Within this first line of conquering set_Democracy in America

States founded. In 1790 there were only a few thousand pioneers

sprinkled along the valleys of the Mississippi; and at the present day

these valleys contain as many inhabitants as were to be found in the

whole Union in 1790. Their population amounts to nearly 4,000,000. *k

The city of Washington was founded in 1800, in the very centre of the

Union; but such are the changes which have taken place, that it now

stands at one of the extremities; and the delegates of the most remote

Western States are already obliged to perform a journey as long as that

from Vienna to Paris. *l

[ 3,672,317—Census of 1830.]

[ The distance from Jefferson, the capital of the State of Missouri, to

Washington is 1,019 miles. (“American Almanac,” 1831, p. 48.)]

All the States are borne onwards at the same time in the path of

fortune, but of course they do not all increase and prosper in the same

proportion. To the North of the Union the detached branches of the

Alleghany chain, which extend as far as the Atlantic Ocean, form

spacious roads and ports, which are constantly accessible to vessels of

the greatest burden. But from the Potomac to the mouth of the

Mississippi the coast is sandy and flat. In this part of the Union the

mouths of almost all the rivers are obstructed; and the few harbors

which exist amongst these lagoons afford much shallower water to

vessels, and much fewer commercial advantages than those of the North.

This first natural cause of inferiority is united to another cause

proceeding from the laws. We have already seen that slavery, which is

abolished in the North, still exists in the South; and I have pointed

out its fatal consequences upon the prosperity of the planter himself.

The North is therefore superior to the South both in commerce *m and

manufacture; the natural consequence of which is the more rapid

increase of population and of wealth within its borders. The States

situate upon the shores of the Atlantic Ocean are already half-peopled.

Most of the land is held by an owner; and these districts cannot

therefore receive so many emigrants as the Western States, where a

boundless field is still open to their exertions. The valley of the

Mississippi is far more fertile than the coast of the Atlantic Ocean.

This reason, added to all the others, contributes to drive the

Europeans westward—a fact which may be rigorously demonstrated by

figures. It is found that the sum total of the population of all the

United States has about tripled in the course of forty years. But in

the recent States adjacent to the Mississippi, the population has

increased thirty-one-fold, within the same space of time. *n

[ The following statements will suffice to show the difference which

exists between the commerce of the South and that of the North:—

In 1829 the tonnage of all the merchant vessels belonging to Virginia,

the two Carolinas, and Georgia (the four great Southern States),

amounted to only 5,243 tons. In the same year the tonnage of the

vessels of the State of Massachusetts alone amounted to 17,322 tons.

(See Legislative Documents, 21st Congress, 2d session, No. 140, p.

244.) Thus the State of Massachusetts had three times as much shipping

as the four above-mentioned States. Nevertheless the area of the State

of Massachusetts is only 7,335 square miles, and its population amounts

to 610,014 inhabitants [2,238,943 in 1890]; whilst the area of the four

other States I have quoted is 210,000 square miles, and their

population 3,047,767. Thus the area of the State of Massachusetts forms

only one-thirtieth part of the area of the four States; and its

population is five times smaller than theirs. (See “Darby’s View of the

United States.”) Slavery is prejudicial to the commercial prosperity of

the South in several different ways; by diminishing the spirit of

enterprise amongst the whites, and by preventing them from meeting with

as numerous a class of sailors as they require. Sailors are usually

taken from the lowest ranks of the population. But in the Southern

States these lowest ranks are composed of slaves, and it is very

difficult to employ them at sea. They are unable to serve as well as a

white crew, and apprehensions would always be entertained of their

mutinying in the middle of the ocean, or of their escaping in the

foreign countries at which they might touch.]

[ “Darby’s View of the United States,” p. 444.]

The relative position of the central federal power is continually

displaced. Forty years ago the majority of the citizens of the Union

was established upon the coast of the Atlantic, in the environs of the

spot upon which Washington now stands; but the great body of the people

is now advancing inland and to the north, so that in twenty years the

majority will unquestionably be on the western side of the Alleghanies.

If the Union goes on to subsist, the basin of the Mississippi is

evidently marked out, by its fertility and its extent, as the future

centre of the Federal Government. In thirty or forty years, that tract

of country will have assumed the rank which naturally belongs to it. It

is easy to calculate that its population, compared to that of the coast

of the Atlantic, will be, in round numbers, as 40 to 11. In a few years

the States which founded the Union will lose the direction of its

policy, and the population of the valley of the Mississippi will

preponderate in the federal assemblies.

This constant gravitation of the federal power and influence towards

the northwest is shown every ten years, when a general census of the

population is made, and the number of delegates which each State sends

to Congress is settled afresh. *o In 1790 Virginia had nineteen

representatives in Congress. This number continued to increase until

the year 1813, when it reached to twenty-three; from that time it began

to decrease, and in 1833 Virginia elected only twenty-one

representatives. *p During the same period the State of New York

progressed in the contrary direction: in 1790 it had ten

representatives in Congress; in 1813, twenty-seven; in 1823,

thirty-four; and in 1833, forty. The State of Ohio had only one

representative in 1803, and in 1833 it had already nineteen.

[ It may be seen that in the course of the last ten years (1820-1830)

the population of one district, as, for instance, the State of

Delaware, has increased in the proportion of five per cent.; whilst

that of another, as the territory of Michigan, has increased 250 per

cent. Thus the population of Virginia had augmented thirteen per cent.,

and that of the border State of Ohio sixty-one per cent., in the same

space of time. The general table of these changes, which is given in

the “National Calendar,” displays a striking picture of the unequal

fortunes of the different States.]

[ It has just been said that in the course of the last term the

population of Virginia has increased thirteen per cent.; and it is

necessary to explain how the number of representatives for a State may

decrease, when the population of that State, far from diminishing, is

actually upon the increase. I take the State of Virginia, to which I

have already alluded, as my term of comparison. The number of

representatives of Virginia in 1823 was proportionate to the total

number of the representatives of the Union, and to the relation which

the population bore to that of the whole Union: in 1833 the number of

representatives of Virginia was likewise proportionate to the total

number of the representatives of the Union, and to the relation which

its population, augmented in the course of ten years, bore to the

augmented population of the Union in the same space of time. The new

number of Virginian representatives will then be to the old numver, on

the one hand, as the new numver of all the representatives is to the

old number; and, on the other hand, as the augmentation of the

population of Virginia is to that of the whole population of the

country. Thus, if the increase of the population of the lesser country

be to that of the greater in an exact inverse ratio of the proportion

between the new and the old numbers of all the representatives, the

number of the representatives of Virginia will remain stationary; and

if the increase of the Virginian population be to that of the whole

Union in a feeblerratio than the new number of the representatives of

the Union to the old number, the number of the representatives of

Virginia must decrease. [Thus, to the 56th Congress in 1899, Virginia

and West Virginia send only fourteen representatives.]]

Chapter XVIII: Future Condition Of Three Races—Part VIII

It is difficult to imagine a durable union of a people which is rich

and strong with one which is poor and weak, even if it were proved that

the strength and wealth of the one are not the causes of the weakness

and poverty of the other. But union is still more difficult to maintain

at a time at which one party is losing strength, and the other is

gaining it. This rapid and disproportionate increase of certain States

threatens the independence of the others. New York might perhaps

succeed, with its 2,000,000 of inhabitants and its forty

representatives, in dictating to the other States in Congress. But even

if the more powerful States make no attempt to bear down the lesser

ones, the danger still exists; for there is almost as much in the

possibility of the act as in the act itself. The weak generally

mistrust the justice and the reason of the strong. The States which

increase less rapidly than the others look upon those which are more

favored by fortune with envy and suspicion. Hence arise the deep-seated

uneasiness and ill-defined agitation which are observable in the South,

and which form so striking a contrast to the confidence and prosperity

which are common to other parts of the Union. I am inclined to think

that the hostile measures taken by the Southern provinces upon a recent

occasion are attributable to no other cause. The inhabitants of the

Southern States are, of all the Americans, those who are most

interested in the maintenance of the Union; they would assuredly suffer

most from being left to themselves; and yet they are the only citizens

who threaten to break the tie of confederation. But it is easy to

perceive that the South, which has given four Presidents, Washington,

Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe, to the Union, which perceives that it

is losing its federal influence, and that the number of its

representatives in Congress is diminishing from year to year, whilst

those of the Northern and Western States are increasing; the South,

which is peopled with ardent and irascible beings, is becoming more and

more irritated and alarmed. The citizens reflect upon their present

position and remember their past influence, with the melancholy

uneasiness of men who suspect oppression: if they discover a law of the

Union which is not unequivocally favorable to their interests, they

protest against it as an abuse of force; and if their ardent

remonstrances are not listened to, they threaten to quit an association

which loads them with burdens whilst it deprives them of their due

profits. “The tariff,” said the inhabitants of Carolina in 1832,

“enriches the North, and ruins the South; for if this were not the

case, to what can we attribute the continually increasing power and

wealth of the North, with its inclement skies and arid soil; whilst the

South, which may be styled the garden of America, is rapidly

declining?” *q

[ See the report of its committee to the Convention which proclaimed

the nullification of the tariff in South Carolina.]

