts and sympathies of many, who having had no practical knowledge in regard to the distinctions and antipa thies existing between the black and the white races, when they are brought into contact, could not per ceive why the same principle should not have a special application in America. The establishment of the American Government, which recognised slavery as a proper legal relation between the white and the black man, thus, oddly enough, made the first converts to Abolitionism ; and still more oddly, it made converts of both its friends and its enemies. It was the first formidable blow that had ever been aimed at the African slave trade. The downfall of this traffic, as a great branch of commerce, was thenceforth certain ; for the Southern 150 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. Slave States, now become free from foreign control, carried into practical effect their traditional policy of refusing to permit the introduction of any more African slaves into their territory. If it be a merit, the slave-holding Confederacy of the United States may claim the honour of having been the very first and prime moving cause of the anti-slavery senti ment which afterwards became so general. Then, however, it was founded chiefly upon a political idea. African slavery was wrong, because it inter posed an impediment to the developernent of a certain political theory. These objections to the system were afterwards enlarged on the ground of philan thropy. As the enthusiasm increased, opposition to slavery, as before said, was interpolated by many into the Christian creed, as a cardinal doctrine of religion. These sentiments, however, were far from being universally entertained. On the contrary, they had made no great progress beyond a very limited circle, confined almost entirely to Slave States, when the French Revolution, with its terrible upheaving of the moral and political elements of the entire European continent, fixed public attention upon the subject, and hurled all Europe into the current which swept onward to universal emancipation. If the fathers of the American Republics are entitled to the credit of inaugurating the anti-slavery sentiment, at the very moment of recognising its lawful existence, to MAKAT, and D ANTON, and ROBESPIERRE are due the honour of having made it universal. It may seem strange at first view, that after the removal of the pressure under which men had been, as it were, forced into INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 151 the adoption of an opinion which they had never previously entertained, they should continue to move on harmoniously, and with a seeming unity of pur pose, in the same direction. And stranger still, that the two parties the farthest removed from each other in their political creeds the most Radical and the most Conservative, according to the usual significa tion of these terms should have agreed in adopting the same principle, and in promoting the same object. This seeming anomaly may be readily accounted for if we follow out the theories of both to their legitimate conclusions. The French Revolution, after many years of conflict, was quieted. It was physically dead; but its leading ideas had taken deep root in men's minds. Its enemies held the sword, but the principles which had been enunciated still lived in the hearts of the great body of the people. Its friends deplored its excesses ; but they saw also the provo cation : and while they refused to adopt it as a model, they cherished its doctrines. Their adversaries feared and watched, and endeavoured to check the developement of such sentiments. While they boldly confronted, they were anxious to conciliate and soften the proselytes to these opinions. The Democrats claimed the right to ' equality and fraternity/ founded upon a general principle that all men sprang from a common father. If they did not demand the same privileges for the African slaves in America, they could not clearly perceive how they might consistently accuse those of wrong who withheld from them what they claimed to be their own natural rights. Their theory may have been founded injustice; but 152 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. they did not consider that it could only be applied to homogeneous nations as distinct communities, and not to the whole human family as a unit. In truth, they thereby abandoned, or made subordinate, the only argument which might have established the justice of their own claim. Their right to equality had no other practical foundation than their capacity to perform its duties, as well as the other members of the same community. That claim might be asserted upon the ground that they were of the same race, and that with equal advantages of education and similar political privileges, there would be found to be no difference between themselves and those who arrogated the right to govern by virtue of their descent, or by the grace of God. But when they gave to their theory a universal application when they claimed that Asiatics, and Africans, and Europeans thrown together in the same State, were entitled to equal political rights and an equal parti cipation in the control of the Government they not only repudiated the only sound principle upon which their own claim rested namely, an equal capacity with those who had taken their places above them but they practically enforced those very distinctions in rank, and fell back upon the very same system against which they were protesting. Because, what ever may be claimed to be the natural right of one man to be the equal of his fellow-man, he can only make good his demand by being physically and in tellectually able to cope with those by whom he is surrounded. This is the universal law of nature, and cannot be changed in practice by argument. There is no period of the world's history during which this INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 153 invariable law has not governed the intercourse of mankind. If the most enlightened inhabitants of the Chinese empire were to-day thrown into contact with an equal number of Englishmen or Frenchmen, such an equality of political rights as existed in the American Republics could not be maintained between them for a month. It might be that neither would at first tamely submit to the dominion of the other, but either the one or the other would become the controlling power, if they remained distinct ; or they would be divided into classes and castes, at least during the process of amalgamation. Equality would never have a beginning until they had been so effect ually intermingled, that all traces of the original distinctions which divided them should have been extinguished. The number of generations or ages which would pass away before the final result would be achieved it would be needless to attempt to cal culate. In effect many European powers have extended their conquests into Africa and Asia. They now exercise dominion over hundreds of millions of the inhabitants, yet we do not find them any more willing to concede the rights of political or social equality than upon the day when their victorious armies first entered the territory as conquerors of an unoffending race. Their Governments may not authorise the dominant race to buy and sell the people they have subdued : it is more profitable to ab sorb their substance to require that a given amount of money shall be paid by each as a tribute to power. Thus, practically, the doctrine of equality is set at naught by the universal practice of mankind now and in all time past. 154 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. But when this democratic theory is pressed to its legitimate conclusion in those countries where, by external violence or from any other cause, two races so dissimilar as the white Europeans and the blacks of South Africa are thrown together, the difficulties are augmented in the ratio of the still more marked distinctions between the races. If the effort to give a practical effect to the principle of equality is at tempted to be applied in a community or State, where the natural relation of master and subordinate has already been in existence from the moment when they were first placed in contact, the difficulties of such a solution are so appalling that the mind of a rational man, who has a clear and full perception of the obstacles to be surmounted, must shrink back in dismay from all further efforts to reduce such a theory to practice. If, in the assumed case of the Englishman or Frenchman and the Arabs, an interval of so many ages is demanded before the new race formed by amalgamation could claim the right to start out upon its career of i equality and fraternity,' how long a time would elapse before the black and the white man of the American continent would be brought to the same happy state of progress ? In the case we are considering, the first serious obstacle to be encountered is the universal feeling or sense of superiority upon the one hand, and of inferiority upon the other, which the relation of master and slave has engendered. Next we are met by the intellectual superiority, natural and acquired, of the one over the other. The difficulties to be encountered in overcoming these may be more INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 155 readily appreciated when we consider of the tenacity and fixedness of purpose which in all ages of the world have animated men in maintaining the purely artificial distinctions which have originated even in the same race. The proclaimed mission of the French Revolution was to eradicate these distinctions, to elevate the masses to an equality with their superiors in social and political rank was the dream of those visionary men whose genius conceived and whose hearts prompted them to attempt the achieve ment. The practical difficulties which supervened, while they did not deter the chief actors in this great tragedy from the pursuit of their object, suggested its attainment by what seemed to be a straighter and a shorter road. The multitude could not, or would not be elevated; and the few would not consent that the distance between them should be diminished. The direction of the Revolution fell into the hands of the Marats and the Robespierres. It was easier for them to destroy than to build up. Easier to drag down a hundred than to elevate a thousand. Easier to kill the aristocrats, than to eradicate the principles of aristocracy from the breasts of those who had been born (and whose ancestors before them had been born) to the inherit ance of its privileges. It was easier to break to pieces and remove the idols from the sight of their worshippers, than to induce the idolaters to relinquish their faith. The reign of terror and of blood was inaugurated. The cities and the villages, the plains and the valleys of France, were deluged with the blood of her best and her worst citizens. The few nobles who survived escaped to foreign lands ; but under all their accumulated load of misfortunes, 156 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. disasters, and humiliations, they still proudly claimed to be the superiors of those who had almost annihi lated their order, and driven them forth as beggars from what they claimed to be their rightful inherit ance. Their followers were bound by the necessities of their position to remain under the dominion of those whom they regarded as their oppressors and their enemies ; but their hearts were with their exiled lords. The French Revolution, so far as regards its out ward manifestation, was finally brought to an end. There are none who will say that those who directed or participated in its progress exhibited any lack of vigour or energy; or that they did not upon the whole attempt to reach the goal of c equality and fraternity' by the only means which offered any reasonable hope of prompt or immediate success. None will doubt that they did make great progress in establishing a greater degree of liberty for the masses of the people. But did they succeed in eradi cating the artificial distinctions of social or political rank, either from Europe, which was the field of their labours, or from France, where they annihilated the old aristocracy? While the political rights of the great body of the people have been augmented, do the higher classes now protect their blood from plebeian contamination any less vigilantly than they did before the first gun of the French Revolution reverberated through every palace and hovel of every European empire, kingdom, and principality? The people who were engaged in this mighty struggle, and who sustained the shock of this moral and political earthquake, and who emerged from the terrible convulsion almost or quite as far removed INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 157 from social equality as at the hour of its commence ment, were members of a homogeneous race. They were directed by the same passions, and the same prejudices, and the same instincts: they had the same history and traditions, and the same physical aspect. The peasant and the lord might have changed places in the cradle, changed tutors, changed the gilded trappings of the court idler and the blouse of the ouvrier, and each would have played the part of the other through life, and died without having failed in a single instance to perform the part assigned him, according to the example of those in whose society he had been cast. Let us return to the Europeans and the Africans, whom the new and startling theory of c equality and fraternity ' found living together in harmony as master and slave in the New World. It will scarcely be denied that the political and social reformer would find on scrutinising the position, that .the feeling of superiority entertained by the master, and of inferi ority by the subordinate, was very strongly I might almost say ineradicably engrafted into the minds of both. It was certainly so in their manners. So far as related to the establishment of ' equality and fra ternity/ America offered a much less hopeful field for the attainment of that chimera that ignis fatuus, which had eluded the grasp of those who so vainly sought it with such bloody zeal through the carnage of the French Eevolution. Practically, there were three roads open, each of which offered the hope of a possible solution to those who were sufficiently infatuated to hope at all. The first and most humane of these was by the 158 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. interposition of some foreign power, which would decree freedom to the slaves, arid send its ships to take away the one or the other of the two races. Such was the plan pursued by Great Britain in the West India Islands. The second was to preface the inauguration of the new era of brotherhood and love by placing arms in the hands of the two races, and saying to them: ' Draw the sword from its scabbard, and the brand from the fire, and never sheathe the one, or extinguish the other, until one or both shall have been extermi nated.' The bloody butchery of the French province of St. Domingo achieved the work of slaughter. The whites were exterminated, and the blacks were left undisputed masters. It is not necessary here to decide whether this was wisely or humanely done ; or whether any real benefit resulted therefrom either to the African or to man kind. But it may be said that it did not inaugurate that real political independence, or that social equality, which still eluded the grasp of its pursuers. The one at the moment of its execution pleased France ; the other at a little later period was accomplished in compliance with the will of England. They were the masters, and if they are satisfied, there are perhaps few now living who will complain. It may at least be said in their justification that they adopted the only means which suggested a hope of reaching the beginning of the end proposed. But it was proven by the result that to change the relations which existed between the black and the white races, re quired the extermination of one or the other ; or the direct interposition of a foreign power. INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 159 We enter now upon the third and only remaining road left open. It has never yet been trodden. There were two nations in existence strong enough to protect themselves against internal violence, or foreign interposition, where the white and the black races lived together as superior and subordinate. The empire of Brazil prosperous, thriving, and con tented; the model government of South America, and the only one which has attained to any consider, able rank lay invitingly open to the European re formers. Strangely enough, even the anti-slavery clergymen of Europe seemed oblivious to the fact that there were there millions upon millions of European masters and African slaves. Without sending a single emissary into, and without uttering a single malediction against Brazil, they passed on to the United States of America. It was against the grievous sin of the Great Republic that the priestly proselytes of Robespierre and Marat employed their energies.