The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-01-02 00:00:00

THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE.

(From the Standard.)
When we received the President's Message on Tuesday last,
we hastily remarked upon some points which struck us as indi-
cative of an unfriendly feeling towards this country, but at the
same time acknowledged that we were probably mistaken in our
view, inasmuch as none of the native journals of the United
States seemed to have adopted it.
We find, however that some of the most intelligent journals
of this country concur in our first impression—and that impres-
sion is, we confess, rather confirmed upon a second perusal of
the message. However, the utmost that we apprehend is, that
M. Van Bruen may wish to use the present embarrassment in
our North American affairs as a means for obtaining better
terms than otherwise he would upon the disputed boundary
question—not a very generous nor a wise policy—but still some-
thing farther from insanity than any scheme for absorbing the
Canadas into the United States. Every intelligent native of
the United States with whom we have conversed, or with whose
writings we are acquainted, is fully convinced that the union is
already too large—that even independently of the rank-
ling and immedicable slave question, and other like ques-
tions, it is upon the eve of falling to pieces from its own
bulk and weight, and that but for the jealous fear of Eng-
land in the West Indies, and England in Canada, the un-
wieldy and ill-cemented fabric had long since given way.
Steam navigation, which serves elsewhere as a connecting link,
has already separated the eastern and western states—into na-
tions differing in feeling as well as in interest; while it is noto-
rious that the noith-eastern states, which were prepared to sepa-
rate from the whole union at the close of the late war, are ra-
pidly returning to the same feeling. For the States, then, sup-
posing them to have the power to do so, to wrest Canada from
England, would be to accelerate their own dissolution—to re-
move the abutment, as it were, of the already tottering arch,
and add its burthen to the incumbent weight.
Suppose, for a moment, the Canadas politically united to the
American commonwealth. What follows? Maine, New York,
Vermont, and the, adjacent states already sufficiently well dis-
poied to separate f•ion -the union, are at once relieved from all
apprehensions on their northern (frontier--nay, receive a vast
accession of homogeneous territory, and are thrown into con-
tact with a homogeneous population, for the French Canadians
would be speedily extinguished. Can there be a doubt that the
north-eastern states thus possessing both sides of the St. Law-
rence, and backed by a British population of freemen, who
would cordially aid in such an enterpriSe—can it be doubted,
we ask, that these north-eastern states, thus circumstanced,
would promptly execute their long-contemplated scheme of
separation ? Every intelligent American knows this. M. Van
Buren cannot be ignorant that such would be the almost imme-
diate effect of the acquisition of the Canadas by the union. No
war of ambition, therefore, is to be feared on that side; indeed,
the interests of Great Britain and the States are identified in
the present distribution of territory, or rather that distribution
is more advantageous to the States than to Great Britain..