If the changes which I have described were gradual, so that each

generation at least might have time to disappear with the order of

things under which it had lived, the danger would be less; but the

progress of society in America is precipitate, and almost

revolutionary. The same citizen may have lived to see his State take

the lead in the Union, and afterwards become powerless in the federal

assemblies; and an Anglo-American republic has been known to grow as

rapidly as a man passing from birth and infancy to maturity in the

course of thirty years. It must not be imagined, however, that the

States which lose their preponderance, also lose their population or

their riches: no stop is put to their prosperity, and they even go on

to increase more rapidly than any kingdom in Europe. *r But they

believe themselves to be impoverished because their wealth does not

augment as rapidly as that of their neighbors; any they think that

their power is lost, because they suddenly come into collision with a

power greater than their own: *s thus they are more hurt in their

feelings and their passions than in their interests. But this is amply

sufficient to endanger the maintenance of the Union. If kings and

peoples had only had their true interests in view ever since the

beginning of the world, the name of war would scarcely be known among

mankind.

[ The population of a country assuredly constitutes the first element

of its wealth. In the ten years (1820-1830) during which Virginia lost

two of its representatives in Congress, its population increased in the

proportion of 13.7 per cent.; that of Carolina in the proportion of

fifteen per cent.; and that of Georgia, 15.5 per cent. (See the

“American Almanac,” 1832, p. 162) But the population of Russia, which

increases more rapidly than that of any other European country, only

augments in ten years at the rate of 9.5 per cent.; in France, at the

rate of seven per cent.; and in Europe in general, at the rate of 4.7

per cent. (See “Malte Brun,” vol. vi. p. 95)]

[ It must be admitted, however, that the depreciation which has taken

place in the value of tobacco, during the last fifty years, has notably

diminished the opulence of the Southern planters: but this circumstance

is as independent of the will of their Northern brethren as it is of

their own.]

Thus the prosperity of the United States is the source of the most

serious dangers that threaten them, since it tends to create in some of

the confederate States that over-excitement which accompanies a rapid

increase of fortune; and to awaken in others those feelings of envy,

mistrust, and regret which usually attend upon the loss of it. The

Americans contemplate this extraordinary and hasty progress with

exultation; but they would be wiser to consider it with sorrow and

alarm. The Americans of the United States must inevitably become one of

the greatest nations in the world; their offset will cover almost the

whole of North America; the continent which they inhabit is their

dominion, and it cannot escape them. What urges them to take possession

of it so soon? Riches, power, and renown cannot fail to be theirs at

some future time, but they rush upon their fortune as if but a moment

remained for them to make it their own.

I think that I have demonstrated that the existence of the present

confederation depends entirely on the continued assent of all the

confederates; and, starting from this principle, I have inquired into

the causes which may induce the several States to separate from the

others. The Union may, however, perish in two different ways: one of

the confederate States may choose to retire from the compact, and so

forcibly to sever the federal tie; and it is to this supposition that

most of the remarks that I have made apply: or the authority of the

Federal Government may be progressively entrenched on by the

simultaneous tendency of the united republics to resume their

independence. The central power, successively stripped of all its

prerogatives, and reduced to impotence by tacit consent, would become

incompetent to fulfil its purpose; and the second Union would perish,

like the first, by a sort of senile inaptitude. The gradual weakening

of the federal tie, which may finally lead to the dissolution of the

Union, is a distinct circumstance, that may produce a variety of minor

consequences before it operates so violent a change. The confederation

might still subsist, although its Government were reduced to such a

degree of inanition as to paralyze the nation, to cause internal

anarchy, and to check the general prosperity of the country.

After having investigated the causes which may induce the

Anglo-Americans to disunite, it is important to inquire whether, if the

Union continues to subsist, their Government will extend or contract

its sphere of action, and whether it will become more energetic or more

weak.

The Americans are evidently disposed to look upon their future

condition with alarm. They perceive that in most of the nations of the

world the exercise of the rights of sovereignty tends to fall under the

control of a few individuals, and they are dismayed by the idea that

such will also be the case in their own country. Even the statesmen

feel, or affect to feel, these fears; for, in America, centralization

is by no means popular, and there is no surer means of courting the

majority than by inveighing against the encroachments of the central

power. The Americans do not perceive that the countries in which this

alarming tendency to centralization exists are inhabited by a single

people; whilst the fact of the Union being composed of different

confederate communities is sufficient to baffle all the inferences

which might be drawn from analogous circumstances. I confess that I am

inclined to consider the fears of a great number of Americans as purely

imaginary; and far from participating in their dread of the

consolidation of power in the hands of the Union, I think that the

Federal Government is visibly losing strength.

To prove this assertion I shall not have recourse to any remote

occurrences, but to circumstances which I have myself witnessed, and

which belong to our own time.

An attentive examination of what is going on in the United States will

easily convince us that two opposite tendencies exist in that country,

like two distinct currents flowing in contrary directions in the same

channel. The Union has now existed for forty-five years, and in the

course of that time a vast number of provincial prejudices, which were

at first hostile to its power, have died away. The patriotic feeling

which attached each of the Americans to his own native State is become

less exclusive; and the different parts of the Union have become more

intimately connected the better they have become acquainted with each

other. The post, *t that great instrument of intellectual intercourse,

now reaches into the backwoods; and steamboats have established daily

means of communication between the different points of the coast. An

inland navigation of unexampled rapidity conveys commodities up and

down the rivers of the country. *u And to these facilities of nature

and art may be added those restless cravings, that busy-mindedness, and

love of pelf, which are constantly urging the American into active

life, and bringing him into contact with his fellow-citizens. He

crosses the country in every direction; he visits all the various

populations of the land; and there is not a province in France in which

the natives are so well known to each other as the 13,000,000 of men

who cover the territory of the United States.

[ In 1832, the district of Michigan, which only contains 31,639

inhabitants, and is still an almost unexplored wilderness, possessed

940 miles of mail-roads. The territory of Arkansas, which is still more

uncultivated, was already intersected by 1,938 miles of mail-roads.

(See the report of the General Post Office, November 30, 1833.) The

postage of newspapers alone in the whole Union amounted to $254,796.]

[ In the course of ten years, from 1821 to 1831, 271 steamboats have

been launched upon the rivers which water the valley of the Mississippi

alone. In 1829 259 steamboats existed in the United States. (See

Legislative Documents, No. 140, p. 274.)]

But whilst the Americans intermingle, they grow in resemblance of each

other; the differences resulting from their climate, their origin, and

their institutions, diminish; and they all draw nearer and nearer to

the common type. Every year, thousands of men leave the North to settle

in different parts of the Union: they bring with them their faith,

their opinions, and their manners; and as they are more enlighthned

than the men amongst whom they are about to dwell, they soon rise to

the head of affairs, and they adapt society to their own advantage.

This continual emigration of the North to the South is peculiarly

favorable to the fusion of all the different provincial characters into

one national character. The civilization of the North appears to be the

common standard, to which the whole nation will one day be assimilated.

The commercial ties which unite the confederate States are strengthened

by the increasing manufactures of the Americans; and the union which

began to exist in their opinions, gradually forms a part of their

habits: the course of time has swept away the bugbear thoughts which

haunted the imaginations of the citizens in 1789. The federal power is

not become oppressive; it has not destroyed the independence of the

States; it has not subjected the confederates to monarchial

institutions; and the Union has not rendered the lesser States

dependent upon the larger ones; but the confederation has continued to

increase in population, in wealth, and in power. I am therefore

convinced that the natural obstacles to the continuance of the American

Union are not so powerful at the present time as they were in 1789; and

that the enemies of the Union are not so numerous.

Nevertheless, a careful examination of the history of the United States

for the last forty-five years will readily convince us that the federal

power is declining; nor is it difficult to explain the causes of this

phenomenon. *v When the Constitution of 1789 was promulgated, the

nation was a prey to anarchy; the Union, which succeeded this

confusion, excited much dread and much animosity; but it was warmly

supported because it satisfied an imperious want. Thus, although it was

more attacked than it is now, the federal power soon reached the

maximum of its authority, as is usually the case with a government

which triumphs after having braced its strength by the struggle. At

that time the interpretation of the Constitution seemed to extend,

rather than to repress, the federal sovereignty; and the Union offered,

in several respects, the appearance of a single and undivided people,

directed in its foreign and internal policy by a single Government. But

to attain this point the people had risen, to a certain extent, above

itself.

[ [Since 1861 the movement is certainly in the opposite direction, and

the federal power has largely increased, and tends to further

increase.]]

The Constitution had not destroyed the distinct sovereignty of the

States; and all communities, of whatever nature they may be, are

impelled by a secret propensity to assert their independence. This

propensity is still more decided in a country like America, in which

every village forms a sort of republic accustomed to conduct its own

affairs. It therefore cost the States an effort to submit to the

federal supremacy; and all efforts, however successful they may be,

necessarily subside with the causes in which they originated.

As the Federal Government consolidated its authority, America resumed

its rank amongst the nations, peace returned to its frontiers, and

public credit was restored; confusion was succeeded by a fixed state of

things, which was favorable to the full and free exercise of

industrious enterprise. It was this very prosperity which made the

Americans forget the cause to which it was attributable; and when once

the danger was passed, the energy and the patriotism which had enabled

them to brave it disappeared from amongst them. No sooner were they

delivered from the cares which oppressed them, than they easily

returned to their ordinary habits, and gave themselves up without

resistance to their natural inclinations. When a powerful Government no

longer appeared to be necessary, they once more began to think it

irksome. The Union encouraged a general prosperity, and the States were

not inclined to abandon the Union; but they desired to render the

action of the power which represented that body as light as possible.