* To secure the desired result by the adoption of the plan which had been followed by England was impossible for there was no over-ruling power which from without might dictate the measure, even if it had been possible to have transported across the ocean the constantly accumulating population. The blacks * In an address delivered by Sir Henry Bulwer, at Constantinople, before a literary association, he made some interesting references to the origin of the anti-slavery propaganda. I regret that I have not before me the printed address, but I remember that he gave the credit of inaugurating the war upon the Institution of Slavery to Talleyrand, who, in a series of lectures, insisted that such a concession to the democratic theories of the age had, as a matter of policy, become necessary on the part of the Governments of Europe. 160 INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. had neither the power nor the inclination to enact the same tragedy which had resulted in exterminat ing the whites of St. Domingo. If the dominant race had therefore been prepared to adopt any suitable plan which might have offered a reasonable hope of accomplishing the end, and had schooled their minds, by proper training, to con template without regret the loss of their inheritance, the only means left open was by a voluntary amal gamation of their own race with that of the African. It scarcely requires an argument to prove that by this means only could the two races be brought into harmony, if the relation of master and slave should be abolished. When such were the means necessary to the attainment of the desired result, it is not wonder ful that the proud and domineering Anglo-Saxon shrank back with loathing and horror from the con taminating association. To suppose that such a relation would be voluntarily assumed by any race of Europeans was, in the estimation of Americans, to discard all knowledge of their characteristics, all respect for them individually, all belief in their high destiny, and all obedience to the laws of the Supreme Ruler, who had announced His will and purpose as plainly in the intellects and aspects which He had respectively bestowed upon them as by any other law recorded in the pages of His Inspired Book. This was, and is, the feeling of the whole American people. It is neither stronger nor weaker to-day than in the days of the Revolution. Every incident in their history bearing upon the question goes to show that there never was a foot of territory over which floated the flag of the late Union north, INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 161 south, east, or west where such a proposition would not have been scouted as an insult. The only dif ference in this respect between the Free States and the Slave States is, that while in the latter it is a sentiment or prejudice which for the most part lies dormant in the breast, in the former it amounts to a fanaticism. The negro is treated in the Free States with much more rigour, and is repelled from all association or contact with much stronger evi dences of disgust, than is observable in the Slave States. This, however, is not to be attributed to any radical divergence of opinion or feeling. The natural antipathy of both, under similar circum stances, would be similarly developed. But in the Slave States the white man has not hitherto had occasion to fear that the African will ever aspire to be his equal, while in the North the legal barriers have been to a certain extent removed, and the white man does not know at what hour some other change in the laws may bring them nearer together. Hence he is constantly impelled to the manifestation of that repugnance which, founded in his nature, has been magnified by education into a controlling sen timent. Those who are curious to observe the manner in which this passion betrays itself will discover it in the conduct of Yankee armies during their invasion of the South. The unnecessary and wholly unpro voked insults which they constantly, and with im punity, inflict upon the harmless Africans are only exceeded by the wanton injuries which they perpe trate against their masters. But the statute books of the Free States furnish the most authoritative M 162 ANTIPATHY TO THE AFRICAN exposition of the deliberate sentiment of repugnance which pervades all classes of Northern society. It may be discovered as well in the laws of New Eng land, before Abolitionism was employed as a means to make presidents, as in the more honest and more recent enactments of the great States of the West. These, while offering the most tempting inducements to other foreign immigrants to enter upon and occupy their unappropriated lands, repel the free negro by the most stringent prohibitions and the most exemplary punishments from any attempt to violate the laws which exclude him. At the very moment when their Government is issuing emanci pation proclamations, if the African crosses their borders he is tried as a criminal and fined, and sold to pay the money penalty of his offence. While urging the poor slave to desert his home and his only protector, they refuse to him even the asylum of an open-air lodging in their vast and untenanted forests. Let not the European Abolitionist condemn too hastily the law-makers of the Free States. The chances are as a hundred to one that if he were similarly situated he would do precisely what they have done. There are documents extant, emanating from the chief source of all power in the United States, which, echoing as they do the universal sentiment of every State, county, and township in the North, are worthy of marked consideration. I refer, amongst others of like import, to the address delivered by President Lincoln to the Committee of Negroes who waited upon him at the executive mansion in Washington, August 14, 1862, to learn what disposition he pro- IN THE NORTHERN STATES. 163 posed to make of the Africans after he should have established their freedom. It may seem surprising that at such a moment the President should have taken such pains to dispel the delusion wherever it might exist, that he was fighting in the cause and for the sake of the African. It may seem strange that, in the very act of calling upon the slave to rise up and aid him in exterminating the white men of the South, he should have told him that he was and always would be abhorred and loathed, and refused a home upon the continent where he had been born. Yet these feelings he has expressed, and these sen timents avowed, in the name of his fellow-country men. He who desires to acquire useful knowledge in regard to the important subject which excited this exposition of negro philanthropy, and to dis cover the probable influence of the policy enunciated upon the future fortunes and fate of the Africans now residing upon the American continent, may find it eminently instructive to study this well-considered speech. The author, who occupies a more important relation towards slavery in America than any other living man who first from choice, and afterwards from the necessities of his position, found himself confronted face to face with the reality of emanci pation who would perhaps shrink back appalled from a contemplation of the horrible fate he is preparing for the African, if it did not hold out the prospect of inflicting a greater evil upon the master, is now obliged to meet the issue he has raised. If the real friend of the slave can find room to hope, after a perusal of this address, and others M 2 164 ANTIPATHY TO THE AFRICAN emanating from the same source, that the Africans would be benefited by the change which emancipation, under such auspices, would produce, his faith must indeed be founded upon the evidence of things not seen by the naked eye and incomprehensible to the sense. I do not desire to be guilty of an injustice to the Northern people by assuming that to be true which the sober judgment of mankind would decide to be an error; but can any reasonable man, in the face of such testimony, believe that the Free States entered upon the conflict now raging to right the wrongs of the slave ? or that they were animated by any intention or desire to better his condition ? Can it be believed that the Institution of Slavery in the Southern States had any other agency in producing the present conflict than that it was employed by the North, in the first place, as a means to procure votes in a presidential election, and in the end as a flimsy pretext for the war of subjugation which they afterwards commenced? Though, in the blindness of their rage and hatred against the Southern people, they may be disposed to employ the slaves as instru ments to destroy their masters, can anyone believe, who has studied their character or who has wit nessed the evidences of their antipathy to the negro, that they would ever, as a nation, at any period of their whole history, have raised a finger in their cause, or breathed to them a word of encouragement or sympathy, except in so far as it might serve as a stepping-stone to the attainment of another pur pose ? If there had never been a presidential elec tion to tempt the partisan leaders to employ such IN THE NORTHERN STATES. 165 means to secure sectional support, is there any reason to believe that an Abolition party could have been formed in the Free States, sufficiently formidable to have carried a majority of the congressional districts in any single State of the old Union ? If we except the European powers which colonised both the black slaves and their white masters in America, the Northern States were the chief instru ments in the establishment of slavery upon the soil of the South, although in doing so they violated the known will of the free inhabitants. In justification of their acts it may be rightfully urged that nearly the whole civilised world was at the same time en gaged in the same commerce. I do not mean to accuse them of doing an immoral or an unchristian deed, for at that day it was regarded by the authorised expounders of the ' true faith ' as a legitimate and truly Christian means of converting the heathen. All the Christian world believed that for the doing of this work of charity for the soul it would only be exacting a very moderate penalty to make the reci pients of such an unspeakable blessing slaves for life, them and their posterity for ever. On the other hand, I do not mean to say that the Southerners desired to turn away the human chattels because they had a better comprehension of their duties, or were directed by a loftier code of morals. I must admit that the Southern provincials only turned their backs upon the African slave merchant because they believed upon the whole that they would be more prosperous without than with his merchandise. But slavery was established, and that firmly, and upon a basis which was evidently intended by its founders 166 AFRICANS ONLY TREATED WITH to make it perpetual. This, however, was a long time ago.* To-day we perhaps should in charity credit Nor thern professions of dislike to that Institution of Slavery which they were one of the instruments in creating; for history aiid experience furnish us with many notable proofs that nations as well as indivi duals have an astonishing alacrity and a most mar vellous facility in changing their principles in accordance with what may seem to be their interest. But even the fullest measure of charity would not require that we should, in the case we are now considering, give them credit for anything more than a death-bed repentance. It must also be added that the more they propose to do to aid in the slave's redemption, the more they seem to loathe him. The more they approach to the consummation of his deliverance from his Southern master, the more carefully they lock and bar their own doors, and the more vigilantly they guard their frontiers ^in order to prevent him from employing his liberty as a means of encroachment upon their territorial limits. In short, the more they profess to love him, the more they seem to hate him. It is a remarkable and well attested fact, which in this connection is worthy of notice, that the African, when brought into contact with the European races, is only treated with kindness and humanity when occupying towards them the relation of slavery. The naturally broad lines which separate the two * The facts in regard to the establishment of slavery within the limits of the present Confederacy are referred to in detail in the ' South Vindicated/ p. 195. KINDNESS WHEN HELD AS SLAVES. 167 grow deeper and clearer in proportion to the advances made towards a social or a political equality. Throughout the American continent, and upon the adjacent islands, this fact is illustrated in their inter course. In the Southern States, where the African is held as a slave, he is treated with a degree of respect and a humanity which is nowhere else accorded to him, while in no other country is he held in such low esteem as in the Free States of the North, where the institution of domestic slavery has been abolished. By the manners and customs of the people, as well as by their laws, he is made an outlaw and held to be a vagabond, who cannot and who ought not to aspire to a higher destiny. The nearer the period of enfranchisement seems to approach, although accomplished by their own act, the more do they manifest their abhorrence of his person, and their determination to avoid the contamination of his presence, if he should presume to approach them.