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.

r
[ 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)]

s
[ 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.

t
[ 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.]

u
[ 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.

v
[ [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

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

x
[ 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.]

y
[ 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

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.

a
[ 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.

b
[ 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.]

c
[ 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.

d
[ 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.]

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

f
[ 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

g
[ 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.]

h
[ 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.)]

i
[ 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.

j
[ 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.

k
[ 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.]

l
[ 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.

m
[ 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

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?

o
[ 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.]]

p
[ 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.

q
[ 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.

r
[ Russia is the country in the Old World in which population increases
most rapidly in proportion.]