The general principle of Union was adopted, but in every minor detail

there was an actual tendency to independence. The principle of

confederation was every day more easily admitted, and more rarely

applied; so that the Federal Government brought about its own decline,

whilst it was creating order and peace.

As soon as this tendency of public opinion began to be manifested

externally, the leaders of parties, who live by the passions of the

people, began to work it to their own advantage. The position of the

Federal Government then became exceedingly critical. Its enemies were

in possession of the popular favor; and they obtained the right of

conducting its policy by pledging themselves to lessen its influence.

From that time forwards the Government of the Union has invariably been

obliged to recede, as often as it has attempted to enter the lists with

the governments of the States. And whenever an interpretation of the

terms of the Federal Constitution has been called for, that

interpretation has most frequently been opposed to the Union, and

favorable to the States.

The Constitution invested the Federal Government with the right of

providing for the interests of the nation; and it had been held that no

other authority was so fit to superintend the “internal improvements”

which affected the prosperity of the whole Union; such, for instance,

as the cutting of canals. But the States were alarmed at a power,

distinct from their own, which could thus dispose of a portion of their

territory; and they were afraid that the central Government would, by

this means, acquire a formidable extent of patronage within their own

confines, and exercise a degree of influence which they intended to

reserve exclusively to their own agents. The Democratic party, which

has constantly been opposed to the increase of the federal authority,

then accused the Congress of usurpation, and the Chief Magistrate of

ambition. The central Government was intimidated by the opposition; and

it soon acknowledged its error, promising exactly to confine its

influence for the future within the circle which was prescribed to it.

The Constitution confers upon the Union the right of treating with

foreign nations. The Indian tribes, which border upon the frontiers of

the United States, had usually been regarded in this light. As long as

these savages consented to retire before the civilized settlers, the

federal right was not contested: but as soon as an Indian tribe

attempted to fix its dwelling upon a given spot, the adjacent States

claimed possession of the lands and the rights of sovereignty over the

natives. The central Government soon recognized both these claims; and

after it had concluded treaties with the Indians as independent

nations, it gave them up as subjects to the legislative tyranny of the

States. *w

[ See in the Legislative Documents, already quoted in speaking of the

Indians, the letter of the President of the United States to the

Cherokees, his correspondence on this subject with his agents, and his

messages to Congress.]

Some of the States which had been founded upon the coast of the

Atlantic, extended indefinitely to the West, into wild regions where no

European had ever penetrated. The States whose confines were

irrevocably fixed, looked with a jealous eye upon the unbounded regions

which the future would enable their neighbors to explore. The latter

then agreed, with a view to conciliate the others, and to facilitate

the act of union, to lay down their own boundaries, and to abandon all

the territory which lay beyond those limits to the confederation at

large. *x Thenceforward the Federal Government became the owner of all

the uncultivated lands which lie beyond the borders of the thirteen

States first confederated. It was invested with the right of parcelling

and selling them, and the sums derived from this source were

exclusively reserved to the public treasure of the Union, in order to

furnish supplies for purchasing tracts of country from the Indians, for

opening roads to the remote settlements, and for accelerating the

increase of civilization as much as possible. New States have, however,

been formed in the course of time, in the midst of those wilds which

were formerly ceded by the inhabitants of the shores of the Atlantic.

Congress has gone on to sell, for the profit of the nation at large,

the uncultivated lands which those new States contained. But the latter

at length asserted that, as they were now fully constituted, they ought

to enjoy the exclusive right of converting the produce of these sales

to their own use. As their remonstrances became more and more

threatening, Congress thought fit to deprive the Union of a portion of

the privileges which it had hitherto enjoyed; and at the end of 1832 it

passed a law by which the greatest part of the revenue derived from the

sale of lands was made over to the new western republics, although the

lands themselves were not ceded to them. *y

[ The first act of session was made by the State of New York in 1780;

Virginia, Massachusetts, Connecticut, South and North Carolina,

followed this example at different times, and lastly, the act of

cession of Georgia was made as recently as 1802.]

[ It is true that the President refused his assent to this law; but he

completely adopted it in principle. (See Message of December 8, 1833.)]

The slightest observation in the United States enables one to

appreciate the advantages which the country derives from the bank.

These advantages are of several kinds, but one of them is peculiarly

striking to the stranger. The banknotes of the United States are taken

upon the borders of the desert for the same value as at Philadelphia,

where the bank conducts its operations. *z

[ The present Bank of the United States was established in 1816, with a

capital of $35,000,000; its charter expires in 1836. Last year Congress

passed a law to renew it, but the President put his veto upon the bill.

The struggle is still going on with great violence on either side, and

the speedy fall of the bank may easily be foreseen. [It was soon

afterwards extinguished by General Jackson.]]

The Bank of the United States is nevertheless the object of great

animosity. Its directors have proclaimed their hostility to the

President: and they are accused, not without some show of probability,

of having abused their influence to thwart his election. The President

therefore attacks the establishment which they represent with all the

warmth of personal enmity; and he is encouraged in the pursuit of his

revenge by the conviction that he is supported by the secret

propensities of the majority. The bank may be regarded as the great

monetary tie of the Union, just as Congress is the great legislative

tie; and the same passions which tend to render the States independent

of the central power, contribute to the overthrow of the bank.

The Bank of the United States always holds a great number of the notes

issued by the provincial banks, which it can at any time oblige them to

convert into cash. It has itself nothing to fear from a similar demand,

as the extent of its resources enables it to meet all claims. But the

existence of the provincial banks is thus threatened, and their

operations are restricted, since they are only able to issue a quantity

of notes duly proportioned to their capital. They submit with

impatience to this salutary control. The newspapers which they have

bought over, and the President, whose interest renders him their

instrument, attack the bank with the greatest vehemence. They rouse the

local passions and the blind democratic instinct of the country to aid

their cause; and they assert that the bank directors form a permanent

aristocratic body, whose influence must ultimately be felt in the

Government, and must affect those principles of equality upon which

society rests in America.

The contest between the bank and its opponents is only an incident in

the great struggle which is going on in America between the provinces

and the central power; between the spirit of democratic independence

and the spirit of gradation and subordination. I do not mean that the

enemies of the bank are identically the same individuals who, on other

points, attack the Federal Government; but I assert that the attacks

directed against the bank of the United States originate in the same

propensities which militate against the Federal Government; and that

the very numerous opponents of the former afford a deplorable symptom

of the decreasing support of the latter.

The Union has never displayed so much weakness as in the celebrated

question of the tariff. *a The wars of the French Revolution and of

1812 had created manufacturing establishments in the North of the

Union, by cutting off all free communication between America and

Europe. When peace was concluded, and the channel of intercourse

reopened by which the produce of Europe was transmitted to the New

World, the Americans thought fit to establish a system of import

duties, for the twofold purpose of protecting their incipient

manufactures and of paying off the amount of the debt contracted during

the war. The Southern States, which have no manufactures to encourage,

and which are exclusively agricultural, soon complained of this

measure. Such were the simple facts, and I do not pretend to examine in

this place whether their complaints were well founded or unjust.

[ See principally for the details of this affair, the Legislative

Documents, 22d Congress, 2d Session, No. 30.]

As early as the year 1820, South Carolina declared, in a petition to

Congress, that the tariff was “unconstitutional, oppressive, and

unjust.” And the States of Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama,

and Mississippi subsequently remonstrated against it with more or less

vigor. But Congress, far from lending an ear to these complaints,

raised the scale of tariff duties in the years 1824 and 1828, and

recognized anew the principle on which it was founded. A doctrine was

then proclaimed, or rather revived, in the South, which took the name

of Nullification.

I have shown in the proper place that the object of the Federal

Constitution was not to form a league, but to create a national

government. The Americans of the United States form a sole and

undivided people, in all the cases which are specified by that

Constitution; and upon these points the will of the nation is

expressed, as it is in all constitutional nations, by the voice of the

majority. When the majority has pronounced its decision, it is the duty

of the minority to submit. Such is the sound legal doctrine, and the

only one which agrees with the text of the Constitution, and the known

intention of those who framed it.

The partisans of Nullification in the South maintain, on the contrary,

that the intention of the Americans in uniting was not to reduce

themselves to the condition of one and the same people; that they meant

to constitute a league of independent States; and that each State,

consequently retains its entire sovereignty, if not de facto, at least

de jure; and has the right of putting its own construction upon the

laws of Congress, and of suspending their execution within the limits

of its own territory, if they are held to be unconstitutional and

unjust.

The entire doctrine of Nullification is comprised in a sentence uttered

by Vice-President Calhoun, the head of that party in the South, before

the Senate of the United States, in the year 1833: “The Constitution is

a compact to which the States were parties in their sovereign capacity;

now, whenever a compact is entered into by parties which acknowledge no

tribunal above their authority to decide in the last resort, each of

them has a right to judge for itself in relation to the nature, extent,

and obligations of the instrument.” It is evident that a similar

doctrine destroys the very basis of the Federal Constitution, and brings

back all the evils of the old confederation, from which the Americans

were supposed to have had a safe deliverance.

