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From its earliest days the progress of the United States has been less that of growth than of a movement of the people of the Old World across to the New. At first the great stream of labour reached both divisions of the country pretty equally.

That of the South was supplied to it in the form of negroes from Africa; that of the North in the shape of free emigrants from Northern Europe. The extinction of the Slave Trade, in 1808, altered this rule. It stopped this mode of increase to the population of the South, whilst that of the North augmented with accelerating rapidity. And whilst this change was taking place, it was accompanied by another, which gave it political force. The Northern States were gradually becoming free. Their climate in winter is far too severe to permit the African race to thrive there. There is no pursuit in which their labour has any advantage over that of the white, whilst in general respects it is far inferior; and as the supply of white labour increased, the negro became an incumbrance.

There were those also who, from the first, were opposed to Slavery on moral grounds. The spirit of their religion was indeed that of the Old Testament, which gives the records of ages in which Slavery existed as an institution common to all nations. But the spirit of their political faith was directly opposed to it. Those who had wrestled with every hardship, disdained every comfort, and triumphed over all obstacles in pursuit of unshackled

freedom, were not the class of men to look with indulgence upon any form of bondage. It was repugnant to the genius of the race. Moderate men

disapproved, zealous men denounced it. Unquestionably the removal of Slavery from the North was, in the main, an economic measure, and would have occurred, apart from all moral considerations. The majority of the slaves were sold to the South, where they were of greater value. But still, at an early period, there were the germs of that Abolitionist movement which has since exercised so powerful an influence on the destinies of the Union, not from the numbers in its ranks, but from their ability, and the passionate intensity of their zeal. And thus, at the same time that the North was moving from its original equality with the South in population, it was diverging still more widely in social views, and thus aggravating the permanent effects of the change.

In many countries a process so slow, and exciting so little notice as the growth of population, might have proceeded for a long period without attracting observation. When observed, it might have been accepted as an inevitable fact, of no political significance. This is impossible under the Constitution and policy of the United States. Increased population converts a territory into a new State, claiming admission; and it must be either a Slave State, or Free. The political effect of emancipation in the Northern States was still greater.

Each State sends to the Senate two

members, and this change in its condition removed them from the side of the Southern to that of the Northern interest, thus producing the effect of four votes on a division. In so small an assembly this had the utmost political importance. The Southerner saw his power in the Senate rapidly passing away, whilst at the same time the number of his members in the House of Representatives was steadily dwindling, in comparison with that of the North. Nor was this merely comparative ; it was also absolute, in consequence of the changes in the ratio, the rapid increase in the number required to return a representative. This was at first 33,000; it is now above 120,000. Hence a State, though increasing in population, if it should not advance at this ratio, will appear to fall behind. Originally Virginia returned 10 members, to 6 from New York; the proportions are nowVirginia 11, to New York 30. But this is not all. Virginia had at one time 23 members, now reduced to 11, although her population has increased, slowly indeed, but steadily, during the period. And South Carolina which, in the scheme of the Constitution, stands for 5 in 65, or onethirteenth of the representation, will return, under the last census, 4 out of 233, or one-sixtieth part. Hence that State has now less than a quarter of the representative power it had when the Federal compact was framed-a compact entered into with the expectation of advantage from it.

It must be at all times a source of pain to the

citizens of any State to see its political importance gradually declining. When it results from natural and inevitable causes, it will still be fraught with regret. But when a State is steadily increasing in population, to find that, notwithstanding this, its political power is decaying, both relatively and absolutely,-this cannot fail to stir up some impatience in the spirit of a proud people. There will appear an insidious principle in laws that produce such an effect. No construction of clauses, nor views of general convenience, will alter the unsatisfactory character of the thing itself. It may be argued that the alteration of the standard or ratio of numbers to each member, has been absolutely necessary to prevent overcrowding the House of Representatives. It will be said, too, that the rule applies equally to all the States. Theoretically this is true, but not so in practical effect. To reduce 100 to 50 is abstractedly the same as to reduce 2 to 1; but in practice the contest of 50 with 100 is possible, whilst that of 1 with 2 is hopeless. The effect of this practice is strongly adverse to the smaller number, or, in other words, it tends to aggravate the effect of the superior numbers of the North. It will be obvious that it only requires to push the principle to extremes to reduce the representation of a small State to a single member, although that State may have been originally important, and have increased slowly, yet steadily in population. Theoretical arguments will have but little

may

effect in averting the discomfort of the losing side.

It is not indeed in human nature to watch such a process without doubting whether laws are really working to equal advantage when their effects are felt to be so unequal. Nor is it in human nature to have once been in possession of power, and permit it to pass into rival hands, without a struggle. And in some of the oldest and most important of the Southern States this spectacle of the decay of political power is rendered far more depressing when a similar decline is apparent in many other directions. Senator Benton, a strong supporter of the Union, after stating the extent to which the Southern import trade had fallen off, continues thus: "This is what the dry and naked figures show.

To the memory and imagination it is worse; for it is a tradition of the Colonies that the South had been the seat of wealth and happi

ness, of power and opulence; that a rich popula

tion covered the land, dispensing a baronial hospitality, and diffusing the felicity which themselves enjoyed; that all was life, and joy, and affluence then. And this tradition was not without similitude to the reality, as this writer can testify; for he was old enough to have seen (after the Revolution) the still surviving state of Southern Colonial manners, when no traveller was allowed to go to a tavern, but was handed over from family to family through entire States; when holidays were days of festivity and expectation long prepared for, and

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