* * It would be unjust in forming a judgment upon these facts not to consider and give due weight to the natural tendency of the African to become a vagabond when he is left at liberty to control his own actions. It may be that this results in part from the ignominy with which he is treated by the dominant race ; but it may be easily established that it does not proceed wholly from this cause. Whoever has visited the West India possessions of Great Britain cannot fail to discover that among the resident Europeans the broad barriers which separate the two races are as thoroughly recognised as when the Africans were slaves. But an illustration of the disinclination of the Africans to adopt the tastes and the industrious habits of the Europeans is exhibited at this day in Nova Scotia. It will be remembered that in the war between the United States and Great Britain the latter carried off from the Southern States a considerable number of African slaves. These were colonised chiefly in Nova Scotia. They were kindly received by the inhabitants, and the most strenuous efforts were adopted to secure their well being, and to lay for them the foundations of future prosperity. They were, I believe, invested with the rights of other British subjects. At least there has been conferred upon them the right of suffrage. They 168 INTENTIONS OF THE NORTH While the existence of a deeply-seated antipathy in the Northern mind to the free negro, before re ferred to, would of itself forbid the assumption that the Free States were tempted into the bloody path they are now following by any sentiment of benevo lence towards the slave, this negative testimony is strengthened when we consider in what manner the liberation of the slaves would affect the wealthiest element in the Republican party. That the leaders of this party designed to employ their political supremacy in such a manner as to control the destinies of the white race in the Southern States, through the instrumentality of the institution of domestic slavery, may be readily conceived. That they meant to keep the South in moral subjection by holding ever over their heads the terrible sword of Abolitionism, and that they endeavoured to weaken the power of the South by creating and fostering a spirit of rebellion amongst the slaves, may not be vote in all elections. So far, however, from progressing, they have absolutely retrograded; and their descendants are not to-day as far advanced in civilisation as when they were released from servitude. They are ignorant, indolent, immoral, and every way degraded in their habits of life. A few employ themselves occasionally in making brooms, or in similar occupations on election day they pocket a few shillings for the rest they are idle, dissolute, and thriftless. Their numbers are constantly diminishing, and they are less numerous now than when they and their fathers were transplanted from the Slave States of the Union, after making due allowance for those who have emigrated. This information I have derived from various sources, but chiefly upon two occasions when I was myself in Halifax. I conversed with many intelligent gentlemen there upon the subject, and all were agreed as to the facts here stated. It would thus seem that, whether in the tropical latitudes of the West Indies in the more moderate climate of the Free States of the American Union or in the colder region of Nova Scotia, the freed African follows the same downward road. We may, therefore, account in some measure for the earnestness with which he is repelled by the laws and the manners of civilised communities. IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 169 questioned ; but that they intended in the beginning absolutely to release the slave from the authority of his master can scarcely be attributed to more than a small number. Such a consummation would have rendered valueless their cherished system of pro hibitory duties. One of the very objects which they set out to accomplish by a sectional organisation was to compel the cotton growers and agriculturists of the South to be their customers. Can we believe that they would stultify themselves by destroying the very sources of the wealth which they were endea vouring to appropriate to themselves? Can we suppose that a burglar, who has planned the robbery of a house which he knew contained a certain treasure, would voluntarily apply the torch, with a view to burn up both house and treasure, at the very moment when he had succeeded in passing the threshold, and was about to clutch the promised reward of his dishonesty? There is only a single contingency which would justify such an inference. If his presence had aroused the inmates, he might seek to make good his escape by setting fire to the premises, and running away by the light of the conflagration. This, in fact, is a solution of the present attitude of parties in the North upon the subject of the abolition of slavery. They would secure dominion over the South at the expense of slavery, if that is necessary to the attainment of their purpose; but if they could subdue the Southern people without changing the relations which have existed between the races inhabiting the South, I presume but few even among Federal partisans would assert that the Institution of Slavery would be abolished by their act. 170 CHAPTER XL THE INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY UPON THE DURATION OF THE UNION FARTHER CONSIDERED. "RETURNING to the point from whence I have -IX been tempted to digress, I propose to consider the third and last means suggested to bring about a political and social equality between the black and white races, which, as before said, involved in its pro gress their amalgamation. It is scarcely necessary to adduce an argument to prove that the voluntary consent of the dominant race to such a solution could never be obtained. It is quite easy for theoretical expounders of political and moral creeds to sit down behind their books and papers and write treatises upon the rights of man, in which they may prove most clearly that a difference in colour, capacity, and race constitute no reason why the weaker should be deprived of his personal liberty. It is not necessary to controvert the abstract truth of the proposition. I might extend it further, and prove that the existence of these differences do not justify European nations in seizing upon vast territories and holding in subjection hundreds of millions of people who have never wronged them. But if we have never yet found any Government, or the subject thereof, INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY. 171 willing to surrender their dominion over a conquered people, even upon a distant continent, how could it be hoped that when a superior and an inferior race are brought together upon the same territory the former would consent to relinquish its supremacy? The American people, whether citizens of the North or of the South, have always believed that the abo lition of slavery could only be accomplished, and peace maintained, by the process of extinguishing their own race by amalgamation with the African. We have seen that it is not difficult for foreign abolitionist lecturers and European demagogues to urge the descendants of Anglo-Saxon and German and French ancestors in America to show their love for the human race, and their devotion to the prin ciples of liberty and equality, by mingling their blood with that of a degraded and an inferior race; but there is not a kingdom nor a principality in Europe that would not scout such a suggestion, if by any possibility it might be brought home to themselves. It is clear that the only means by which the end proposed might be reached would be through the instrumentality of an overruling external power. Suppose that such a pressure had been brought upon the Americans, and that slavery had been abolished, and that the process of absorption had been com menced among the humbler classes, who would, by the necessities of their position, have been thrown into familiar intercourse : the first effect would have been to have destroyed the Republic. It will hardly be affirmed that the same laws which might govern one homogeneous race would be applicable to a com munity composed in the ratio of only two to one 172 REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE of such different and antagonistical elements. The strong arm of absolute power, irresponsible to the inhabitants, could alone hold in due subjection such discordant materials. The peace of society hu manity itself would, in such a case, impel the people to seek shelter and protection under the wing of just such a Government as that which the French Revo lution was instituted to destroy. Thus the theory of political and social equality, pressed beyond its legitimate boundaries, and applied to mankind as a unit, instead of to homogeneous communities, would have destroyed the only great Republic in existence, and created a despotism upon its ruins. Whether such a result will be accepted as a solution of the present devastating war remains to be seen ; but that would have been the end long ago, if the political and social distinctions between the blacks and the whites had been obliterated from the laws of the country. In considering the results which must inevitably attend the universal application of the theoretical principles enunciated by the French Revolution, we may not wonder at the coincidence of sentiment before referred to between its proselytes and the representatives of that political dogma which the revolution was instituted to destroy. The theory of the one was adverse to the existence of slavery of the other, adverse to the existence of liberty. The practical application of the first upon the American continent would have destroyed slavery ; but it would have destroyed the Republic and liberty at the same time Was it wonderful that the politicians of the schools OF OPINION ON THE SUBJECT OF SLAVEKY. 173 of Louis XIV. and Henry VIII. should have locked arms with the Marats and the Robespierres, and said c We will unite with you in fighting the battle of Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality for the down trodden Africans upon the continent of America ! ' There was a broad distinction between the prin ciples enunciated by Washington and his compatriots and those which were promulgated by the French Republic. The American Republics adopted as their guide the great principles of civil and religious liberty as applied to homogeneous communities. The French Republic adopted the same principles, but sought to apply them to mankind as a unit. The former established political equality amongst its own recognised citizens, leaving it to the indi vidual to find his own social level, according to his tastes, his habits, and his education : the latter sought to enforce not only political but social equality. The theory of the former was that each nation had a right to such a Government as might satisfy the wants and desires of its own citizens : the theory of the latter was that all mankind should be governed by uniform laws, both in their social and political relations, resting upon a democratic basis. Follow out the theory of the first to its legitimate conclusions, and it establishes liberty for each distinct homogeneous nation : the theory of the latter, in its practical application, could only end in the establish ment of despotism. Unfortunately for the cause of real liberty, the comprehensive but impracticable theory promulgated by the enthusiasts of the Robespierrean school, dur ing a period of general delirium, has found more 174 THE FRENCH REPUBLIC. admirers amongst those who in Europe have assumed to be the leaders of the party of freedom than the less brilliant, though more practical scheme inau gurated by Washington and the fathers of the American Republics. Considering the radically dif ferent auspices under which the two were ushered into existence, it may not be regarded as wonderful that each, in its developement, should have partaken somewhat of the character of the circumstances and the times in which they respectively had their origin. The independence of the thirteen British colonies having been acknowledged there were none to oppose them in their onward progress. They were the architects of their own destinies, and whatever may be the fate reserved for the Confederation which they formed, the structure of the Government they created will ever remain a monument to the wisdom of its founders. They were inaugurating an experi ment which had never before been submitted to a practical test. It should excite less wonder that they failed in the arrangement of some details of its complicated machinery than that they only failed in a few. The French Republic, on the contrary, born amidst the convulsions of a continent cradled and reared up in storm and tempest hurled forth the firebrand of political and social equality and fraternity for all mankind, as President Lincoln has issued his pro clamation of emancipation, not to enunciate a dogma, but to crush their enemies to destroy rather than to build up to enslave rather than to make free. It was dictated by hatred against those who opposed its progress, rather than by love for those in whose THE FEENCH EMPIRE. 175 interests they professed to employ it. If the Republic had lived the dogma would have died, for the exist ence of the one was incompatible with that of the other. The Republic perished and the dogma has survived. From the ruins of a despotic monarchy, and the downfall of a still more despotic democracy, there has, however, emerged a Government preserving all that was really free, and rejecting all that was really despotic of both. Happy for the French people when they threw off the despotism of their tyrant kings ; happier still when they cast away the bloodier tyranny of their democratic rulers; but most happy when they settled down at last to the enjoyment of that real liberty which was consistent with the prosperity, the welfare, the greatness, and the glory of the nation. 176 CHAPTER XII. THE INSTITUTION OF SLAVERY RETARDED THE DISRUPTION OF THE UNION. I HAVE declared that the Institution of African Slavery did not produce the dissolution of the Union. I think that the universal and almost fanatical antipathy of the people of the North to the negro, and the extreme harshness of the laws they have enacted to repel and degrade him, and the frank recognition and acknowledgement of this by President Lincoln himself ought to be regarded as satisfactory proof that no sentiment of love for the slave, nor a desire to better his condition, prompted the North to enter upon their bloody crusade against the South. That there existed a party who urged the general Government to decree the abolition of slavery in the Southern States is true ; but it is easy to show that the desire to accomplish this purpose originated in a feeling of unkindness towards the Southern white men, rather than a regard for those whom they would emancipate. It is also true that President Lincoln was the elected chief of a party existing only in the Free States, which party was pledged to an unconstitutional interference with the domestic institutions of the Southern States. INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY. 177 But the thoughtful student of American history cannot fail to discover that this result was brought about by other causes, stimulated to an unnatural developement by the madness which always attended presidential elections. While it may be thus established that the Institu tion of Slavery did not hasten the disruption of the Confederacy, there is the strongest reason for be lieving that it retarded that result. The inauguration of the American Government upon the principle of entire equality amongst its citizens, upon whom devolved the duty of conduct ing the Government, was an untried experiment. It had no predecessors, for the republics of former days bore scarcely any resemblance to that of which Washington was the first President. Its founders, although guided by the most profound wisdom, could not profit by the experience of others. It was in its nature subject to many dangers. The people might at times become remiss in the discharge of their duties at other times they might prove more zealous than discreet. Admitting that the great body of the people could not have any interest which would not be promoted by a good Government, they were liable to be imposed upon and led astray by artful demagogues. Of all the dangers which a republican Govern ment has to encounter, the one most to be feared is the influence of the demagogue. This is true in theory, and it has proven to be so in practice. The people, however honest, cannot always distinguish between their real friends and those who pander to their passions in order to win their friendship. N 178 ARTS OF THE DEMAGOGUE. However great may have been this evil in the earlier days of the Republic, it did not, during the lifetime of ' the Fathers,' assume such alarming pro portions. The Revolution had drawn forth from the mass a galaxy of statesmen and patriots whose high qualities secured for ,them the confidence and respect of all classes of their fellow-countrymen. The wis dom with which they guided the nation may be in ferred from the fact that even yet the politician can adopt no means more sure to win the sympathies of the people than by assuring them that he follows in the footsteps of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe. When these all passed away the field for the demagogue was enlarged. There were many causes which conspired to make the Free States the great theatre upon which this class of politicians played their parts. Although the right of suffrage was exercised alike by all citizens, yet in the South it was limited to white men. More than one-third of the population being slaves, or of African descent, were non -voters. In the North, on the contrary, the most ignorant and vicious of the population were as powerful in deciding the result of elections as the most intelligent and the most virtuous. This, however, might possibly have been an endurable evil, if it had not given birth to dema gogues who employed that ignorance as a means to elevate themselves to high places of trust. They constituted the material from whence he drew his sustenance. They were an ever-present temptation, seducing even the better class of politicians into a way of life which ended by bringing the great body of those who were engaged in politics to the same ARTS OF THE DEMAGOGUE. 