The Express.
London, England, 1851-03-31 00:00:00

ght erprego.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.
Meet, orment. gut, Med tut "The Etprom," leadoe F.veh p :tlr,
ewe he ti the MUD. IS Bouvorw-street, by Two o'cooel. oh the
day of pobocalloa.

MGR WATig AT U)NDON
Trots IrAT-1111116011 MST= kfternam, 111.511 a.
Tagoaauw—lisesieg. 16.11 a. MUMMA. 21. 2imm.

LONDON, MONDAY, MARCH 3:

GREAT BRITAIN and the United States are both
engaged in the task of taking a MMus of their popu-
lation. In a country whose polity is rounded, like
that of America, upon the great principle that the
proper busine,..s of lawgivers is to ascertain the di-
methm of national tendencios, and the proper object
of institutions is to realist the prevalent will, few
subjects of inquiry possess so deep and permanent an
interest. With us the census is at best regarded as
" rather a dry subject" of public discussion or private
conversation. 'll e all have a certain curiosity to
know by how many thousands the hives of manufac-
turing industry have become more crowded dur-
ing the past ten years; and most people think
it sounds common-sensicul to profess that they
" think it very interesting" to observe how one
part of the kingdom has lost and another gained in
the number of its inhabitants. But in truth, the
generality of persons one meets in society don't think
anything about the matter. " Very interesting"
means—just nothing at all. plow should it he other-
wise? Save in rare instances, it signifies little
whether the decimal proportion of the parish you
live in has moved upwards or downwards, or leas
remained stationary. Beyond a given point it tells
upon the balance of poor rates and wages,--a balance
which nut one iu a thousand even pretends to under-
stand; but in any other sense it would be marvel-
lously difficult to show what it signifies to Sniggles-
thorpe whether its average births since Is4l have
exceeded those of Marry-cum-children by the fifty-
seventh part of a unit, or by half a dozen numerals.
Laws, law-making, and law-makers in England de-
pend upon totally different considerations. Our re-
presentative system is the net result of the contro-
versy between the power of acreage and the power
of l" tentage, between the claim of hereditary tur-
rets to overlook all other abodes in the land, and the
ambition of certain ambitious chimnies to overtop
them. But as for the mill' wants or wishes of the
shifting masses of population, who believes that our
imperial system was ever meant to reflect faith-
fully or to obey loyally influences so variable or

vulgar?
In the United States things are somewhat different.
Money and land, manufacturing and territorial power,
are not the corner stones of the political edifice;
they are nut even so much as distinctivel) recog-
nised in the system. If any man or number of men
happen to have inherited or to have accumulated
great riches., so much the better in private ler them.
But the state takes no cognisance thereof. It exists.
for quite other purposes than to swell the insolencs
of wealth or birth. Man as a trading, writing, tra-
velling, postal,v -paying. railway travelling. excises
grudging. customs-evading, and lawsuit-loving ani-
mal.—man. in these inherent qualities of civilization,
is the sole subject of the deliberations of Con-
gress. and of the curious mechanism of administra-
tive rule which for seventy years has existed in
North America. We do not hope to be able to eon-
, vino those who find their account in maintaining
the opposite scheme of polity on this side of the
ocean, that theirs is not the better of the two. We
only wish to mark the essential difference in the
scope and aim of the rival systems, as accounting
for the very different feelings with which the taking
of the decennial census, amongst other things, is re-
garded by our western kinsfolk and ourselves.
In America,asin England. great social controversies
prevail. But in that democratic region the sole ar-
bitrament which exists, or can exist, is that of pre-
dominant opinion : and where opinion, as in the case
of slavery, is identical with geographical and pro-
yincial distinctions, an inquiry into the comparative
progress of population assumes at once and palpably
the form of a scrutiny into the actual resources of the.
two parties into which the nation it divided. Hence
the anxiety manifested at the present moment by
every sect and class of politicians to ascertain
the probable results of the national enumeration
for some time preceding. but which is still
incomplete. Approximations to the precise results
have been. however, put forth apparently on good
authority: and, as might be anticipated. these state-
ments already form the elements of many edam's-