When South Carolina perceived that Congress turned a deaf ear to its

remonstrances, it threatened to apply the doctrine of nullification to

the federal tariff bill. Congress persisted in its former system; and

at length the storm broke out. In the course of 1832 the citizens of

South Carolina, *b named a national Convention, to consult upon the

extraordinary measures which they were called upon to take; and on

November 24th of the same year this Convention promulgated a law, under

the form of a decree, which annulled the federal law of the tariff,

forbade the levy of the imposts which that law commands, and refused to

recognize the appeal which might be made to the federal courts of law.

*c This decree was only to be put in execution in the ensuing month of

February, and it was intimated, that if Congress modified the tariff

before that period, South Carolina might be induced to proceed no

further with her menaces; and a vague desire was afterwards expressed

of submitting the question to an extraordinary assembly of all the

confederate States.

[ That is to say, the majority of the people; for the opposite party,

called the Union party, always formed a very strong and active

minority. Carolina may contain about 47,000 electors; 30,000 were in

favor of nullification, and 17,000 opposed to it.]

[ This decree was preceded by a report of the committee by which it was

framed, containing the explanation of the motives and object of the

law. The following passage occurs in it, p. 34:—“When the rights

reserved by the Constitution to the different States are deliberately

violated, it is the duty and the right of those States to interfere, in

order to check the progress of the evil; to resist usurpation, and to

maintain, within their respective limits, those powers and privileges

which belong to them as independent sovereign States. If they were

destitute of this right, they would not be sovereign. South Carolina

declares that she acknowledges no tribunal upon earth above her

authority. She has indeed entered into a solemn compact of union with

the other States; but she demands, and will exercise, the right of

putting her own construction upon it; and when this compact is violated

by her sister States, and by the Government which they have created,

she is determined to avail herself of the unquestionable right of

judging what is the extent of the infraction, and what are the measures

best fitted to obtain justice.”]

Chapter XVIII: Future Condition Of Three Races—Part IX

In the meantime South Carolina armed her militia, and prepared for war.

But Congress, which had slighted its suppliant subjects, listened to

their complaints as soon as they were found to have taken up arms. *d A

law was passed, by which the tariff duties were to be progressively

reduced for ten years, until they were brought so low as not to exceed

the amount of supplies necessary to the Government. *e Thus Congress

completely abandoned the principle of the tariff; and substituted a

mere fiscal impost to a system of protective duties. *f The Government

of the Union, in order to conceal its defeat, had recourse to an

expedient which is very much in vogue with feeble governments. It

yielded the point de facto, but it remained inflexible upon the

principles in question; and whilst Congress was altering the tariff

law, it passed another bill, by which the President was invested with

extraordinary powers, enabling him to overcome by force a resistance

which was then no longer to be apprehended.

[ Congress was finally decided to take this step by the conduct of the

powerful State of Virginia, whose legislature offered to serve as

mediator between the Union and South Carolina. Hitherto the latter

State had appeared to be entirely abandoned, even by the States which

had joined in her remonstrances.]

[ This law was passed on March 2, 1833.]

[ This bill was brought in by Mr. Clay, and it passed in four days

through both Houses of Congress by an immense majority.]

But South Carolina did not consent to leave the Union in the enjoyment

of these scanty trophies of success: the same national Convention which

had annulled the tariff bill, met again, and accepted the proffered

concession; but at the same time it declared its unabated perseverance

in the doctrine of Nullification: and to prove what it said, it

annulled the law investing the President with extraordinary powers,

although it was very certain that the clauses of that law would never

be carried into effect.

Almost all the controversies of which I have been speaking have taken

place under the Presidency of General Jackson; and it cannot be denied

that in the question of the tariff he has supported the claims of the

Union with vigor and with skill. I am, however, of opinion that the

conduct of the individual who now represents the Federal Government may

be reckoned as one of the dangers which threaten its continuance.

Some persons in Europe have formed an opinion of the possible influence

of General Jackson upon the affairs of his country, which appears

highly extravagant to those who have seen more of the subject. We have

been told that General Jackson has won sundry battles, that he is an

energetic man, prone by nature and by habit to the use of force,

covetous of power, and a despot by taste. All this may perhaps be true;

but the inferences which have been drawn from these truths are

exceedingly erroneous. It has been imagined that General Jackson is

bent on establishing a dictatorship in America, on introducing a

military spirit, and on giving a degree of influence to the central

authority which cannot but be dangerous to provincial liberties. But in

America the time for similar undertakings, and the age for men of this

kind, is not yet come: if General Jackson had entertained a hope of

exercising his authority in this manner, he would infallibly have

forfeited his political station, and compromised his life; accordingly

he has not been so imprudent as to make any such attempt.

Far from wishing to extend the federal power, the President belongs to

the party which is desirous of limiting that power to the bare and

precise letter of the Constitution, and which never puts a construction

upon that act favorable to the Government of the Union; far from

standing forth as the champion of centralization, General Jackson is

the agent of all the jealousies of the States; and he was placed in the

lofty station he occupies by the passions of the people which are most

opposed to the central Government. It is by perpetually flattering

these passions that he maintains his station and his popularity.

General Jackson is the slave of the majority: he yields to its wishes,

its propensities, and its demands; say rather, that he anticipates and

forestalls them.

Whenever the governments of the States come into collision with that of

the Union, the President is generally the first to question his own

rights: he almost always outstrips the legislature; and when the extent

of the federal power is controverted, he takes part, as it were,

against himself; he conceals his official interests, and extinguishes

his own natural inclinations. Not indeed that he is naturally weak or

hostile to the Union; for when the majority decided against the claims

of the partisans of nullification, he put himself at its head, asserted

the doctrines which the nation held distinctly and energetically, and

was the first to recommend forcible measures; but General Jackson

appears to me, if I may use the American expressions, to be a

Federalist by taste, and a Republican by calculation.

General Jackson stoops to gain the favor of the majority, but when he

feels that his popularity is secure, he overthrows all obstacles in the

pursuit of the objects which the community approves, or of those which

it does not look upon with a jealous eye. He is supported by a power

with which his predecessors were unacquainted; and he tramples on his

personal enemies whenever they cross his path with a facility which no

former President ever enjoyed; he takes upon himself the responsibility

of measures which no one before him would have ventured to attempt: he

even treats the national representatives with disdain approaching to

insult; he puts his veto upon the laws of Congress, and frequently

neglects to reply to that powerful body. He is a favorite who sometimes

treats his master roughly. The power of General Jackson perpetually

increases; but that of the President declines; in his hands the Federal

Government is strong, but it will pass enfeebled into the hands of his

successor.

I am strangely mistaken if the Federal Government of the United States

be not constantly losing strength, retiring gradually from public

affairs, and narrowing its circle of action more and more. It is

naturally feeble, but it now abandons even its pretensions to strength.

On the other hand, I thought that I remarked a more lively sense of

independence, and a more decided attachment to provincial government in

the States. The Union is to subsist, but to subsist as a shadow; it is

to be strong in certain cases, and weak in all others; in time of

warfare, it is to be able to concentrate all the forces of the nation

and all the resources of the country in its hands; and in time of peace

its existence is to be scarcely perceptible: as if this alternate

debility and vigor were natural or possible.

I do not foresee anything for the present which may be able to check

this general impulse of public opinion; the causes in which it

originated do not cease to operate with the same effect. The change

will therefore go on, and it may be predicted that, unless some

extraordinary event occurs, the Government of the Union will grow

weaker and weaker every day.

I think, however, that the period is still remote at which the federal

power will be entirely extinguished by its inability to protect itself

and to maintain peace in the country. The Union is sanctioned by the

manners and desires of the people; its results are palpable, its

benefits visible. When it is perceived that the weakness of the Federal

Government compromises the existence of the Union, I do not doubt that

a reaction will take place with a view to increase its strength.

The Government of the United States is, of all the federal governments

which have hitherto been established, the one which is most naturally

destined to act. As long as it is only indirectly assailed by the

interpretation of its laws, and as long as its substance is not

seriously altered, a change of opinion, an internal crisis, or a war,

may restore all the vigor which it requires. The point which I have

been most anxious to put in a clear light is simply this: Many people,

especially in France, imagine that a change in opinion is going on in

the United States, which is favorable to a centralization of power in

the hands of the President and the Congress. I hold that a contrary

tendency may distinctly be observed. So far is the Federal Government

from acquiring strength, and from threatening the sovereignty of the

States, as it grows older, that I maintain it to be growing weaker and

weaker, and that the sovereignty of the Union alone is in danger. Such

are the facts which the present time discloses. The future conceals the

final result of this tendency, and the events which may check, retard,

or accelerate the changes I have described; but I do not affect to be

able to remove the veil which hides them from our sight.

Of The Republican Institutions Of The United States, And What Their

Chances Of Duration Are

The Union is accidental—The Republican institutions have more prospect

of permanence—A republic for the present the natural state of the

Anglo-Americans—Reason of this—In order to destroy it, all the laws

must be changed at the same time, and a great alteration take place in

manners—Difficulties experienced by the Americans in creating an

aristocracy.