179 low standard. The worst became finally the con trolling element in all elections, and the best at last descended to the same level, as a sole resource against complete exclusion from any participation in public affairs. To secure the favour of the worst third of the population was a passport to office and power. To fail in winning their approbation was an irrever sible order to the political aspirant to return to the quiet of private life. To be 'a statesman ' constituted but a very slight claim to a seat in Congress. To have been a i rail-splitter ' was the highest boast of a candidate for the presidency. In the South the arts of the demagogues often won the prize of political favour; but it required more skill and a higher order of talent. In the North it was only necessary to arouse the passions of the people, by calling the Southerners c aristocrats. 7 In the South the candidate for popular favour had to satisfy the people that he was himself a patriot. While in the North the proverbial fickleness of the multitude often displaced the favourite of yester day without any just cause, who had been elevated without merit; in the South they in many cases retained for a long time in office those whom they had chosen as their public functionaries. Political pursuits in the South were held in higher esteem than in the North. There was, therefore, a greater number of high-toned, educated gentlemen in the former who were willing to come forward as candi dates for office. Both have degenerated in very many respects from the standard of the earlier days of the Republic, but the descent has been much greater in the North than in the South. N 2 180 IMMIGRATION OF FOREIGNERS There was, however, a wide field for the operations of the demagogue in the North which had no exist ence in the South. The naturalisation laws of the United States required a residence of only five years to invest a foreigner with all the rights of a native- born citizen, whose ancestors had peopled the country in the days of its colonial dependence. Even this short period of probation was, in consequence of the exigences of parties, reduced in many of the States to a period of one year, and it has occurred that voters have been marched from the emigrant ship to the ballot-box upon the day on which they first set foot upon American soil. That many thousands of the better class of Europeans were attracted by the favourable conditions offered to them is most true. If the full rights of citizenship could have been con ferred upon these, and withheld from that far larger class who also came to claim the promised bounty, the Republics would in one sense have been the gainers. We can only realise the magnitude of this power of votes in the North by looking over the yearly reports of immigration; but without troubling the reader with these statistics, he may approximate to an understanding of the subject by considering that the population of the States of the Union has been augmented from three millions to more than thirty- three millions within about three quarters of a century. Whatever may have been the quality of this immense influx of foreigners into the North it may easily be imagined that great changes would result in the policy, the manners, and the habits of thought r AND THEIR INFLUENCE. 181 and action of the Northern people. That very many thousands of these were utterly unfit, at the end of their short probation of five years, to take charge of the Government will not, I think, be questioned by those who have well considered the subject. Utterly unprepared by education and early training for the discharge of the duties which were confided to them, they nevertheless constituted in a number of the Northern States a controlling balance of power in deciding elections. Even many of the most intelligent and best in formed politicians of Europe do not fully compre hend the relations of the general Government to the individual States : how could these uninformed immigrants be expected to administer such a Govern ment wisely ? The greater number of them learned, for the first time, on their arrival in America that the country was divided into a number of indepen dent States, united together under a league or constitution. We may conclude that even the best informed amongst them were surprised to find upon their arrival that they immediately came under the influence of the State Laws, and that they might live to old age and die without having been brought once under the operation of the laws of the United States. In their native countries they had heard only of that Government whose Capitol was Washington. The United States, to them, was like France, or Prussia, or England a consolidated sovereignly. When, upon settling themselves down, they found that they were citizens of Indiana, or Ohio, or New York, and that they could not reside in any part of the American continent where they 182 IMMIGRATION OF FOREIGNERS could be properly designated as c citizens of the United States/ they were not only disappointed, but many of them believed it to be a radical defect in the structure of the Government. They had been familiar in Europe with the idea of a great central head to a Government, and they thought that they would confer a service upon America if they could reform the Government of the United States accord ing to that standard. The consequence was, when the Republican party came forward, pledged to a policy which would in its operation absorb the sovereignity of the several States into that of the Northern States, through the instrumentality of the Federal Government, it found hundreds of thousands of foreign-born voters ready to assist them in the accomplishment of their unconstitutional enterprise. They were attached to the Government of the United States, but they had of course no local attachments which would cause them to reverence the State Governments. We may well believe that the existence of these feelings on the part of the great mass of foreign- born voters supplied at least one of the stimulants which induced the Republican party to persevere in the course they had indicated, even after it became manifest that they could only accomplish their measures by the sword. Having no respect for a system of State Governments, of which they could not comprehend the uses, but which they believed truly, operated as a check upon the despotic rule of a mere majority, they have been the most available instruments of Mr. Lincoln in fighting his battles AND THEIR INFLUENCE. 183 for the subjugation of the Southern States, and the erection of a central despotism. It would not, probably, be hazarding too much to say that if the right of suffrage as regards natural ised citizens had been properly guarded if they had even been placed on an equality with native-born citizens, and have been required to reside twenty-one years in the country before being permitted to exercise the right of suffrage they would have become more instructed in regard to the nature of the Government, and the Confederation might pos sibly have sustained the shock even of presidential elections for perhaps a generation longer. I entertain these opinions in common, I am quite sure, with a considerable number of thoughtful foreign-born citizens. It does not follow, because an intelligent immigrant has accepted the privileges which have been offered to him, that he believes the law conferring them to be a good one. The earnest and devoted patriotism of many citizens who were born in foreign countries has been conspicuously manifest at all periods of American history ; but even many of these have failed to comprehend that the surest bulwark of liberty in the United States consisted in the division of supreme power amongst the several States. They knew that in concentration there existed a greater capacity for doing good promptly; but they failed to perceive that it led directly to despotism. Still the small class referred to were patriots. They became Americans in heart when they assumed the duties of citizens. They never sought to form a 'power of foreign-born 184 IMMIGRATION OF FOREIGNERS voters/ for the purpose of putting themselves in opposition to those who were born upon the soil. There was another, and unfortunately a larger class of intelligent foreign-born citizens, who being revolutionists and demagogues at home, did not leave these characteristic qualities behind them when they went to America. Many of them were political adventurers and foes to real liberty in the countries from whence they came, and they have well sus tained the same characters in the new field they have selected. Their province was rather to break down and destroy all government, than to make war upon bad Governments. Whether they were engaged, according to their own declarations, ' in securing the blessings of liberty for the down-trodden masses of Europe,' by efforts to displace those whom they declared to be their oppressors or employing their swords to assist in reducing the freemen of the South to political servitude was alike congenial to their principles and their tastes. Kevolution was their trade. In times of peace and quiet they were rest less and dissatisfied. Their occupation was gone, and they sank into ignoble insignificance. But they flourished amidst disorders, and were only happy when mingling in those scenes of violence and carnage which might bring them forth from obscurity. The leaders of these may now be found occupying the highest places in the army and the diplomacy of the Government ; and shame to the native-born citizens of the North without the aid of these adventurers and other foreign mercenaries, who have been at tracted to their standard by high bounties and a natural desire to shed blood they could not have AND THEIR INFLUENCE. 185 maintained their war against the South, notwith standing their superior numbers, for a single month. Far be it from me to attribute this disinclination on the part of the great body of the native-born Northern people to any lack of the personal qualities necessary to make good soldiers. In a good cause, I doubt not for a moment that they would be as brave as the bravest. But their passions alone are in this war, not their hearts or their consciences, which up braid them for the deep wrong they are perpetrating against those who have never injured them. They are willing to pay the highest rates for professional cut-throats, adventurers, and revolutionists, whether of domestic growth or foreign importation; but many of them shrink from doing the bloody work themselves. Upon the arrival of one of these European adven turers in the United States, about the period of a presidential election, he was forthwith closeted with the professional president-makers, who discussed with him the various schemes for bringing the 'foreign element to bear upon the approaching contest/ The ignorant, and often vicious material of which the foreign-born voters were composed offered an inviting field for their machinations. They plunged at once into the arena of party politics, with all the reckless ness, and vehemence, and adroitness of veterans in party warfare. They entered upon the work of pulling down the Eepublic with all the zeal and zest they had displayed in their pretended efforts to reform the monarchies of the Old World. At length they succeeded in combining the greater portion of the foreign element of president-making material 186 BUT FEW FOREIGNERS into a unit of political power; and those v/ho had been chiefly instrumental in the accomplishment of this result at once took a high rank as party leaders and expectant recipients of govermental honours and bounties. At a little later period they were just as ready to take a leading part in the hostile invasion of the territory of a free and an honourable people, whom they at least had never known but as friends and benefactors in the hour of their greatest need, and against whom they could not urge even the pretence of a wrong. As long as this foreign power of votes was dis tributed amongst the various contestants for the prize of the presidency and the spoils of the Treasury, the one part, to a certain extent, counteracted the influence of the other. As long as the political parties maintained their national character, like the c Whig ' and ' Democratic ' parties, into which the nation was during so many years divided even though they might, to a certain extent, combine in favour of the one or the other their power of mis chief was limited and restrained. But the moment that a powerful party made its appearance, as a new contestant for supreme power deriving its support exclusively upon one side of a geographical line, and that division being the one in which this foreign element resided even a partial concentration of their strength, embracing as it did an overwhelming majority, turned the scale against the party which sought support from every part of the nation. In the South this election material did not exist. The small number of foreign-born voters there, were either of the better class, or were more profitably T BECAME CITIZENS OF THE SOUTH. 187 engaged at highly remunerative wages than in the work of president-making. The great body of the Southern people were descendants of ancestors who first peopled the wilds of North America. They were not, therefore, materially affected by the radicalism of a great and constant influx of strangers. They cherished the political institutions of their fathers as something holy something, if need be, to die for. They revered the State Governments, from which they and their ancestors before them had de rived their title-deeds to their estates : they had each a local history, written and traditional. These causes made the Southern people, in the fullest signification of the term, Conservative that is, they were rigid upholders of the Constitution and opposed to change. This Conservatism was notably exhibited when the two sections were thrown together in Congress. Whatever divisions might exist in the South in reference to political parties, the predominating feeling amongst all, was to make as few inroads as possible upon the Constitution, or upon the original structure of the Government. This quality of Southern statesmen gave to them a powerful influence with those citizens of the North who entertained similar opinions. The respect in which they were held, and the confidence which was reposed in them, has been urged as a proof that the South has always ruled the nation. This is perhaps true in one sense, but untrue in the sense in which it is spoken. Washington was a slaveholder and a Southerner; but who would designate him, in a sectional sense, as a Southerner? Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Polk, Taylor, were all Southerners and slaveholders 188 EFFECTS OF SLAVERY. several of these were even opposed to the Institu tion of Slavery and not one of them was chosen because he was a Southerner. In the whole history of the Union not a single citizen, either from the North or South, has been called to fill the station of President because he was a Northerner or a Southerner, except Mr. Lincoln. The Institution of African Slavery in the Southern Confederacy may or may not be an evil in the sense in which that term is employed I owe it to frankness to say that I do not believe it though, as I said in the outset, I do not propose to enter into a discussion of that question. It may, or may not, have inflicted injury upon the material interests of mankind though I am free to say that I can discover no evidences that it has. It may, or may not, have degraded the African below the position occupied by his race elsewhere, though I think that the weight of testimony is against such a supposition ; but I believe that candid and unprejudiced men will decide that its conservative influence acting upon the Governments and people of the South, and from thence reacting upon the Federal Government and the Free States, has had a powerful influence in preserving the whole fabric from the domination of the radical and revolu tionary elements which have for so long menaced its integrity; and that although it could not save the Union, it retarded the consummation of its final overthrow. 