American Institutions and Their Influence Part 44

[270] 3,672,317; census 1830.

[271] The distance of Jefferson, the capital of the state of Missouri, to Was.h.i.+ngton, is 1,018 miles. (American Almanac, 1831, p. 40.)

[272] The following statements will suffice to show the difference which exists between the commerce of the south and that of the north:--

In 1829, the tonnage of all the merchant-vessels belonging to Virginia, the two Carolinas, and Georgia (the four great southern states), amounted to only 5,243 tons. In the same year the tonnage of the vessels of the state of Ma.s.sachusetts alone amounted to 17,322 tons. (See Legislative Doc.u.ments, 21st congress, 2d session, No. 140, p. 244.) Thus the state of Ma.s.sachusetts has three times as much s.h.i.+pping as the four abovementioned states. Nevertheless the area of the state of Ma.s.sachusetts is only 7,335 square miles, and its population amounts to 610,014 inhabitants; while the area of the four other states I have quoted is 210,000 square miles, and their population 3,047,767. Thus the area of the state of Ma.s.sachusetts forms only one thirtieth part of the area of the four states; and its population is five times smaller than theirs. (See Darby's View of the United States.) Slavery is prejudicial to the commercial prosperity of the south in several different ways; by diminis.h.i.+ng the spirit of enterprise among the whites, and by preventing them from meeting with as numerous a cla.s.s of sailors as they require.

Sailors are generally taken from the lowest ranks of the population. But in the southern states these lowest ranks are composed of slaves, and it is very difficult to employ them at sea. They are unable to serve as well as a white crew, and apprehensions would always be entertained of their mutinying in the middle of the ocean, or of their escaping in the foreign countries at which they might touch.

[273] Darby's view of the United States, p. 444.

[274] It may be seen that in the course of the last ten years (1820-'30) the population of one district, as for instance, the state of Delaware, has increased in the proportion of 5 per cent.; while that of another, as the territory of Michigan, has increased 250 per cent. Thus the population of Virginia has augmented 13 per cent., and that of the border state of Ohio 61 per cent., in the same s.p.a.ce of time. The general table of these changes, which is given in the National Calendar, displays a striking picture of the unequal fortunes of the different states.

[275] It has just been said that in the course of the last term the population of Virginia has increased 13 per cent.; and it is necessary to explain how the number of representatives of a state may decrease, when the population of that state, far from diminis.h.i.+ng, is actually upon the increase. I take the state of Virginia, to which I have already alluded, as my term of comparison. The number of representatives of Virginia in 1823 was proportionate to the total number of the representatives of the Union, and to the relation which its population bore to that of the whole Union; in 1833, the number of representatives of Virginia was likewise proportionate to the total number of the representatives of the Union, and to the relation which its population, augmented in the course of ten years, bore to the augmented population of the Union in the same s.p.a.ce of time. The new number of Virginian representatives will then be to the old number, on the one hand, as the new number of all the representatives is to the old number; and, on the other hand, as the augmentation of the population of Virginia is to that of the whole population of the country. Thus, if the increase of the population of the lesser country be to that of the greater in an exact inverse ratio of the proportion between the new and the old numbers of all the representatives, the number of representatives of Virginia will remain stationary; and if the increase of the Virginian population be to that of the whole Union in a feebler ratio than the new number of representatives of the Union to the old number, the number of the representatives of Virginia must decrease.

[276] See the report of its committees to the convention, which proclaimed the nullification of the tariff in South Carolina.

[277] The population of a country a.s.suredly const.i.tutes the first element of its wealth. In the ten years (1820-'30) 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 15 per cent.; and that of Georgia 51-5 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.; of France at the rate of 7 per cent.; and of Europe in general at the rate of 4-7 per cent. (See Maltebrun, vol. vi., p. 95.)

[278] 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 circ.u.mstance is as independent of the will of their northern brethren, as it is of their own.

[279] 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 report of the general post-office, 30th November, 1833.) The postage of newspapers alone in the whole Union amounted to $254,796.

[280] 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 Doc.u.ments, No. 140, p. 274.)

[281] See in the legislative doc.u.ments 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.

[282] The first act of cession was made by the state of New York in 1780; Virginia, Ma.s.sachusetts, 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.

[283] It is true that the president refused his a.s.sent to this law; but he completely adopted it in principle. See message of 8th December, 1833.

[284] The present bank of the United States was established in 1816, with a capital of 35,000,000 dollars; its charter expires in 1836. Last year congress pa.s.sed 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.

[285] See princ.i.p.ally for the details of this affair, the legislative doc.u.ments, 22d congress, 2d session, No 3.

[286] 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.

[287] 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 pa.s.sage occurs in it, p. 34: "When the rights reserved by the const.i.tution 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 dest.i.tute 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."

[288] Congress was finally decided to take this step by the conduct of the powerful state of Virginia, whose legislature offered to serve as a mediator between the Union and South Carolina. Hitherto the latter state had appeared to be entirely abandoned even by the states which had joined her in her remonstrances.

[289] This law was pa.s.sed on the 2d March, 1833.

[290] This bill was brought in by Mr. Clay, and it pa.s.sed in four days through both houses of Congress, by an immense majority.

[291] The total value of goods imported during the year which ended on the 30th September, 1832, was 101,129,266 dollars. The value of the cargoes of foreign vessels did not amount to 10,731,039 dollars, or about one-tenth of the entire sum.

[292] The value of goods exported during the same year amounted to 87,176,943 dollars; the value of goods exported by foreign vessels amounted to 21,036,183 dollars, or about one quarter of the whole sum.

(Williams's Register, 1833, p. 398.)

[293] 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 s.h.i.+ps which entered the ports of Great Britain was 29 to 100.

[294] Materials are, generally speaking, less expensive in America than in Europe, but the price of labor is much higher.

[295] 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 s.h.i.+pping 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 compet.i.tion with the English.

[296] Part of the commerce of the Mediterranean is already carried on by American vessels.

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 princ.i.p.al facts with more certainty. A traveller, who has just left the walls of an immense city, climbs the neighboring hill; as he goes farther off, he loses sight of the men whom he has so recently quitted; their dwellings are confused in a dense ma.s.s; 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 counter-balance 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 tongue but ours; and all the European settlements scattered over that immense region recalled the traditions of our country. Louisburg, Montmorency, Duquesne, Saint-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 circ.u.mstances, which it would be tedious to enumerate,[297] 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 const.i.tute, 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 among 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 a.s.serted that the British race is not confined within the frontiers of the Union, since it already extends to the northeast.

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 toward Mexico, are still dest.i.tute 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 inst.i.tutions, 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.

The lands of the New World belong to the first occupants 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.

[The prophetic accuracy of the author, in relation to the present actual condition of Texas, exhibits the sound and clear perception with which he surveyed our inst.i.tutions and character.--_American Editor_.]

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 civilisation, 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 a.s.suredly 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. While the enemy laid waste the sh.o.r.es 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 const.i.tution, 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 ensue, the abolition of republican inst.i.tutions, and the tyrannical government which might succeed it, may r.e.t.a.r.d 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 s.p.a.ce contained between the polar regions and the tropics, extending from the coasts of the Atlantic to the sh.o.r.es 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.[298] 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.[299] What cause can prevent the United States from having as numerous a population in time?

Many ages must elapse before the divers offsets of the British race in America cease to present the same h.o.m.ogeneous 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 a.n.a.logous 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 civilisation. 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 among 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 a.s.similation 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,[300] equal in condition, the progeny of one race, owing their origin to the same cause, and preserving the same civilisation, 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.