The dismemberment of the Union, by the introduction of war into the

heart of those States which are now confederate, with standing armies,

a dictatorship, and a heavy taxation, might, eventually, compromise the

fate of the republican institutions. But we ought not to confound the

future prospects of the republic with those of the Union. The Union is

an accident, which will only last as long as circumstances are

favorable to its existence; but a republican form of government seems

to me to be the natural state of the Americans; which nothing but the

continued action of hostile causes, always acting in the same

direction, could change into a monarchy. The Union exists principally

in the law which formed it; one revolution, one change in public

opinion, might destroy it forever; but the republic has a much deeper

foundation to rest upon.

What is understood by a republican government in the United States is

the slow and quiet action of society upon itself. It is a regular state

of things really founded upon the enlightened will of the people. It is

a conciliatory government under which resolutions are allowed time to

ripen; and in which they are deliberately discussed, and executed with

mature judgment. The republicans in the United States set a high value

upon morality, respect religious belief, and acknowledge the existence

of rights. They profess to think that a people ought to be moral,

religious, and temperate, in proportion as it is free. What is called

the republic in the United States, is the tranquil rule of the

majority, which, after having had time to examine itself, and to give

proof of its existence, is the common source of all the powers of the

State. But the power of the majority is not of itself unlimited. In the

moral world humanity, justice, and reason enjoy an undisputed

supremacy; in the political world vested rights are treated with no

less deference. The majority recognizes these two barriers; and if it

now and then overstep them, it is because, like individuals, it has

passions, and, like them, it is prone to do what is wrong, whilst it

discerns what is right.

But the demagogues of Europe have made strange discoveries. A republic

is not, according to them, the rule of the majority, as has hitherto

been thought, but the rule of those who are strenuous partisans of the

majority. It is not the people who preponderates in this kind of

government, but those who are best versed in the good qualities of the

people. A happy distinction, which allows men to act in the name of

nations without consulting them, and to claim their gratitude whilst

their rights are spurned. A republican government, moreover, is the

only one which claims the right of doing whatever it chooses, and

despising what men have hitherto respected, from the highest moral

obligations to the vulgar rules of common-sense. It had been supposed,

until our time, that despotism was odious, under whatever form it

appeared. But it is a discovery of modern days that there are such

things as legitimate tyranny and holy injustice, provided they are

exercised in the name of the people.

The ideas which the Americans have adopted respecting the republican

form of government, render it easy for them to live under it, and

insure its duration. If, in their country, this form be often

practically bad, at least it is theoretically good; and, in the end,

the people always acts in conformity to it.

It was impossible at the foundation of the States, and it would still

be difficult, to establish a central administration in America. The

inhabitants are dispersed over too great a space, and separated by too

many natural obstacles, for one man to undertake to direct the details

of their existence. America is therefore pre-eminently the country of

provincial and municipal government. To this cause, which was plainly

felt by all the Europeans of the New World, the Anglo-Americans added

several others peculiar to themselves.

At the time of the settlement of the North American colonies, municipal

liberty had already penetrated into the laws as well as the manners of

the English; and the emigrants adopted it, not only as a necessary

thing, but as a benefit which they knew how to appreciate. We have

already seen the manner in which the colonies were founded: every

province, and almost every district, was peopled separately by men who

were strangers to each other, or who associated with very different

purposes. The English settlers in the United States, therefore, early

perceived that they were divided into a great number of small and

distinct communities which belonged to no common centre; and that it

was needful for each of these little communities to take care of its

own affairs, since there did not appear to be any central authority

which was naturally bound and easily enabled to provide for them. Thus,

the nature of the country, the manner in which the British colonies

were founded, the habits of the first emigrants, in short everything,

united to promote, in an extraordinary degree, municipal and provincial

liberties.

In the United States, therefore, the mass of the institutions of the

country is essentially republican; and in order permanently to destroy

the laws which form the basis of the republic, it would be necessary to

abolish all the laws at once. At the present day it would be even more

difficult for a party to succeed in founding a monarchy in the United

States than for a set of men to proclaim that France should

henceforward be a republic. Royalty would not find a system of

legislation prepared for it beforehand; and a monarchy would then

exist, really surrounded by republican institutions. The monarchical

principle would likewise have great difficulty in penetrating into the

manners of the Americans.

In the United States, the sovereignty of the people is not an isolated

doctrine bearing no relation to the prevailing manners and ideas of the

people: it may, on the contrary, be regarded as the last link of a

chain of opinions which binds the whole Anglo-American world. That

Providence has given to every human being the degree of reason

necessary to direct himself in the affairs which interest him

exclusively—such is the grand maxim upon which civil and political

society rests in the United States. The father of a family applies it

to his children; the master to his servants; the township to its

officers; the province to its townships; the State to its provinces;

the Union to the States; and when extended to the nation, it becomes

the doctrine of the sovereignty of the people.

Thus, in the United States, the fundamental principle of the republic

is the same which governs the greater part of human actions; republican

notions insinuate themselves into all the ideas, opinions, and habits

of the Americans, whilst they are formerly recognized by the

legislation: and before this legislation can be altered the whole

community must undergo very serious changes. In the United States, even

the religion of most of the citizens is republican, since it submits

the truths of the other world to private judgment: as in politics the

care of its temporal interests is abandoned to the good sense of the

people. Thus every man is allowed freely to take that road which he

thinks will lead him to heaven; just as the law permits every citizen

to have the right of choosing his government.

It is evident that nothing but a long series of events, all having the

same tendency, can substitute for this combination of laws, opinions,

and manners, a mass of opposite opinions, manners, and laws.

If republican principles are to perish in America, they can only yield

after a laborious social process, often interrupted, and as often

resumed; they will have many apparent revivals, and will not become

totally extinct until an entirely new people shall have succeeded to

that which now exists. Now, it must be admitted that there is no

symptom or presage of the approach of such a revolution. There is

nothing more striking to a person newly arrived in the United States,

than the kind of tumultuous agitation in which he finds political

society. The laws are incessantly changing, and at first sight it seems

impossible that a people so variable in its desires should avoid

adopting, within a short space of time, a completely new form of

government. Such apprehensions are, however, premature; the instability

which affects political institutions is of two kinds, which ought not

to be confounded: the first, which modifies secondary laws, is not

incompatible with a very settled state of society; the other shakes the

very foundations of the Constitution, and attacks the fundamental

principles of legislation; this species of instability is always

followed by troubles and revolutions, and the nation which suffers

under it is in a state of violent transition.

Experience shows that these two kinds of legislative instability have

no necessary connection; for they have been found united or separate,

according to times and circumstances. The first is common in the United

States, but not the second: the Americans often change their laws, but

the foundation of the Constitution is respected.

In our days the republican principle rules in America, as the

monarchical principle did in France under Louis XIV. The French of that

period were not only friends of the monarchy, but they thought it

impossible to put anything in its place; they received it as we receive

the rays of the sun and the return of the seasons. Amongst them the

royal power had neither advocates nor opponents. In like manner does

the republican government exist in America, without contention or

opposition; without proofs and arguments, by a tacit agreement, a sort

of consensus universalis. It is, however, my opinion that by changing

their administrative forms as often as they do, the inhabitants of the

United States compromise the future stability of their government.

It may be apprehended that men, perpetually thwarted in their designs

by the mutability of the legislation, will learn to look upon

republican institutions as an inconvenient form of society; the evil

resulting from the instability of the secondary enactments might then

raise a doubt as to the nature of the fundamental principles of the

Constitution, and indirectly bring about a revolution; but this epoch

is still very remote.

It may, however, be foreseen even now, that when the Americans lose

their republican institutions they will speedily arrive at a despotic

government, without a long interval of limited monarchy. Montesquieu

remarked, that nothing is more absolute than the authority of a prince

who immediately succeeds a republic, since the powers which had

fearlessly been intrusted to an elected magistrate are then transferred

to a hereditary sovereign. This is true in general, but it is more

peculiarly applicable to a democratic republic. In the United States,

the magistrates are not elected by a particular class of citizens, but

by the majority of the nation; they are the immediate representatives

of the passions of the multitude; and as they are wholly dependent upon

its pleasure, they excite neither hatred nor fear: hence, as I have

already shown, very little care has been taken to limit their

influence, and they are left in possession of a vast deal of arbitrary

power. This state of things has engendered habits which would outlive

itself; the American magistrate would retain his power, but he would

cease to be responsible for the exercise of it; and it is impossible to

say what bounds could then be set to tyranny.

Some of our European politicians expect to see an aristocracy arise in

America, and they already predict the exact period at which it will be

able to assume the reins of government. I have previously observed, and

I repeat my assertion, that the present tendency of American society

appears to me to become more and more democratic. Nevertheless, I do

not assert that the Americans will not, at some future time, restrict

the circle of political rights in their country, or confiscate those

rights to the advantage of a single individual; but I cannot imagine

that they will ever bestow the exclusive exercise of them upon a

privileged class of citizens, or, in other words, that they will ever

found an aristocracy.

An aristocratic body is composed of a certain number of citizens who,

without being very far removed from the mass of the people, are,

nevertheless, permanently stationed above it: a body which it is easy

to touch and difficult to strike; with which the people are in daily

contact, but with which they can never combine. Nothing can be imagined

more contrary to nature and to the secret propensities of the human

heart than a subjection of this kind; and men who are left to follow

their own bent will always prefer the arbitrary power of a king to the

regular administration of an aristocracy. Aristocratic institutions

cannot subsist without laying down the inequality of men as a

fundamental principle, as a part and parcel of the legislation,

affecting the condition of the human family as much as it affects that

of society; but these are things so repugnant to natural equity that

they can only be extorted from men by constraint.