189 CHAPTER XIII. A REVIEW OF THE EVENTS CONNECTED WITH THE FORMATION OF THE FEDERAL UNION, AND THE OPINIONS OF THE AUTHORS OF THE CONSTITUTION, IN REGARD TO SECTIONAL AND STATE SOVEREIGNTY QUESTIONS. TO a correct solution of the causes which produced the rupture of the Federal Union, and to estimate their relative weight, it is almost essential that we should commence our investigations upon the first page of its history. In the succeeding chapter I propose to review somewhat in detail the most prominent events con nected with the progress of the presidential elections from Washington to Lincoln. These two names, constituting the extreme limits of our investigations, will no doubt suggest forcibly to the mind of the reader that it is a downward road he is invited to travel. In the present preliminary chapter I propose once more to return to the earliest period of the Union's history, and to the opinions and acts of the framers of the Constitution, as explained by themselves, in regard to the causes which were a source of division amongst themselves, and which they feared might be productive of evil in the future. Very great confusion in the public mind in regard 190 THE THREE AMERICAN UNIONS. to American affairs has grown out of the fact that the history of the changes which have taken place in the Government of the United States since the first Revolution have not been understood or duly con sidered. Although it may be presumed that at the present day information in this respect is generally diffused, yet a brief reference to these changes may be of service to the general reader. The First Government of the United States. The thirteen North American colonies of Great Britain, through their delegates, in a Convention which assembled in Philadelphia, May 10, 1775, established ' Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union ' between the several colonies. The following extracts from these articles indicate the nature and objects of the league : ARTICLE 1. The name of this Confederacy shall be the United Colonies of North America. [On July 2, 1776, the word ' colonies ' was changed to ' states ' by Act of Congress, upon which day was assumed the title, ' United States of America. 1 On the 4th of the same month was issued the formal Declaration of Independence. It was under the operation of this Government that George Washington was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Army of the Confederation.] ARTICLE 2. The United Colonies hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, binding on themselves and their posterity, for their common defence against their enemies, for the securities of their liberties and properties, and their mutual and general welfare. ARTICLE 3. Each colony shall enjoy and 'retain as much as it may think fit of its own present laws, customs, rights, privileges, and peculiar jurisdiction within its own limits.' THE THREE AMERICAN UNIONS. 191 Second Government of the United States. In the third year of Independence, that is, on July 7, 1778, the first Government was abolished, and Congress adopted other 4 Articles of Confedera tion and Perpetual Union : * ARTICLE 1. The style of this Confederacy shall be * The United States of America* ARTICLE 2. Each State retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right which is not by their confederation expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled. ARTICLE 3. The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other for their common defence, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare. ARTICLE 13. ... The articles of this Confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall be per- pepetual : nor shall any alteration be made in any of them, unless such alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and afterwards confirmed by the Legislature of every State* Third Government of the United States. In the twelfth year of Independence, that is, on December 17, 1787, the second Government of the United States was abolished, as far as concerned the States which sanctioned the formation of the new Government, and was succeeded by a third. * Many persons, by a very natural confusion of the several Constitu tions, have assigned this clause to the present Constitution, and hence have concluded that this prohibition precluded the Southern States from the right to withdraw themselves from the Federal Union, whereas it was in violation of this very clause that the late Union was established j at first by nine of the twelve States which were parties to the preceding league. 192 THE THREE AMERICAN UNIONS. This was accomplished by a Convention of Delegates, representing ten of the States, at the head of which was George Washington. The States, however, not being unanimous in desiring a change, there was some discussion as to how far the last article above recited would be binding. It was decided that no restriction contained in that clause could prevent such States as might choose to do so from resuming their delegated powers and establishing a new league. They accordingly adopted an article providing that 1 the ratification of the Conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Con stitution between the States so ratifying the same.' In effect the requisite number of States did approve the Constitution thus formed. They therefore se ceded from the previous Government, and established themselves under that league from which the Southern States seceded upon the election of Mr. Lincoln to the presidency. It was not, however, until May 29, 1790, that the last of the thirteen States, Rhode Island, consented to join the new league. New York did not enter until July 26, 1789; and North Carolina did not give in her adhesion until August 7 of the same year. Thus these three States did not become members of the new Union until after the election of George Washington as the first President. Although the powers delegated by the States to the Federal Government were more clearly defined in the last than in the two which preceded it, yet the principle of State sovereignty was as carefully guarded in the one as the other. Each one declared that the object of the league was 4 to establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION. 193 defence, and promote the general welfare/ And the third Government, from which the Southern States withdrew, declared in the articles of the compact that ' the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people/ Although the Constitution of the third and now existing Government of the United States as finally adopted bears evidence of the compromises and con cessions which were mutually agreed upon by the representatives of the different interests, States, and sections, yet we can discover more clearly the ground-work of the sectional troubles which after wards, under the stimulant of presidential elections, were employed to produce the dissolution of the Union, by examining the propositions in detail as brought forward and sustained by the respective representatives of each. If after these compromises had been achieved by mutual concessions there had never been any general elections which might serve to revive the recollection of these differences, and thus excite the popular mind, we might have reason ably hoped that the same calm councils which con curred in creating would have maintained the Con stitution in its purity. The North had far greater cause to desire the perpetuation of the Union upon the compromises of the Constitution in the year 1860 than existed in 1787. Nothing short of the demo ralising influence of presidential elections could ever have so blinded that shrewd, far-seeing, and sagacious people, as to induce them to forego all the advan tages of a peaceful political connection with the o 194 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION Southern States, by endeavouring to rob the latter of their constitutional prerogatives. In truth, I can discover no reason for believing that the Northern people as a body would ever have placed themselves in an attitude of hostility to the South, but for the influence of that army of agitators and political adventurers which was brought into being through the instrumentality of presidential contests. There did, however, exist conflicting interests, and other mutually repelling influences, which rendered the task of the agitators more easy of accomplishment. The debates in the Convention which formed the Constitution afford us a clear view of the sectional antagonisms which were finally developed into their present proportions. The Constitution provided that three-fifths of the slaves should be estimated in deciding upon the number of representatives to which the Slave States should be entitled in the Federal Congress, and in the assessment of direct taxes for the benefit of the general Government. Also that those who escaped into the Free States should not be made free on account of any laws existing in said States, but should be delivered up on the application of the legal owner. We find, by reference to the debates upon these topics in the Convention, that although there may be discovered the germ of sectionalism, founded upon the supposed pecuniary antagonisms between the North and the South, yet there was even less diffi culty in effecting a compromise upon this question than upon others involving also the interests of the two sections. Some of the bitterest opponents of ON THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY. 195 slavery were delegates from the South ; while a few of the Northern adversaries of the South opposed the foregoing provisions not alone because ' slavery was opposed to humanity, and was seriously detri mental to the progress in prosperity and wealth ' of their Southern brethren but because it involved the North in the necessity of expending its blood and treasure to protect the Southern people against slave insurrections! The Free States would consent to this heavy burthen, however, upon condition that the Federal Government might be permitted to tax the exports of Southern slave labour as an equivalent. They already exercised the right of imposing heavy duties upon foreign imports, and of transporting Southern produce by means of navigation laws, in Northern ships, to the exclusion of other competitors for the carrying trade ; and if to this had been added the right (they were also in receipt of both protection and large bounties paid by the general Government to their fisheries) to tax the exports of slave labour, the South might well have prayed King George to take them back again, and do to them his will in the way of taxes, imposts, and stamp duties. It would probably be unjust to deny to the few Northern anti- slavery men of that day the merit of sincerity in their philanthropic endeavours to mitigate the evils of slavery; but the least censorious even may not deny that they mingled with this benevolent sentiment a fixed purpose to increase their worldly stores through the instrumentality of the condemned institution. The following additional extracts from the debates in the Convention (as reported by Mr. Madison) o 2 196 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION cannot fail to be both interesting and instructive to those who desire to know the individual views and sentiments of the members : August 8, 1787. Mr. Rufus King, of Massachusetts, could not reconcile his mind to the proposition (concerning the admission of slaves into the rule of representation). The admission of slaves was a most grating circumstance to his mind. In two great points the hands of the Congress were absolutely tied. The importation of slaves could not be prohibited. Exports could not be taxed \ Is this reasonable? What are the great objects of the general system ? First, defence against foreign invasion ; secondly, against internal sedition. Shall all the States, then, be bound to defend each, and shall each be at liberty to introduce a weakness which will render defence more difficult ? Shall one part of the United States be bound to defend another part, and that other part be at liberty not only to increase its own danger, but to withhold the compensation for the burden. If slaves are to be imported, shall not the exports produced by their labour supply a revenue, the better to enable the general Government to defend their masters ? There was so much inequality and unreasonable ness in all this that the people of the Northern States could never be reconciled to it. ... At all events either slaves should not be represented, or exports should be taxable. Mr. Gouverneur Morris, of Pennsylvania, moved to insert ' free ' before the word < inhabitants.' . . . Domestic slavery is the most prominent feature in the aristocratic countenance of the proposed Constitution. The vassalage of the poor has ever been the favourite offspring of aristocracy. And what is the poposed compensation to the North for a sacrifice of every principle of right, of every impulse of humanity ? They are to bind themselves to march their militia for the defence of the Southern States against those very slaves of whom they complain. Without pausing to comment upon the peculiar and characteristic code of morals under which the two last speakers proposed to assist 'in the sacrifice of every principle of right, and every impulse of humanity/ provided they could be guaranteed a pecuniary compensation commensurate with the ON THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY. 197 greatness of the crime they were called upon to uphold, one cannot fail to be struck with the lan guage of exaggeration they employed in referring to the services they would be called upon to render. If they were not speaking in irony, the sequel has been a striking commentary upon their judg ment. The only occasions upon which the North has ever interfered between the blacks and the whites of the South were first clandestinely, and afterwards openly, to place the dagger in the hands of the slaves, with instructions to slay their masters. But to continue : Mr. Pinchney, of South Carolina, considered the fisheries and the western frontier as more burthensome to the United States than the slaves. The motion of Mr. G. Morris (to insert free ') was rejected- all the States voting against it, except New Jersey. August 21. Mr. Luther Martin proposed to vary Article 7 so as to allow a prohibition or tax on the importation of slaves. . . . Slaves weakened one part of the Union which the other part were bound to protect.* ... It was inconsistent with the principles of the Revolution, and dishonourable to the American character, to have such a feature in the Constitution. Mr. Rutledge, of South Carolina, would readily exempt the other States from the obligation to protect the Southern States against the slaves. He was not apprehensive of insurrections. Mr. Ellsworth, of Connecticut, was for leaving the clause as it stands. Let every State import what it pleases. The morality or wisdom of slavery are considerations belonging to the States themselves. What enriches a part enriches the whole, and the States are the best judges of their particular interests. Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina, can never receive the plan, if it prohibits the slave trade. In every proposed extension of the powers of Congress that State has expressly and watchfully * From the moment these words were uttered up to the present the only protection afforded by the North to the Slave States was the protec tion which vultures give to lambs. 