ideality that exists in only the mind. Our nationality being thus unique, the accountability of New-York for the slavery of Kansas is not ascertainable by our national relation to Kansas, till we determine first whether our nationality gives New-York a legal voice on the subject. To ascertain this we resort to the Constitution, which fails in deciding the question-some persons expounding the Constitution as permitting interference by the Congressional representatives of New-York, and others expounding it as denying to Congress any voice in the matter.

§ 4. But could the Constitution decide the foregoing question, our condition would not be mended; and our belief to the contrary is a more disturbing error than any I have specified. Men may be killed by eating what is sanctioned by the best physicians, and our Union may be conserved or separated by measures sanctioned by the best constitutional casuistry. An excise law of undisputed constitutionality, produced a rebellion during the Administration of Washington, and a constitutional tariff produced an incipient rebellion under the Administration of Jackson.

The power of peace and war are among the inevitable ne

cessities of any Confederacy, but New-Englanders felt so aggrieved by the War of 1812, that they called a Convention at Hartford to separate from the Union, "peacefully if they could, forcibly if they must." Nor was our Mexican war less instructive of the inefficacy of mere constitutional sanction to preserve the Union, though opposition in that war extended to only moral treason by encouraging the public enemy, obstructing the transmission of troops, and procrastinating needful legislation. The constitutionality of an evil may soothe its infliction, yet no compact, not even marriage, can bind parties who find the bonds subversive of happiness and prosperity.

§ 5. Now, if gold is more valuable than the shape of the ingot, the Union is more valuable than the Constitution. Suppose, then, no constitutional difficulty could be alleged against the universal suppression of domestic slavery by Congress, the question would still remain, whether the exercise of the power would promote or impair "the more perfect Union," which was the main. design of the Constitution, and which is as superior thereto, as fruit is superior to the seed from which it sprang. A man, therefore, who looks at only the Constitution for his duty to the Union, may submit to the requirements of the Fugitive Slave Law, or evade them by force or cunning, according to his constitutional views; but a man patriotically disposed to the Union, will govern himself towards the law by the effect which his conduct will produce on the fraternal feelings of the States.

§ 6. Satirists often contrast the compliances of courtship with the tyranny of marriage. May not the compromises which alone confederated the States be contrasted also with the uncompromising acts by Congress that some of us desire. But the marriage tie is not always secure against subsequent abuse, nor is our Union. Nationalities as large as our own, have failed of conservation; while we possess elements of disruption which no other aggregated nation ever possessed, our States severally containing all the machinery, civil, military, and judicial, of independent sovereignties, with revenues and affectionate subjects. Twentyseven millions of people are thus situated. At the census of 1860, we shall number thirty-one millions; in 1870, forty-two millions; and before the infants of to-day shall attain to middle life, our population will be a hundred millions.

§7. The immediate disruption of our Union may be impracticable under a determined resistance by the General Government; but to be permanent, the Confederation must be desirable to all the Confederates,' difficult as this ever must be from the diversity of their climates, productions, and social customs; hence were we governed like England, by a single legislature, our Confederacy would not exist a year. When Congress exercised its undoubted right to prescribe the time for electing Congressional representatives, an infraction of the law had to be disregarded till the States chose to conform, and like concessions have been numerous. Providentially, the diversi. ties of prejudices and interests in our Union are founded on diversities of locality; so that Congressional legislation need not interfere therewith, if Congress will permit each locality to legislate for itself in all particulars but the few that are indispensable to the General Government. As Congress shall thus circumscribe its power, the yoke of the Union will be proportionably ungalling; and a nonexercise of disturbing power is only a remission of it from Congress to the separate States and Territories more particularly interested therein, and who possess all legislative and sovereign power to act as they shall wish. The interdict includes all the disputed construction of harbors and improvement of rivers. Had Congress steadily refused such legislation, our States would have depended on themselves therein, as they depend for railroads, canals, and telegraphs; and rivers and harbors would have been improved beyond what Congress could accomplish with its best efforts. The same may be said of a protective tariff. New-York protected by a bounty its Onondaga salt, and it may give the same protection to any other manufac

ture; hence New-York need not abandon the Union for any non-protective action by Congress; except that were it out of the Union, it might impose a duty on rival importations. But the duty would operate as a tax on the consumers of the imported article, as burdensome as a bounty to be raised by a tax for the benefit of the home manufac

ture.

§ 8. But the best dissuasive against contentious legislation by Congress remains to be stated :—If every man could act as he pleases, personal freedom would be perfect, and the nearest approach thereto is, that every locality shall be uncontrolled by every other. After the French dethroned. Louis Phillippe, their first act was to enfranchise all slaves in the French colonies, irrespective of the wishes of the colonists. The end may justify the means when a man looks only superficially, but whoever imposes his will over the will of another is so far a tyrant; and if tyranny is to be estimated by the quality of its acts, our theory of government is abandoned. The world has ever been full of patriots who would control others; but the problem our country is solving is, whether man can be satisfied with controlling himself, and permitting a like liberty to all others. No virtue is so cheap as the denouncement of other men's vices. When the Missouri Compromise was repealed, to enable each organized locality to decide on its own domestic institutions, some citizens of Irish nationality deemed the repeal an offence against liberty, forgetting that England's crime against Ireland consists in only a refusal to permit Ireland to legislate for itself. If the principle of self-government is to be subordinated to the subject on which it happens to operate, why should England, who possesses the power, not legislate for Ireland in mat

ters which England may deem as important as slavery? Some Germans of New-York were also clamorous, because the people of Kansas were entrusted with the liberty of fashioning their own domestic institutions; when, however, the Maine Law undertook to decide for these Germans, whether they should or should not indulge in lager beer, they, like most other men, entertained no good opinion of the law, as they felt the halter drawn around their own liberties.

§ 9. But though madness occasionally makes suicides of individuals, self-preservation is nature's general law, and on it we safely rely for the perpetuity of our species; so political madness occasionally threatens the subversion of all the foregoing principles of Congressional forbearance, on which depend the peace and permanence of our Confederacy; but self-preservation is applicable to nationalities also, and on it we may safely rely for the perpetuity of our institutions. On this principle, the almost uniform success of the Democratic party can be accounted for. They have always been the party of union and the country, in opposition to those who in the second war with England, and in the war with Mexico, sided with the public enemy; in opposition, also, to those who struggled against the acquisition of Louisiana, Florida, Texas, California, and NewMexico, and who sided with the United States Bank in its contest against the Government. If a fester has ever been on the body politic, who but the Democratic party has medicated it? Who would not have known that Democrats were not the authors of the Maine Law, were he in Japan when the first announcement of such a law should have reached him? Who would not have known also, that Democrats were not the secret plotters to debase emi