I do not think a single people can be quoted, since human society began

to exist, which has, by its own free will and by its own exertions,

created an aristocracy within its own bosom. All the aristocracies of

the Middle Ages were founded by military conquest; the conqueror was

the noble, the vanquished became the serf. Inequality was then imposed

by force; and after it had been introduced into the manners of the

country it maintained its own authority, and was sanctioned by the

legislation. Communities have existed which were aristocratic from

their earliest origin, owing to circumstances anterior to that event,

and which became more democratic in each succeeding age. Such was the

destiny of the Romans, and of the barbarians after them. But a people,

having taken its rise in civilization and democracy, which should

gradually establish an inequality of conditions, until it arrived at

inviolable privileges and exclusive castes, would be a novelty in the

world; and nothing intimates that America is likely to furnish so

singular an example.

Reflection On The Causes Of The Commercial Prosperity Of The Of The

United States

The Americans destined by Nature to be a great maritime people—Extent

of their coasts—Depth of their ports—Size of their rivers—The

commercial superiority of the Anglo-Americans less attributable,

however, to physical circumstances than to moral and intellectual

causes—Reason of this opinion—Future destiny of the Anglo-Americans as

a commercial nation—The dissolution of the Union would not check the

maritime vigor of the States—Reason of this—Anglo-Americans will

naturally supply the wants of the inhabitants of South America—They

will become, like the English, the factors of a great portion of the

world.

The coast of the United States, from the Bay of Fundy to the Sabine

River in the Gulf of Mexico, is more than two thousand miles in extent.

These shores form an unbroken line, and they are all subject to the

same government. No nation in the world possesses vaster, deeper, or

more secure ports for shipping than the Americans.

The inhabitants of the United States constitute a great civilized

people, which fortune has placed in the midst of an uncultivated

country at a distance of three thousand miles from the central point of

civilization. America consequently stands in daily need of European

trade. The Americans will, no doubt, ultimately succeed in producing or

manufacturing at home most of the articles which they require; but the

two continents can never be independent of each other, so numerous are

the natural ties which exist between their wants, their ideas, their

habits, and their manners.

The Union produces peculiar commodities which are now become necessary

to us, but which cannot be cultivated, or can only be raised at an

enormous expense, upon the soil of Europe. The Americans only consume a

small portion of this produce, and they are willing to sell us the

rest. Europe is therefore the market of America, as America is the

market of Europe; and maritime commerce is no less necessary to enable

the inhabitants of the United States to transport their raw materials

to the ports of Europe, than it is to enable us to supply them with our

manufactured produce. The United States were therefore necessarily

reduced to the alternative of increasing the business of other maritime

nations to a great extent, if they had themselves declined to enter

into commerce, as the Spaniards of Mexico have hitherto done; or, in

the second place, of becoming one of the first trading powers of the

globe.

The Anglo-Americans have always displayed a very decided taste for the

sea. The Declaration of Independence broke the commercial restrictions

which united them to England, and gave a fresh and powerful stimulus to

their maritime genius. Ever since that time, the shipping of the Union

has increased in almost the same rapid proportion as the number of its

inhabitants. The Americans themselves now transport to their own shores

nine-tenths of the European produce which they consume. *g And they

also bring three-quarters of the exports of the New World to the

European consumer. *h The ships of the United States fill the docks of

Havre and of Liverpool; whilst the number of English and French vessels

which are to be seen at New York is comparatively small. *i

[ The total value of goods imported during the year which ended on

September 30, 1832, was $101,129,266. The value of the cargoes of

foreign vessels did not amount to $10,731,039, or about one-tenth of

the entire sum.]

[ The value of goods exported during the same year amounted to

$87,176,943; the value of goods exported by foreign vessels amounted to

$21,036,183, or about one quarter of the whole sum. (Williams’s

“Register,” 1833, p. 398.)]

[ The tonnage of the vessels which entered all the ports of the Union

in the years 1829, 1830, and 1831, amounted to 3,307,719 tons, of which

544,571 tons were foreign vessels; they stood, therefore, to the

American vessels in a ratio of about 16 to 100. (“National Calendar,”

1833, p. 304.) The tonnage of the English vessels which entered the

ports of London, Liverpool, and Hull, in the years 1820, 1826, and

1831, amounted to 443,800 tons. The foreign vessels which entered the

same ports during the same years amounted to 159,431 tons. The ratio

between them was, therefore, about 36 to 100. (“Companion to the

Almanac,” 1834, p. 169.) In the year 1832 the ratio between the foreign

and British ships which entered the ports of Great Britain was 29 to

100. [These statements relate to a condition of affairs which has

ceased to exist; the Civil War and the heavy taxation of the United

States entirely altered the trade and navigation of the country.]]

Thus, not only does the American merchant face the competition of his

own countrymen, but he even supports that of foreign nations in their

own ports with success. This is readily explained by the fact that the

vessels of the United States can cross the seas at a cheaper rate than

any other vessels in the world. As long as the mercantile shipping of

the United States preserves this superiority, it will not only retain

what it has acquired, but it will constantly increase in prosperity.

Chapter XVIII: Future Condition Of Three Races—Part X

It is difficult to say for what reason the Americans can trade at a

lower rate than other nations; and one is at first led to attribute

this circumstance to the physical or natural advantages which are

within their reach; but this supposition is erroneous. The American

vessels cost almost as much to build as our own; *j they are not better

built, and they generally last for a shorter time. The pay of the

American sailor is more considerable than the pay on board European

ships; which is proved by the great number of Europeans who are to be

met with in the merchant vessels of the United States. But I am of

opinion that the true cause of their superiority must not be sought for

in physical advantages, but that it is wholly attributable to their

moral and intellectual qualities.

[ Materials are, generally speaking, less expensive in America than in

Europe, but the price of labor is much higher.]

The following comparison will illustrate my meaning. During the

campaigns of the Revolution the French introduced a new system of

tactics into the art of war, which perplexed the oldest generals, and

very nearly destroyed the most ancient monarchies in Europe. They

undertook (what had never before been attempted) to make shift without

a number of things which had always been held to be indispensable in

warfare; they required novel exertions on the part of their troops

which no civilized nations had ever thought of; they achieved great

actions in an incredibly short space of time; and they risked human

life without hesitation to obtain the object in view. The French had

less money and fewer men than their enemies; their resources were

infinitely inferior; nevertheless they were constantly victorious,

until their adversaries chose to imitate their example.

The Americans have introduced a similar system into their commercial

speculations; and they do for cheapness what the French did for

conquest. The European sailor navigates with prudence; he only sets

sail when the weather is favorable; if an unforseen accident befalls

him, he puts into port; at night he furls a portion of his canvas; and

when the whitening billows intimate the vicinity of land, he checks his

way, and takes an observation of the sun. But the American neglects

these precautions and braves these dangers. He weighs anchor in the

midst of tempestuous gales; by night and by day he spreads his sheets

to the wind; he repairs as he goes along such damage as his vessel may

have sustained from the storm; and when he at last approaches the term

of his voyage, he darts onward to the shore as if he already descried a

port. The Americans are often shipwrecked, but no trader crosses the

seas so rapidly. And as they perform the same distance in a shorter

time, they can perform it at a cheaper rate.

The European touches several times at different ports in the course of

a long voyage; he loses a good deal of precious time in making the

harbor, or in waiting for a favorable wind to leave it; and he pays

daily dues to be allowed to remain there. The American starts from

Boston to go to purchase tea in China; he arrives at Canton, stays

there a few days, and then returns. In less than two years he has

sailed as far as the entire circumference of the globe, and he has seen

land but once. It is true that during a voyage of eight or ten months

he has drunk brackish water and lived upon salt meat; that he has been

in a continual contest with the sea, with disease, and with a tedious

existence; but upon his return he can sell a pound of his tea for a

half-penny less than the English merchant, and his purpose is

accomplished.

I cannot better explain my meaning than by saying that the Americans

affect a sort of heroism in their manner of trading. But the European

merchant will always find it very difficult to imitate his American

competitor, who, in adopting the system which I have just described,

follows not only a calculation of his gain, but an impulse of his

nature.

The inhabitants of the United States are subject to all the wants and

all the desires which result from an advanced stage of civilization;

but as they are not surrounded by a community admirably adapted, like

that of Europe, to satisfy their wants, they are often obliged to

procure for themselves the various articles which education and habit

have rendered necessaries. In America it sometimes happens that the

same individual tills his field, builds his dwelling, contrives his

tools, makes his shoes, and weaves the coarse stuff of which his dress

is composed. This circumstance is prejudicial to the excellence of the

work; but it powerfully contributes to awaken the intelligence of the

workman. Nothing tends to materialize man, and to deprive his work of

the faintest trace of mind, more than extreme division of labor. In a

country like America, where men devoted to special occupations are

rare, a long apprenticeship cannot be required from anyone who embraces

a profession. The Americans, therefore, change their means of gaining a

livelihood very readily; and they suit their occupations to the

exigencies of the moment, in the manner most profitable to themselves.

Men are to be met with who have successively been barristers, farmers,

merchants, ministers of the gospel, and physicians. If the American be

less perfect in each craft than the European, at least there is

scarcely any trade with which he is utterly unacquainted. His capacity

is more general, and the circle of his intelligence is enlarged.