198 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION excepted that of meddling with the importation of negroes. If the States be all left at liberty on this subject, South Carolina may by degrees do of herself what is wished, as Virginia and Maryland have already done.* Mr. Sherman, of Connecticut, disapproved of the slave trade ; yet, as the States were now possessed of the right to import slaves, as the public good did not require it to be taken from them, and as it was expedient to have as few objections as possible to the proposed scheme of Government, he thought it best to leave the matter as we find it. He observed that the abolition of slavery seemed to be going on in the United States, and that the good sense of the several States would probably by degrees complete it. Mr. Mason, of Virginia. This infernal traffic originated in the avarice of British merchants. The British Government con stantly checked the attempts of Virginia to put a stop to it. The evil of having slaves was experienced during the late war. . . . He mentioned the instructions given by Cromwell to the commissioners sent to Virginia to arm the servants and slaves, in case other means of obtaining its submission should fail. Mary land and Virginia had already prohibited the importation of slaves. North Carolina had done the same thing in substance. All this would be in vain, if South Carolina and Georgia be at liberty to import. The Western people are already calling out for slaves for their new lands, and will fill that country with slaves, if they can be got through South Carolina and Georgia. Mr. Ellsworth, of Connecticut, had never owned a slave, and could not judge of the effects of slavery upon character. If it was to be considered in a moral light, we ought to go farther, and free those already in the country. As slaves also multiply so fast in Virginia and Maryland that it is cheaper to raise than import them, whilst in the sickly rice swamps foreign supplies are neces sary if we go no farther than is urged, we shall be unjust towards South Carolina and Georgia. Let us not intermeddle. As population increases, poor labourers will be so plenty as to render slavery useless. Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina. If slavery be wrong it is justified by the example of all the world. He cited the case of * In effect, South Carolina prohibited the slave trade the same year, and from that time to the present, except during three years, the pro hibition has been rigidly enforced. ' South Vindicated/ p. 200. ON THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY. 199 Greece, Rome, and other ancient States ; and the sanction given by France, Spain, England, Holland, and other modern nations. In all ages one half of mankind had been slaves. If the Southern States were let alone they will probably of themselves stop importation. He would himself, as a citizen of South Carolina, vote for it. An attempt to take away the right as proposed will produce serious objections to the Constitution. General Pinckney. . . . South Carolina and Georgia cannot do without slaves. As to Virginia, she will gain by stopping the importations. The slaves would rise in value, and she has more than she wants. . . . He contended that the importation of slaves would be for the interest of the whole Union. . . . He admitted it to be reasonable that slaves should be dutied like other imports. Mr. Gerry, of Massachusetts, thought we had nothing to do with the conduct of the States as to slaves, but ought to be care ful not to give any sanction to it. Mr. Dickinson, of Delaware, considered it as inadmissible on every principle of honour and safety that the importation of slaves should be authorised to the States by the Constitution. The true question was whether the national happiness would be promoted or impeded by the importation, and this question ought to be left to the National Government, not to the States particularly in terested. If England and France permitted slavery, slaves are at the same time excluded from both those kingdoms. Mr. Williamson, of North Carolina, thought the Southern States could not be members of the Union if the clause should be rejected. Mr. Rufus King, of Massachusetts, thought the subject should be considered in a political light only. . . . He remarked on the exemption of slaves from duty (on importation), whilst every other import was subjected to it, as an inequality that could not fail to strike the commercial sagacity of the Northern [and Middle States. Mr. Gouverneur Morris, of Pennsylvania, wished the whole sub ject to be committed, including the clauses relating to taxes on exports and to a Navigation Act. These things may form a bargain amongst the Northern and Southern States. Mr. Pierce Butler, of South Carolina, said that he would never agree to the power of taxing exports. Mr. Sherman said it would be better to let the Southern State? import slaves than to part with them. . . . 200 PROVISION FOR THE Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina, moved to commit Section 6, as to a Navigation Act requiring two-thirds of each House (instead of a bare majority). Mr. Gorham, of Massachusetts, did not see the propriety of it. He desired it to be remembered that the Eastern States had no motive to union but a commercial one. They were able to pro tect themselves. They were not afraid of external danger, and did not need the aid of the Southern States. August 25. General Pinckney, of South Carolina, moved to strike out the words ' the year eighteen hundred,' as the year limiting the importation of slaves, and to insert the words * the year eighteen hundred and eight.' The first part of the report was then agreed to, amended as follows : ' The migration or importation of such persons as the several States now existing shall think proper to admit shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year 1808.' (States voting for extension of the term for importation of slaves were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. States voting against the extension were New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia. The remaining States were not represented in the Convention.) The following clause was agreed to nem. con. viz. : A tax or duty may be imposed on such importations not exceeding ten dollars for each person. Provision for Rendition of Slaves. August 29. Mr. Pierce Sutler, of South Carolina, moved to insert after Article 15 : * If any person bound to service or labour in any of the United States shall escape into another State, he or she shall not be discharged from such service or labour in conse quence of any regulations subsisting in the State to which they escape, but shall be delivered up to the person justly claiming their service or labour ' which was agreed to nem. con. There stands THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW, in all its length and breadth and thickness. The authors were George Washington. James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, and their associates in the Constitutional Convention, all of whom either RENDITION OF SLAVES. 201 voted for its enactment, or suffered it to be passed without one word of opposition. So far as we may learn from the recorded proceedings of that distin guished body of patriots and statesmen it became part and parcel of the fundamental law of the Union, by the unanimous voice of all the representatives of all the States, slave and free. More than half a century afterwards the world of Abolitionism was thrown into convulsions by the announcement that a wicked South and a truculent North had decreed the 'infamous enactment.' All Europe partici pated in the excitement, and joined in the hue and cry of the North against the arrogant and wicked exactions of the ' slave power.' Of course, there was not one in a thousand who filled the lecture halls of England to listen to the rhapsodies of Abolition orators, who did not believe that the constitutional provision was as recent as the excitement ; and fewer still who knew that its authors were the men who fought the battles of the First Revolution, and were known in history as the ' Fathers of the Republic.' Although the wire- workers of presidential contests in the United States could not plead ignorance of this requirement of the Constitution, yet the higher-law doctrine of 'conscience before constitutions' had been already accepted as the guide of Northern politicians; and immediately the leading Abolition States enacted laws, making the attempt to enforce this provision of the Constitution a penal offence punishable as a crime of the highest magnitude. The intended effect was produced upon the public mind. Politicians eagerly mounted upon the wave of popular passions which were evoked by the 202 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. discussion, and rode safely into the possession of the offices they coveted. But there existed the germ of another sectional issue at the period of the formation of the Constitu tion, which was afterwards developed into a bitter controversy and struggle between the North and the South, and which for a long time, as a chief element in presidential contests, threatened to divide the Union. I refer to the protection claimed by the North for its manufactures by means of high duties upon foreign imports. The representatives of the Southern States, as will be seen, proposed to restrain the exercise of this power, but the controversy was finally adjusted by conferring upon Congress the right to tax foreign imports for purposes of revenue only. As this subject became afterwards a source of sectional agitation, scarcely second to the question of slavery itself, the discussions in regard thereto in the Constitutional Convention may not be without interest to the reader : Mr. Pinchney, of South Carolina, moved * That no Act of the Congress for the purpose of regulating the commerce of the United States with foreign powers among the several States shall be passed without the assent of two-thirds of the members of each House.' He remarked that there were five distinct com mercial interests : 1. The fisheries and West India trade, which belonged to the New England States. 2. The interests of New York lay in free trade. 3. Wheat and flour were the staples of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. 4. Tobacco the staple of Maryland and Virginia, and partly North Carolina. 5. Rice and indigo the staples of South Carolina and Georgia. These different interests would be a source of oppressive regulations, if no check to a bare majority should be provided. States pursue their interests with less scruple than individuals. The power of regulating commerce was a pure concession on the part of the Southern States. They did n^ ^>eed the protection of the Northern States. NORTH AND SOUTH. 203 General Pinckney (also of South Carolina) said it was the true interest of the Southern States to have no regulation of commerce ; but considering the loss brought on the commerce of the Eastern States by the Revolution, their liberal conduct towards the views of South Carolina (on the slavery question), and the interest the weak Southern States had in being united with the strong Eastern States, he thought it proper that no fetter should be imposed on the power of making commercial regulations, and that his constituents, though prejudiced against the Eastern States, would be reconciled to this liberality. Mr. Roger Sherman, of Connecticut, alluding to Mr. Pinckney's enumeration of particular interests as requiring security against abuse of the power, observed that the diversity was itself security. Mr. Pinckney replied that his enumeration meant the five minute interests. It still left the two great divisions of Northern and Southern interests. Mr. G. Morris, of Pennsylvania, opposed the object of the motion as highly injurious. Preferences to American ships will multiply them till they can carry the Southern produce cheaper than it is now carried. A navy was essential to security, par ticularly of the Southern States, and can only be had by a Navigation Act encouraging American bottoms and seamen. Mr. Williamson, of North Carolina, was in favour of making two-thirds instead of a majority requisite, as more satisfactory to the Southern people. As to the weakness of the Southern States, he was not alarmed on that account. Mr. Spraight, of North Carolina, was against the motion. The Southern States could at any time save themselves from oppres sion by building ships for their own use. Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, differed from those who con sidered the rejection of the motion as no concession upon the part of the Southern States. He considered the interest of these and of the Eastern States to be as different as the interests of Russia and Turkey. Being, notwithstanding, desirous of con ciliating the affections of the Eastern States, he should vote against requiring two- thirds instead of a majority. Colonel Mason, of Virginia. The majority will be governed by their interests. The Southern States are the minority in both Houses of Congress. Is it to be expected that they will deliver themselves bound hand and foot to the Eastern States, and thus enable them to exclaim in the words of Cromwell * the Lord hath delivered them into our hands.' 204 NORTH AND SOUTH. Mr. Madison observed that the disadvantage to the Southern States from a Navigation Act lay chiefly in a temporary rise of freight, attended, however, with an increase of Southern as well as Northern shipping, and with the emigration of Northern seamen and merchants. . . . An abuse of the power would be qualified with these good effects. But he thought the abuse was rendered improbable by the provision of the two branches by the independence of the Senate by the negation of the Executive . . . and by the accession of Western States, which would be altogether agricultural. Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, said that there were features in the Constitution so odious as it now stands that he doubted whether he should be able to agree to it. A rejection of the motion would complete the deformity of the system. Mr. Gorham, of Massachusetts. If the Government is to be so fettered as to be unable to relieve the Eastern States, what motive can they have to join in it, and thereby tie their own hands from measures which they could otherwise take for them selves ? The Eastern States were not led to strengthen the Union by fear for their own safety. He deprecated the conse quences of disunion ; but if it should take place, it was the Southern part of the continent that had most reason to dread them. He urged the improbability of a combination against the interests of the Southern States the different situations of the Northern and Middle States being a security against it. It was, moreover, certain that foreign ships would never be altogether excluded. On the question (to require two-thirds), it was decided in the negative Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia Aye, 4. New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, South Carolina No, 7. There was not exhibited, however, in the Con vention so much jealousy between the two sections, as distinguished by the terms Northern and Southern, as between the larger and the smaller States. The diversities of interest which might thereafter arise between the two great sections was a contingency of the future the differences between the large and small States was a present fact. All the States LARGE AND SMALL STATES. 