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Page 28
I have not included the territory recently acquired by the treaty with
Mexico. The North is making the most strenuous efforts to appropriate
the whole to herself, by excluding the South from every foot of it. If
she should succeed, it will add to that from which the South has already
been excluded, 526,078 square miles, and would increase the whole which
the North has appropriated to herself, to 1,764,023, not including the
portion that she may succeed in excluding us from in Texas. To sum up
the whole, the United States, since they declared their independence,
have acquired 2,373,046 square miles of territory, from which the North
will have excluded the South, if she should succeed in monopolizing the
newly acquired territories, about three fourths of the whole, leaving to
the South but about one fourth.
Such is the first and great cause that has destroyed the equilibrium
between the two sections in the Government.
The next is the system of revenue and disbursements which has been
adopted by the Government. It is well known that the Government has
derived its revenue mainly from duties on imports. I shall not undertake
to show that such duties must necessarily fall mainly on the exporting
States, and that the South, as the great exporting portion of the Union,
has in reality paid vastly more than her due proportion of the revenue;
because I deem it unnecessary, as the subject has on so many occasions
been fully discussed. Nor shall I, for the same reason, undertake to
show that a far greater portion of the revenue has been disbursed at the
North, than its due share; and that the joint effect of these causes
has been, to transfer a vast amount from South to North, which, under an
equal system of revenue and disbursements, would not have been lost to
her. If to this be added, that many of the duties were imposed, not for
revenue, but for protection,--that is, intended to put money, not in
the treasury, but directly into the pockets of the manufacturers,--some
conception may be formed of the immense amount which, in the long course
of sixty years, has been transferred from South to North. There are no
data by which it can be estimated with any certainty; but it is safe to
say that it amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars. Under the most
moderate estimate, it would be sufficient to add greatly to the wealth
of the North, and thus greatly increase her population by attracting
emigration from all quarters to that section.
This, combined with the great primary cause, amply explains why the
North has acquired a preponderance in every department of the Government
by its disproportionate increase of population and States. The former,
as has been shown, has increased, in fifty years, 2,400,000 over that
of the South. This increase of population, during so long a period,
is satisfactorily accounted for, by the number of emigrants, and the
increase of their descendants, which have been attracted to the northern
section from Europe and the South, in consequence of the advantages
derived from the causes assigned. If they had not existed--if the South
had retained all the capital which had been extracted from her by the
fiscal action of the Government; and, if it had not been excluded by
the ordinance of 1787 and the Missouri compromise, from the region lying
between the Ohio and the Mississippi rivers, and between the Mississippi
and the Rocky Mountains north of 36� 30'--it scarcely admits of a
doubt, that it would have divided the emigration with the North, and
by retaining her own people, would have at least equalled the North in
population under the census of 1840, and probably under that about to
be taken. She would also, if she had retained her equal rights in those
territories, have maintained an equality in the number of States with
the North, and have preserved the equilibrium between the two sections
that existed at the commencement of the Government. The loss, then, of
the equilibrium is to be attributed to the action of this Government.
But while these measures were destroying the equilibrium between the two
sections, the action of the Government was leading to a radical change
in its character, by concentrating all the power of the system in
itself. The occasion will not permit me to trace the measures by which
this great change has been consummated. If it did, it would not be
difficult to show that the process commenced at an early period of the
Government; and that it proceeded, almost without interruption, step by
step, until it virtually absorbed its entire powers; but without
going through the whole process to establish the fact, it may be done
satisfactorily by a very short statement.
That the Government claims, and practically maintains, the right to
decide in the last resort, as to the extent of its powers, will scarcely
be denied by any one conversant with the political history of the
country. That it also claims the right to resort to force to maintain
whatever power it claims against all opposition is equally certain.
Indeed it is apparent, from what we daily hear, that this has become the
prevailing and fixed opinion of a great majority of the community.
Now, I ask, what limitation can possibly be placed upon the powers of a
government claiming and exercising such rights? And, if none can be,
how can the separate governments of the States maintain and protect
the powers reserved to them by the Constitution--or the people of the
several States maintain those which are reserved to them, and among
others, the sovereign powers by which they ordained and established, not
only their separate State Constitutions and Governments, but also the
Constitution and Government of the United States? But, if they have no
constitutional means of maintaining them against the right claimed by
this Government, it necessarily follows, that they hold them at its
pleasure and discretion, and that all the powers of the system are in
reality concentrated in it. It also follows, that the character of the
Government has been changed in consequence, from a federal republic, as
it originally came from the hands of its framers, into a great
national consolidated democracy. It has indeed, at present, all the
characteristics of the latter, and not of the former, although it still
retains its outward form.
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