The inhabitants of the United States are never fettered by the axioms

of their profession; they escape from all the prejudices of their

present station; they are not more attached to one line of operation

than to another; they are not more prone to employ an old method than a

new one; they have no rooted habits, and they easily shake off the

influence which the habits of other nations might exercise upon their

minds from a conviction that their country is unlike any other, and

that its situation is without a precedent in the world. America is a

land of wonders, in which everything is in constant motion, and every

movement seems an improvement. The idea of novelty is there

indissolubly connected with the idea of amelioration. No natural

boundary seems to be set to the efforts of man; and what is not yet

done is only what he has not yet attempted to do.

This perpetual change which goes on in the United States, these

frequent vicissitudes of fortune, accompanied by such unforeseen

fluctuations in private and in public wealth, serve to keep the minds

of the citizens in a perpetual state of feverish agitation, which

admirably invigorates their exertions, and keeps them in a state of

excitement above the ordinary level of mankind. The whole life of an

American is passed like a game of chance, a revolutionary crisis, or a

battle. As the same causes are continually in operation throughout the

country, they ultimately impart an irresistible impulse to the national

character. The American, taken as a chance specimen of his countrymen,

must then be a man of singular warmth in his desires, enterprising,

fond of adventure, and, above all, of innovation. The same bent is

manifest in all that he does; he introduces it into his political laws,

his religious doctrines, his theories of social economy, and his

domestic occupations; he bears it with him in the depths of the

backwoods, as well as in the business of the city. It is this same

passion, applied to maritime commerce, which makes him the cheapest and

the quickest trader in the world.

As long as the sailors of the United States retain these inspiriting

advantages, and the practical superiority which they derive from them,

they will not only continue to supply the wants of the producers and

consumers of their own country, but they will tend more and more to

become, like the English, the factors of all other peoples. *k This

prediction has already begun to be realized; we perceive that the

American traders are introducing themselves as intermediate agents in

the commerce of several European nations; *l and America will offer a

still wider field to their enterprise.

[ It must not be supposed that English vessels are exclusively employed

in transporting foreign produce into England, or British produce to

foreign countries; at the present day the merchant shipping of England

may be regarded in the light of a vast system of public conveyances,

ready to serve all the producers of the world, and to open

communications between all peoples. The maritime genius of the

Americans prompts them to enter into competition with the English.]

[ Part of the commerce of the Mediterranean is already carried on by

American vessels.]

The great colonies which were founded in South America by the Spaniards

and the Portuguese have since become empires. Civil war and oppression

now lay waste those extensive regions. Population does not increase,

and the thinly scattered inhabitants are too much absorbed in the cares

of self-defense even to attempt any amelioration of their condition.

Such, however, will not always be the case. Europe has succeeded by her

own efforts in piercing the gloom of the Middle Ages; South America has

the same Christian laws and Christian manners as we have; she contains

all the germs of civilization which have grown amidst the nations of

Europe or their offsets, added to the advantages to be derived from our

example: why then should she always remain uncivilized? It is clear

that the question is simply one of time; at some future period, which

may be more or less remote, the inhabitants of South America will

constitute flourishing and enlightened nations.

But when the Spaniards and Portuguese of South America begin to feel

the wants common to all civilized nations, they will still be unable to

satisfy those wants for themselves; as the youngest children of

civilization, they must perforce admit the superiority of their elder

brethren. They will be agriculturists long before they succeed in

manufactures or commerce, and they will require the mediation of

strangers to exchange their produce beyond seas for those articles for

which a demand will begin to be felt.

It is unquestionable that the Americans of the North will one day

supply the wants of the Americans of the South. Nature has placed them

in contiguity, and has furnished the former with every means of knowing

and appreciating those demands, of establishing a permanent connection

with those States, and of gradually filling their markets. The

merchants of the United States could only forfeit these natural

advantages if he were very inferior to the merchant of Europe; to whom

he is, on the contrary, superior in several respects. The Americans of

the United States already exercise a very considerable moral influence

upon all the peoples of the New World. They are the source of

intelligence, and all the nations which inhabit the same continent are

already accustomed to consider them as the most enlightened, the most

powerful, and the most wealthy members of the great American family.

All eyes are therefore turned towards the Union; and the States of

which that body is composed are the models which the other communities

try to imitate to the best of their power; it is from the United States

that they borrow their political principles and their laws.

The Americans of the United States stand in precisely the same position

with regard to the peoples of South America as their fathers, the

English, occupy with regard to the Italians, the Spaniards, the

Portuguese, and all those nations of Europe which receive their

articles of daily consumption from England, because they are less

advanced in civilization and trade. England is at this time the natural

emporium of almost all the nations which are within its reach; the

American Union will perform the same part in the other hemisphere; and

every community which is founded, or which prospers in the New World,

is founded and prospers to the advantage of the Anglo-Americans.

If the Union were to be dissolved, the commerce of the States which now

compose it would undoubtedly be checked for a time; but this

consequence would be less perceptible than is generally supposed. It is

evident that, whatever may happen, the commercial States will remain

united. They are all contiguous to each other; they have identically

the same opinions, interests, and manners; and they are alone competent

to form a very great maritime power. Even if the South of the Union

were to become independent of the North, it would still require the

services of those States. I have already observed that the South is not

a commercial country, and nothing intimates that it is likely to become

so. The Americans of the South of the United States will therefore be

obliged, for a long time to come, to have recourse to strangers to

export their produce, and to supply them with the commodities which are

requisite to satisfy their wants. But the Northern States are

undoubtedly able to act as their intermediate agents cheaper than any

other merchants. They will therefore retain that employment, for

cheapness is the sovereign law of commerce. National claims and

national prejudices cannot resist the influence of cheapness. Nothing

can be more virulent than the hatred which exists between the Americans

of the United States and the English. But notwithstanding these

inimical feelings, the Americans derive the greater part of their

manufactured commodities from England, because England supplies them at

a cheaper rate than any other nation. Thus the increasing prosperity of

America turns, notwithstanding the grudges of the Americans, to the

advantage of British manufactures.

Reason shows and experience proves that no commercial prosperity can be

durable if it cannot be united, in case of need, to naval force. This

truth is as well understood in the United States as it can be anywhere

else: the Americans are already able to make their flag respected; in a

few years they will be able to make it feared. I am convinced that the

dismemberment of the Union would not have the effect of diminishing the

naval power of the Americans, but that it would powerfully contribute

to increase it. At the present time the commercial States are connected

with others which have not the same interests, and which frequently

yield an unwilling consent to the increase of a maritime power by which

they are only indirectly benefited. If, on the contrary, the commercial

States of the Union formed one independent nation, commerce would

become the foremost of their national interests; they would

consequently be willing to make very great sacrifices to protect their

shipping, and nothing would prevent them from pursuing their designs

upon this point.

Nations, as well as men, almost always betray the most prominent

features of their future destiny in their earliest years. When I

contemplate the ardor with which the Anglo-Americans prosecute

commercial enterprise, the advantages which befriend them, and the

success of their undertakings, I cannot refrain from believing that

they will one day become the first maritime power of the globe. They

are born to rule the seas, as the Romans were to conquer the world.

Conclusion

I have now nearly reached the close of my inquiry; hitherto, in

speaking of the future destiny of the United States, I have endeavored

to divide my subject into distinct portions, in order to study each of

them with more attention. My present object is to embrace the whole

from one single point; the remarks I shall make will be less detailed,

but they will be more sure. I shall perceive each object less

distinctly, but I shall descry the principal facts with more certainty.

A traveller who has just left the walls of an immense city, climbs the

neighboring hill; as he goes father off he loses sight of the men whom

he has so recently quitted; their dwellings are confused in a dense

mass; he can no longer distinguish the public squares, and he can

scarcely trace out the great thoroughfares; but his eye has less

difficulty in following the boundaries of the city, and for the first

time he sees the shape of the vast whole. Such is the future destiny of

the British race in North America to my eye; the details of the

stupendous picture are overhung with shade, but I conceive a clear idea

of the entire subject.

The territory now occupied or possessed by the United States of America

forms about one-twentieth part of the habitable earth. But extensive as

these confines are, it must not be supposed that the Anglo-American

race will always remain within them; indeed, it has already far

overstepped them.

There was once a time at which we also might have created a great

French nation in the American wilds, to counterbalance the influence of

the English upon the destinies of the New World. France formerly

possessed a territory in North America, scarcely less extensive than

the whole of Europe. The three greatest rivers of that continent then

flowed within her dominions. The Indian tribes which dwelt between the

mouth of the St. Lawrence and the delta of the Mississippi were

unaccustomed to any other tongue but ours; and all the European

settlements scattered over that immense region recalled the traditions

of our country. Louisbourg, Montmorency, Duquesne, St. Louis,

Vincennes, New Orleans (for such were the names they bore) are words

dear to France and familiar to our ears.

But a concourse of circumstances, which it would be tedious to

enumerate, *m have deprived us of this magnificent inheritance.

Wherever the French settlers were numerically weak and partially

established, they have disappeared: those who remain are collected on a

small extent of country, and are now subject to other laws. The 400,000

French inhabitants of Lower Canada constitute, at the present time, the

remnant of an old nation lost in the midst of a new people. A foreign

population is increasing around them unceasingly and on all sides,

which already penetrates amongst the ancient masters of the country,

predominates in their cities and corrupts their language. This

population is identical with that of the United States; it is therefore

with truth that I asserted that the British race is not confined within

the frontiers of the Union, since it already extends to the northeast.