205 agreed that the separate sovereignty of each should remain intact, in all that related to their domestic affairs, and that the general Government should only be employed in regulating their intercourse with foreign nations and with each other. The large States insisted that this constitutional provision afforded sufficient security for the protection of the small States against encroachments. The latter replied that this was well enough as far as it went ; but they urged that, in right of their sovereignty, each State, as a distinct political element, should have an equal representation in the Senate. This admission of, and protection to their sovereignty conceded, they were willing that the other branch of the National Legislature should represent numbers. One reason, perhaps, why the differences which might occur between the North and the South excited but little apprehension, arose from the fact that there was no very great disparity in their relative strength, and it was supposed that the accession of Western States would still farther strengthen the South against any efforts of the Northern States to usurp the control of the Govern ment. It must be borne in mind that the com mercial antagonisms between the North and the South grew out of the difference of their pursuits. Many men were opposed to slavery both on political and social grounds ; but the hostility to that insti tution did not extend to the master. The sternest and most uncompromising adversaries of the system of slavery were found in the Slave States. At the period of time we are now considering, the autho rised teachers of religion had not announced the 206 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. dogma that the slave-holder was precluded by the Divine will from entering after life upon the joys of the Christian's paradise. Although we, therefore, find an occasional reference to the antagonisms between the North and the South, and an intimation that a combination might be formed between the Northern States which would be injurious to the interests of the South, yet the Northern representatives uniformly replied that such a concentration would in the nature of things be impossible, for the reason that the Western States would be the allies of the South; and this, too, seemed to be the opinion of the great body of the Southerners. The small States, however, were not so readily satisfied that they would not be swallowed up, unless their distinct nationality should be sub stantially recognised in the arrangement of the details and organisation of the Government. In illustration of the sentiments and opinions of the members of the Convention in regard to this point I will make some farther extracts from the pro ceedings as reported by Mr. Madison : Wednesday, June Pith. Mr. Luther Martin, of Maryland, contended at great length, and with great earnestness, that the general Government was meant merely to preserve the State Governments, not to govern individuals. That its powers ought to be kept within narrow limits that if too little power was given to it, more might be added but that if too much, it could never be resumed. That individuals, as such, have little to do but with their own States that to resort to the citizens at large for their sanction to a new Government would be throwing them back to a state of nature that an equal vote in each State was essential to the Federal idea, and was founded not merely in policy but on justice and freedom that the States, like individuals, were in a state of nature equally sovereign and free that the States, being STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 207 equal, cannot confederate or treat, so as to give up an equality of votes, without giving up their liberty. The general Government ought to be formed for the States, not for individuals. Mr. Williamson, of North Carolina, thought that if any political truth could be grounded on mathematical demonstration it was that if the States were equally sovereign now, and parted with equal proportions of sovereignty, that they would remain equally sovereign. He could not comprehend how the smaller States would be injured in the case. Mr. Madison, of Virginia, could neither be convinced that the rule contended for was just, nor that it was necessary for the safety of the small States against the large ones. Was a combi nation of the large States dreaded ? This must arise either from some interest common to Virginia, Massachusetts, and Pennsyl vania (the three large States), or from the mere circumstance of similarity of size. Did any such common interest exist ? In point of situation, they could not have been more effectually separated from each other by the most jealous citizens of the most jealous States. In point of manners, religion, and the other cir cumstances which sometimes beget affection between different communities, they were not more assimilated than the other States. In point of the staple productions, they were as dissimilar as any three other States in the Union. . . . Mr. Sherman, of Connecticut. The question is not what rights naturally belong to man, but how they may be most equally and effectually guarded in society. If some give up more than others to obtain this end there can be no room for complaint. June 29th. Mr. Johnson, of Connecticut. The controversy must be endless whilst gentlemen differ in the grounds of their arguments those on one side considering the States as districts of people composing one political society, those on the other con sidering them as so many political societies. The fact is, the States do exist as political societies, and a Government is to be formed for them in their political capacity as well as for the individuals composing them. Does it not seem to follow that if the States, as such, are to exist, they must be armed with some power of ' self -defence ? Besides the aristrocratic and other interests which ought to have the means of defending them selves, the States, as such, have their interests, which ought to have the means of defending themselves. On the whole, he thought that in some respects the States are to be considered in their political capacity, and in others as districts of individual 208 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. citizens in one branch the people ought to be represented, and in the other the States. Mr. Gorham, of Massachusetts. The States as now confede rated have no doubt a right to refuse to be consolidated, or to be formed into any new system. But he wished the small States to consider which are to give up most they or the larger ones. Mr. Madison entreated the gentlemen representing the small States to renounce a principle which was confessedly unjust. He prayed them to ponder well the consequences of suffering the Confederacy to go to pieces. Mr. Alexander Hamilton. It has been said that if the smaller States renounced their equality, they renounced at the same time their liberty. The truth is, it is a contest for power, not for liberty. He admitted that common residence within the same State would produce a certain degree of attachment, and that this principle might have a certain degree of influence on public affairs. He thought, however, that this might by some precau tions be in a great measure excluded, and that no material incon venience could result from it, as there could not be any ground for combination amongst the States whose influence was most dreaded. The only considerable distinctions of interests lay between the carrying and non-carrying States, which divides instead of uniting the largest States. Mr. Pierce, of Georgia, considered the equality of votes under the Confederation as the great source of the public difliculties. State distinctions must be sacrificed as far as the general good required, but without destroying the States. Mr. Gerry, of Massachusetts. . . . The States and the ad vocates for them were intoxicated with the idea of their sove reignty. He was a member of Congress at the time the Federal articles were framed. The injustice of allowing each State an equal vote was long insisted on. He voted for it, but it was against his judgment, and under the pressure of public danger, and the obstinacy of the lesser States. [Upon the vote which was taken at the close of this discussion it was decided that the rule of suffrage in the first branch of the Legislature should be in accordance with the populations of the different States.] Mr. Ellsworth, of Connecticut, moved ' That the rule of suffrage in the second branch [the Senate] be the same with that esta blished by the Articles of Confederation [that is, that the States should be equally represented]. He was not sorry, on the whole, STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 209 he said, that the vote just passed had determined against the rule in the first branch. They were partly national, partly Federal. The proportional representation in the first branch was conform able to the national principle, and would secure the large States against the small. An equality of voices was conformable to the Federal principle, and was necessary to secure the small States against the large. To the eastward he was sure that Massa chusetts was the only State that would listen to a proposition for excluding the States as equal political societies from an equal voice in both branches. The others would risk every conse quence rather than part with so dear a right. The power of self-defence was essential to the small States. Nature had given it to the smallest insect of the creation. He could never admit that there was no danger of combination amongst the large States. They will, like individuals, find out and avail themselves of the advantage to be gained by it. It was true the danger would be greater if they were contiguous and had a more immediate and common interest* The existing Confederation was founded upon the equality of the States in the article of suffrage. Mr, Baldwin, of Georgia, would vote against the motion of Mr. Ellsworth, though he concurred with those who thought it would be impossible for the general Legislature to extend its cares to the local matters of the States. Mr. Wilson, of Pennsylvania, in an elaborate speech, insisted that the representation in the Senate should be in accordance with the populations of the respective States. The rule of suf frage ought, he said, on every principle, to be the same in the second as the first branch. Much has been said of an imaginary combination of three States. It would be easy to prove, both from reason and history, that rivalships would be more probable than coalitions; and that there are no coinciding interests that could produce the latter. If the motion should be agreed to, we shall leave the United States fettered precisely as heretofore under * Although this distinguished citizen of Connecticut did not judge rightly in regard to the combination which was the object of his imme diate fears, yet he seems thoroughly to have understood the encroaching disposition of his countrymen, when he intimated that if contiguous States could be united upon any common interest, they would not respect the constitutional rights of the weaker members, but would combine to overthrow them. 210 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. the Confederation.* He thought the States necessary and valuable parts of a good system. Mr. Ellsivorth. No instance of a confederacy has existed in which an equality of voices has not been exercised by the members of it. The danger of combinations among the States is not imaginary. Although no particular abuses could be fore seen by him, the possibility of them was sufficient to alarm him. He appealed to the obligations of the Federal compact, which was still in force, and which had been entered into with so much solemnity. Mr. Madison contended that the States were divided into dif ferent interests, not by their difference of size, but by other cir cumstances, the most material of which resulted partly from climate, but principally from the effects of their having or not having slaves. These two causes concurred in forming the great division of interests in the United States. It did not lie between the large and small States. It lay between the Northern and Southern ; and if any defensive power were necessary, it ought to be mutually given to these two interests. He was so strongly impressed with this important truth, that he had been casting about in his mind for some expedient that would answer the purpose. . . . He would preserve the State rights as carefully as the trial by jury. Mr. Bedford, of Delaware, contended that there was no middle way between a perfect consolidation and a mere confederacy of States. The first is out of the question, and in the latter they must continue, if not perfectly, at least equally sovereign. . . . Are not the large States evidently seeking to aggrandise them selves at the expense of the small ? They think, no doubt, that they have right on their side, but interest has blinded their eyes. The small States are willing to observe their engagements, but will meet the large ones on no other ground but that of the confederation. Mr. Ellsworth. Under a National Government we should * The motion was agreed to in substance, and the Government was so ' fettered,' notwithstanding which the combination then deemed im possible did afterwards take place the North against the South with an avowed purpose which, if accomplished, would despoil the Southern States of their constitutional rights. Can it be believed that the South did not possess the right by the very letter and spirit of the compact to resist ? STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 211 participate in the national security ; but that was all. What he wanted was domestic happiness. The National Government could not descend to the local objects on which this depended. It could only embrace objects of a general nature. He turned his eyes, therefore, for the preservation of his rights to the State Governments. From these alone he could derive the greatest happiness he expects in this life. This happiness depended on their existence, as much as a new-born infant on its mother for nourishment. Mr. King, of Massachusetts. As the fundamental rights of individuals are secured by express provisions in the State Con stitutions, why may not a like security be provided for the rights of the States in the National Constitution ? Mr. L. Martin, in reply to a suggestion that a committee should be appointed to devise * a compromise,' said that no modifications whatever could reconcile the smaller States to the least dimi nution of their equal sovereignty. Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, reminded the small States that if the large States should combine, some danger of which he did not deny, there would be a check in the revisionary power of the Executive ; and intimated that, in order to render this still more effectual, he would agree that in the choice of an executive each State should have an equal vote. The States'-rights party finally triumphed, and the Convention adopted the rule that, in the sena torial or second branch of the National Legislature, each State should have an equal vote. These extracts from the proceedings of the Con vention of States, which seceded from the second Confederation and established the late Union, enable us to obtain a clear insight into the thoughts, the passions, the interests, and the sympathies of those who framed the compact of the Union. It is true that, by a perusal of the provisions of the Consti tution itself, the mind is led almost irresistibly to the conclusion that they were the results of conces sions and compromises between adverse opinions p 2 212 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. and interests; but here we enter into the very thoughts of the actors, and are by this means enabled to discover more clearly the meaning of all its various parts, by the detailed expression of the individual sentiments of those who embodied them into a Con stitution. We discover that a certain number would have favoured the absorption of the State Governments into a general Government, and the establishment of a monarchy; but they accompanied the announce ment of their individual opinions by a distinct dis claimer of any intention to press their views upon the Convention in opposition to the almost unanimous public sentiment. Upon a single point, with the few exceptions before referred to, the entire body of members was agreed namely, the preservation of the sovereignty of the State Governments, except in such cases as certain powers might be specifically delegated to a Federal Government, limited to the regulation of the foreign and domestic intercourse of the States. There was a severe struggle between the large and the small States in regard to the principle of repre sentation. The large States insisted that they should be allowed an influence in the Federal Govern ment proportioned to their relative wealth and population ; yet they at the same time repelled the idea that they wished to infringe in the slightest degree upon the sovereignty of the individual States. But the majority insisted firmly that the States were not only sovereign, but equally sovereign that they would not enter into a union unless that sovereignty and equality were admitted and that it must be re- STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 213 cognised by the admission of each State to an equal voice in the senatorial branch of the National Legis lature. It is made clear by the debates that the Convention would have adopted other safeguards for the protection of the weak States against the en croachments of the stronger, if it had not been believed that it would be impossible to form a com bination of States sufficiently powerful to menace seriously the independence or the liberties of the others. In reference to the power of coercion centred in the Federal Government, it will be observed that it was only intended to be applied within the States in aid of the constituted State authorities. It would assist in putting down a rebellion within a State; but the idea of applying the force of the Federal Government against a State needed only to be hinted at to be scouted by the entire Convention. When this point came to be incidentally discussed, upon a resolution empowering the Government to call forth the force of the Union against any member of the Union failing to fulfill its duties under the articles thereof, Mr. Madison observed : The more he reflected on the use of force, the more he doubted its practicability, justice, and efficacy, when applied to people collectively and not individually. A union of the States, containing such an ingredient, seemed to provide for its own destruction. The use of force against a State would look more like a declara tion of war than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all pre vious compacts by which it might be bound. Colonel Alexander Hamilton remarked that a certain portion of military force was absolutely necessary in large communities ; but how can this force be exerted on the States collectively ? It is impossible. 214 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. In effect, the motion of Mr. Madison to postpone the section referred to, in order that some system might be framed to render the application of force unnecessary, was unanimously adopted (see 4 Madison Papers/ vol. ii. p. 761). Here we have proof positive that the entire Convention, embracing every State, repudiated the bare intimation that the Govern ment of the United States might apply force against a State, even though the latter '"might oppose the carrying into execution the acts or treaties of the Federal Government' (see also 'Madison Papers/ vol. ii. p. 863). Mr. Jefferson, in a letter to Colonel Humphries (March 18, 1789), properly defines the nature of the league between the States in the following words : ' The best general key for the solution of questions of power between our Governments is the fact that every foreign and federal power is given to the Fede ral Government, and to the States every power purely domestic. 7 About the same time he wrote : ' The Federal is in truth our foreign Government, which de partment alone is taken from the sovereignty of the several States/ It is manifest in every act of the Convention that the allegiance of the citizens was regarded as pri marily due to the States to which they respectively belonged, and only secondarily to the Government of the Union. Just as individuals of a nation are bound by the treaties of their own Government with foreign States, so were the citizens bound to the Government of the United States. But the moment that a State, through its regularly constituted authori ties, repudiated the authority of the Federal Govern- STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 215 merit, that very instant the citizen of such State was released from his legal obligation to the Govern ment of the Union. How could it have been other wise? Could the citizen serve two masters who were at war with each other? The States, through their representatives, formed the Union, each one having an equal voice without reference to wealth or popu lation. They voted upon each and every article as States, not as representatives of the people of the Union as a single community. The State laws operated constantly upon the citizens the United States laws rarely, and then only in the exceptional cases which might arise between themselves and foreigners, or, what was the same thing, between citizens of different States. Under the State laws they derived their title to their lands under the State laws they were protected in their rights or punished for their offences : the State laws provided for the transmission of their estates to their descend ants. In short, all the functions of internal Govern ment were performed by the States, while the Government of the United States had no authority, nor did it even exercise any authority over the indi vidual or his property, except in the rarely occurring instances specifically designated in the Constitution. To avoid all misconstruction, the Constitution pro vided in a separate article that all such powers as were not specifically granted to the general Government were reserved to the States respectively, and the people. Whatever may have been the merits of the contro versy between the Federal and State authorities, the responsibility of the individual for acts committed against the Government of the Union was merged 216 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. and lost in that of the State by whose authority and command he acted. How, then, is it possible that a citizen of a State, acting in obedience to the laws of his State, could be released from his obligations as a citizen? Even admitting that he owed a certain fealty to the two Governments, yet, when they were at war with each other, he must serve one and oppose the other; and in serving his own State, he could not, by virtue of any law, human or divine, be re garded, in the proper legal signification of that term, as in rebellion against the Federal Government. Hence, when the latter power decreed the confiscation of the property of citizens of the Southern seceding States, and inflicted grievous and degrading wrongs against their persons, because they were acting in obedience to the requirements of the Governments to which they owned allegiance, it was nothing less than an act of brigandage, as wholly unjustified by the laws of the country or the usages of civilised nations, as it was repugnant to every principle of justice or humanity. How far one nation may be justified in attempting or accomplishing the subjugation of another, will probably be decided in the future, as it has been in the past, by the sword ; but after the pas sions engendered by the conflict shall have subsided, the moral sentiment of the world must unite in con demning that nation which in effect conducts even a war of conquest upon the same principles which govern highway robbers. Mr. Madison's View of the Federal Compact. As to the right of the Southern States to withdraw from the Union, the questions involved have been r STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 217 so thoroughly discussed that but little is left to say. Yet it may not be inappropriate to refer to the opinions of those who framed the Constitution, and who ought to have understood the effect and meaning of their own acts. We again quote from a speech of Mr. Madison who may be said to have been at least a Father of the Constitution delivered before that Convention, of which he was a leading and most influential member: It has been alleged (said Mr. Madison) that the Confederation, having been formed by unanimous consent, could be dissolved by unanimous consent only. If we consider the Federal Union as analogous to the fundamental compact by which individuals com pose one society, and which must, in its theoretic origin at least, have been the act of the component members, it cannot be said that no dissolution of the compact can be effected without unanimous consent. A. breach of the fundamental principles of the compact by a part of the society would certainly absolve the other part from their obligations to it. If the breach of any article by any of the parties does not set the others at liberty, ifc is because the contrary is implied in the compact itself, and particularly by that law of it which gives an indefinite authority to the majority to bind the whole in all cases. This latter cir cumstance shows that we are not to consider the Federal Union as analogous to the social compact of individuals ; for if it were, a majority would have the right to bind the rest, and even to form a constitution for the whole. If we consider the Federal Union as analogous, not to the social compacts amongst individual men, but to the conventions amongst individual States, what is the doctrine resulting from these conventions ? Clearly that a breach of any one article, by any one party, leaves all the other parties at liberty to consider the whole convention as dissolved. It would be impossible to define in clearer language the plain intent and meaning of the Constitution than this exposition by one who aided in its con struction, and which was addressed to his colleagues, who approved his views. I presume that there 218 COMPROMISES will not be found any disinterested persons who will say that the spirit of the compact had not been broken by the North before the secession of a single Southern State. The entire body of Northern States had combined together to usurp the exclusive control of the Government of the Union, and were pledged to an unconstitutional interference with the domestic institutions of the Southern States. Clergymen and politicians of the North had been during a number of years engaged in stimulating the fanaticism and the passions of the multitude against the Southern States, until they were wrought up to such a pitch of fury and madness as rendered it apparent that there was no longer any safety for the South in the Union. The Southern States did not attempt to revolutionise the Government. They merely withdrew from a Union which had become hateful to them, and from a people who cherished against them the bitterest feeling of rancour. They felt that their safety and happiness were no longer to be hoped for in a political union with the North, and they said to their Confederates : ; The great continent of America is broad enough for both of us : let us part in peace.' The answer to this just demand is known to the world. To return from this partial digression to the point which I set out to establish, I will only add that, whatever may be the judgment of mankind in regard to the wisdom which governed the councils of the framers of the Convention in the adjustment of its compromises, it is clear that they should not have been afterwards subjected to the trying ordeal of periodical presidential elections. By this means they reopened OF THE CONSTITUTION. 219 every four years, before a tribunal composed of the whole body of the people, the same sources of discord which were with difficulty adjusted by the small body of statesmen and patriots who composed the Convention. Often during the progress of that work the difficulties of compromising all the questions at issue seemed almost insuperable, and even the most sanguine at times despaired of ultimate success. Eventually they succeeded in agreeing upon terms of union. Each conceded something in order to obtain guarantees for other rights or interests ; and although no party, or section, or interest was wholly content, yet they agreed to adopt the Constitution as the best that could be done under the circumstances. But how could it be hoped that the compromises and bargains which they made would stand the test of a resubmission to the people twenty-five times in every succeeding century? When we consider that every four years, under the system of presidential elections, the nicely- balanced compromises of the Union were submitted to the operation of such an ordeal with such an ever-augmenting population from foreign countries, a large portion of whom were of different races, speaking different languages, operated upon by dif ferent motives, with different tastes, habits, and principles, who, without any practical knowledge of such a Government, entered almost at the moment of their arrival into the business of king-making for the Republic our only wonder should be that the Federal Union was not sooner overthrown. 220 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. Tabular Statement of Presidential Elections. Popular Vote in Presidential Elections from 1824 to 1860. Year Names of Candidates North South Total Majority and Minority 1824* John QuincyAdams (Democrat)E. 82,863 22,458 105,321 }No elec Andrew Jackson (Democrat) 74,786 78,113 152,899 tion by Wm. H. Crawford (Democrat) . 17,398 29,867 47,2 6 Electoral Henry Clay (Democrat) 19,361 27,726 47,087 College 1828 Andrew Jackson (Democrat) E. . 417,871 232,157 650,028 1 maj. John Quincy Adams (Whig) 411,162 100.996 512,158 J 137,870 1832 Andrew Jackson (Democrat) E. . 487,730 199,772 687,502 1 maj. Henry Clay (Whig) . 449,229 104,565 550,189 J 137,313 1836 Martin Van Buren (Democrat) E. 550,880 21 1,269 762,149 \ maj. All others (chiefly Whig) . 520,024 216,712 736,736 J 25,41.' 1840 William H. Harrison (Whig) E. . 900.346 374,437 1,274,783 1 ma \ Martin Van Buren (Democrat) . Birney (Abolition) 809,705 7,609 318,997 | 1,136,311 1 niaj. J 138,472 1844 James K. Polk (Democrat) E. 924,632 411,202 1,335,834 }. Henry Clay (Whig) . Birney (Abolition) . . 910,860 62,270 386,173 1 1,359,303 min. 23,469 1848 Z. Taylor (Whig) E. . 970,165 391,866 1,362,031 }. Lewis Cass (Democrat) Martin Van Buren (Free Soil) . 847,842 291,379 374,613 299 j 1,514,133 min. 152,102 1852 Franklin Pearce (Democrat) E. . 1,147,375 443,115 1,590,490 ) m \ Winfield Scott (Whig) Hale (Abolition) .... 1.044,347 156,856 364,242 440 | 1,535,885 1 maj. J 54,605 1856 James Buchanan (Democrat) E. . 1,232,783 618,177 1,850,960 }. Millard Fillmore (American) J. C. Freemont (Republican) 407,843 1,333,306 478,117 1.247 j 2,220,513 min. 369,55;-* 1860 Abraham Lincoln (Republican) E. 1,831,180 26,430 1,857,610 1 Douglas (Democrat) . . "1 Breckenridge (Democrat) . j 1,480,03' 786,496 } 2,857,660 1 min. f 1,000,050 Bell (Southern Peace candidate) . 74,658 515,973 J * The very small number of votes cast in this election, compared with those which follow, was owing to the fact that up to the election of 1828 many of the States chose their presidential electors by the Legislature. Up to 18 <4, the States adopting this method were, Delaware, Georgia, Louisiana, New York, Vermont, and South Carolina. In all subsequent elections, however, every State except South Carolina submitted the choice of election to the popular voice. This latter State is, therefore, not estimated in this table except in the last election, where I assume what would have been the vote if the election had gone before the people. E. Elected President. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS. 221 Table of Elections by the Presidential Electoral Colleges, from Washington to Lincoln inclusive. 1788 to 1860. Year Names of Candidates Votes cast for each Candidate Whole No. of elec toral Votes Distri buted NTo.of State* m the Union N. S. Total N. S. Nrn. Srn. 1788 George Washington 38 31 69 *73 38 35 5 5 1792 George Washington . 73 59 132 135 73 62 8 7 1796 John Adams (Federalist) 59 12 71 138 73 65 8 8 Thomas Jefferson (Democrat )f . 14 54 6* 1800 Thmas J^ffers'.n (Democrat) \ . John Adams (Federalist) . 20 53 53 12 73 65 138 73 65 8 8 1804 Thomas Jefferson (Democrat) 85 77 162 176 95 81