There is no doubt that the question of Slavery had much to do with the rebellion, but it was not its sole cause.The real cause must be sought in the program that had been made, especially in the States themselves, in forming and administering their respective governments, as well as the General government, in accordance with political theories borrowed from European speculators on government, the socalled Liberals and Revolutionists, which have and can have no legitimate application in the United States.The tendency of American politics, for the last thirty or forty years, has been, within the several States themselves, in the direction of centralized democracy, as if the American people had for their mission only the reproduction of ancient Athens.The American system is not that of any of the simple forms of government, nor any combination of them.The attempt to bring it under any of the simple or mixed forms of government recognized by political writers, is an attempt to clothe the future in the cast-off garments of the past.The American system, wherever practicable, is better than monarchy, better than aristocracy, better than simple democracy, better than any possible combination of these several forms, because it accords more nearly with the principles of things, the real order of the universe.
But American statesmen have studied the constitutions of other states more than that of their own, and have succeeded in obscuring the American system in the minds of the people, and giving them in its place pure and simple democracy, which is its false development or corruption.Under the influence of this false development, the people were fast losing sight of the political truth that, though the people are sovereign, it is the organic, not the inorganic people, the territorial people, not the people as simple population, and were beginning to assert the absolute God-given right of the majority to govern.All the changes made in the bosom of the States themselves have consisted in removing all obstacles to the irresponsible will of the majority, leaving minorities and individuals at their mercy.
This tendency to a centralized democracy had more to do with provoking secession and rebellion than the anti-slavery sentiments of the Northern, Central, and Western States.
The failure of secession and the triumph of the National cause, in spite of the short-sightedness and blundering of the Administration, have proved the vitality and strength of the national constitution, and the greatness of the American people.
They say nothing for or against the democratic theory of our demagogues, but every thing in favor of the American system or constitution of government, which has found a firmer support in American instincts than in American statesmanship.In spite of all that had been done by theorists, radicals, and revolutionists, no-government men, non-resistants, humanitarians, and sickly sentimentalists to corrupt the American people in mind, heart, and body, the native vigor of their national constitution has enabled them to come forth triumphant from the trial.Every American patriot has reason to be proud of his country-men, and every American lover of freedom to be satisfied with the institutions of his country.But there is danger that the politicians and demagogues will ascribe the merit, not to the real and living national constitution, but to their miserable theories of that constitution, and labor to aggravate the several evils and corrupt tendencies which caused the rebellion it has cost so much to suppress.What is now wanted is, that the people, whose instincts are right, should understand the American constitution as it is, and so understand it as to render it impossible for political theorists, no matter of what school or party, to deceive them again as to its real import, or induce them to depart from it in their political action.
A work written with temper, without passion or sectional prejudice, in a philosophical spirit, explaining to the American people their own national constitution, and the mutual relations of the General government and the State governments, cannot, at this important crisis in our affairs, be inopportune, and, if properly executed, can hardly fail to be of real service.Such a work is now attempted--would it were by another and abler hand-which, imperfect as it is, may at least offer some useful suggestions, give a right direction to political thought, although it should fail to satisfy the mind of the reader.
This much the author may say, in favor of his own work, that it sets forth no theory of government in general, or of the United States in particular.The author is not a monarchist, an aristocrat, a democrat, a feudalist, nor an advocate of what are called mixed governments like the English, at least for his own country; but is simply an American, devoted to the real, living, and energizing constitution of the American republic as it is, not as some may fancy it might be, or are striving to make it.
It is, in his judgment, what it ought to be, and he has no other ambition than to present it as it is to the understanding and love of his countrymen.
Perhaps simple artistic unity and propriety would require the author to commence his essay directly with the United States; but while the constitution of the United States is original and peculiar, the government of the United States has necessarily something in common with all legitimate governments, and he has thought it best to precede his discussion of the American republic, its constitution, tendencies, and destiny, by some considerations on government in general.He does this because he believes, whether rightly or not, that while the American people have received from Providence a most truly profound and admirable system of government, they are more or less infected with the false theories of government which have been broached during the last two centuries.In attempting to realize these theories, they have already provoked or rendered practicable a rebellion which has seriously threatened the national existence, and come very near putting an end to the American order of civilization itself.These theories have received already a shock in the minds of all serious and thinking men; but the men who think are in every nation a small minority, and it is necessary to give these theories a public refutation, and bring back those who do not think, as well as those who do, from the world of dreams to the world of reality.It is hoped, therefore, that any apparent want of artistic unity or symmetry in the essay will be pardoned for the sake of the end the author has had in view.