[ The foremost of these circumstances is, that nations which are

accustomed to free institutions and municipal government are better

able than any others to found prosperous colonies. The habit of

thinking and governing for oneself is indispensable in a new country,

where success necessarily depends, in a great measure, upon the

individual exertions of the settlers.]

To the northwest nothing is to be met with but a few insignificant

Russian settlements; but to the southwest, Mexico presents a barrier to

the Anglo-Americans. Thus, the Spaniards and the Anglo-Americans are,

properly speaking, the only two races which divide the possession of

the New World. The limits of separation between them have been settled

by a treaty; but although the conditions of that treaty are exceedingly

favorable to the Anglo-Americans, I do not doubt that they will shortly

infringe this arrangement. Vast provinces, extending beyond the

frontiers of the Union towards Mexico, are still destitute of

inhabitants. The natives of the United States will forestall the

rightful occupants of these solitary regions. They will take possession

of the soil, and establish social institutions, so that when the legal

owner arrives at length, he will find the wilderness under cultivation,

and strangers quietly settled in the midst of his inheritance. *n

[ [This was speedily accomplished, and ere long both Texas and

California formed part of the United States. The Russian settlements

were acquired by purchase.]]

The lands of the New World belong to the first occupant, and they are

the natural reward of the swiftest pioneer. Even the countries which

are already peopled will have some difficulty in securing themselves

from this invasion. I have already alluded to what is taking place in

the province of Texas. The inhabitants of the United States are

perpetually migrating to Texas, where they purchase land; and although

they conform to the laws of the country, they are gradually founding

the empire of their own language and their own manners. The province of

Texas is still part of the Mexican dominions, but it will soon contain

no Mexicans; the same thing has occurred whenever the Anglo-Americans

have come into contact with populations of a different origin.

It cannot be denied that the British race has acquired an amazing

preponderance over all the other European races in the New World; and

that it is very superior to them in civilization, in industry, and in

power. As long as it is only surrounded by desert or thinly peopled

countries, as long as it encounters no dense populations upon its

route, through which it cannot work its way, it will assuredly continue

to spread. The lines marked out by treaties will not stop it; but it

will everywhere transgress these imaginary barriers.

The geographical position of the British race in the New World is

peculiarly favorable to its rapid increase. Above its northern

frontiers the icy regions of the Pole extend; and a few degrees below

its southern confines lies the burning climate of the Equator. The

Anglo-Americans are, therefore, placed in the most temperate and

habitable zone of the continent.

It is generally supposed that the prodigious increase of population in

the United States is posterior to their Declaration of Independence.

But this is an error: the population increased as rapidly under the

colonial system as it does at the present day; that is to say, it

doubled in about twenty-two years. But this proportion which is now

applied to millions, was then applied to thousands of inhabitants; and

the same fact which was scarcely noticeable a century ago, is now

evident to every observer.

The British subjects in Canada, who are dependent on a king, augment

and spread almost as rapidly as the British settlers of the United

States, who live under a republican government. During the war of

independence, which lasted eight years, the population continued to

increase without intermission in the same ratio. Although powerful

Indian nations allied with the English existed at that time upon the

western frontiers, the emigration westward was never checked. Whilst

the enemy laid waste the shores of the Atlantic, Kentucky, the western

parts of Pennsylvania, and the States of Vermont and of Maine were

filling with inhabitants. Nor did the unsettled state of the

Constitution, which succeeded the war, prevent the increase of the

population, or stop its progress across the wilds. Thus, the difference

of laws, the various conditions of peace and war, of order and of

anarchy, have exercised no perceptible influence upon the gradual

development of the Anglo-Americans. This may be readily understood; for

the fact is, that no causes are sufficiently general to exercise a

simultaneous influence over the whole of so extensive a territory. One

portion of the country always offers a sure retreat from the calamities

which afflict another part; and however great may be the evil, the

remedy which is at hand is greater still.

It must not, then, be imagined that the impulse of the British race in

the New World can be arrested. The dismemberment of the Union, and the

hostilities which might ensure, the abolition of republican

institutions, and the tyrannical government which might succeed it, may

retard this impulse, but they cannot prevent it from ultimately

fulfilling the destinies to which that race is reserved. No power upon

earth can close upon the emigrants that fertile wilderness which offers

resources to all industry, and a refuge from all want. Future events,

of whatever nature they may be, will not deprive the Americans of their

climate or of their inland seas, of their great rivers or of their

exuberant soil. Nor will bad laws, revolutions, and anarchy be able to

obliterate that love of prosperity and that spirit of enterprise which

seem to be the distinctive characteristics of their race, or to

extinguish that knowledge which guides them on their way.

Thus, in the midst of the uncertain future, one event at least is sure.

At a period which may be said to be near (for we are speaking of the

life of a nation), the Anglo-Americans will alone cover the immense

space contained between the polar regions and the tropics, extending

from the coasts of the Atlantic to the shores of the Pacific Ocean. The

territory which will probably be occupied by the Anglo-Americans at

some future time, may be computed to equal three-quarters of Europe in

extent. *o The climate of the Union is upon the whole preferable to

that of Europe, and its natural advantages are not less great; it is

therefore evident that its population will at some future time be

proportionate to our own. Europe, divided as it is between so many

different nations, and torn as it has been by incessant wars and the

barbarous manners of the Middle Ages, has notwithstanding attained a

population of 410 inhabitants to the square league. *p What cause can

prevent the United States from having as numerous a population in time?

[ The United States already extend over a territory equal to one-half

of Europe. The area of Europe is 500,000 square leagues, and its

population 205,000,000 of inhabitants. (“Malte Brun,” liv. 114. vol.

vi. p. 4.)

[This computation is given in French leagues, which were in use when

the author wrote. Twenty years later, in 1850, the superficial area of

the United States had been extended to 3,306,865 square miles of

territory, which is about the area of Europe.]]

[ See “Malte Brun,” liv. 116, vol. vi. p. 92.]

Many ages must elapse before the divers offsets of the British race in

America cease to present the same homogeneous characteristics: and the

time cannot be foreseen at which a permanent inequality of conditions

will be established in the New World. Whatever differences may arise,

from peace or from war, from freedom or oppression, from prosperity or

want, between the destinies of the different descendants of the great

Anglo-American family, they will at least preserve an analogous social

condition, and they will hold in common the customs and the opinions to

which that social condition has given birth.

In the Middle Ages, the tie of religion was sufficiently powerful to

imbue all the different populations of Europe with the same

civilization. The British of the New World have a thousand other

reciprocal ties; and they live at a time when the tendency to equality

is general amongst mankind. The Middle Ages were a period when

everything was broken up; when each people, each province, each city,

and each family, had a strong tendency to maintain its distinct

individuality. At the present time an opposite tendency seems to

prevail, and the nations seem to be advancing to unity. Our means of

intellectual intercourse unite the most remote parts of the earth; and

it is impossible for men to remain strangers to each other, or to be

ignorant of the events which are taking place in any corner of the

globe. The consequence is that there is less difference, at the present

day, between the Europeans and their descendants in the New World, than

there was between certain towns in the thirteenth century which were

only separated by a river. If this tendency to assimilation brings

foreign nations closer to each other, it must a fortiori prevent the

descendants of the same people from becoming aliens to each other.

The time will therefore come when one hundred and fifty millions of men

will be living in North America, *q equal in condition, the progeny of

one race, owing their origin to the same cause, and preserving the same

civilization, the same language, the same religion, the same habits,

the same manners, and imbued with the same opinions, propagated under

the same forms. The rest is uncertain, but this is certain; and it is a

fact new to the world—a fact fraught with such portentous consequences

as to baffle the efforts even of the imagination.

[ This would be a population proportionate to that of Europe, taken at

a mean rate of 410 inhabitants to the square league.]

There are, at the present time, two great nations in the world which

seem to tend towards the same end, although they started from different

points: I allude to the Russians and the Americans. Both of them have

grown up unnoticed; and whilst the attention of mankind was directed

elsewhere, they have suddenly assumed a most prominent place amongst

the nations; and the world learned their existence and their greatness

at almost the same time.

All other nations seem to have nearly reached their natural limits, and

only to be charged with the maintenance of their power; but these are

still in the act of growth; *r all the others are stopped, or continue

to advance with extreme difficulty; these are proceeding with ease and

with celerity along a path to which the human eye can assign no term.

The American struggles against the natural obstacles which oppose him;

the adversaries of the Russian are men; the former combats the

wilderness and savage life; the latter, civilization with all its

weapons and its arts: the conquests of the one are therefore gained by

the ploughshare; those of the other by the sword. The Anglo-American

relies upon personal interest to accomplish his ends, and gives free

scope to the unguided exertions and common-sense of the citizens; the

Russian centres all the authority of society in a single arm: the

principal instrument of the former is freedom; of the latter servitude.

Their starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same;

yet each of them seems to be marked out by the will of Heaven to sway

the destinies of half the globe.

[ Russia is the country in the Old World in which population increases

most rapidly in proportion.]

Within this first line of conquering settlers towns are built, and vast