Marshall County Democrat. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1855-1859, 1858-08-12

tien is not in opposition to, but flows from
the allegiance due to one of the United
States. Washington was not less Vir-
ginian when he commanded at Boston; nor
did Gates or Green weaken the bonds that
bound them to their seve .al States by their
campaigns in the South.
In proportion as citizen loves his own
State will he strive to honor by preserving
her name and her fame free from the tar
nish of having failed to observe her obi
cations, and to fulfill her duties to her sis
ter States. Each page of our history is IL
lustrated by the names and deeds of those
who have.well understood and discharged
the obligation. Have we SO degenerated
that we can no longer emulate their vir-
tues? Have the purposes for which our
Union was formed lost their value? Has
patriotism ceased to be virtue, and is
narrow sectionalism no longer to be count
ed crime? Shall the North not rejoice
that the progress of agriculture in the
South has given to her great staple the
controlling influence OF the commerce of
the world, and put manufacturing nations
under bond to keep the peace with the
United States? Shall the South not exult
in the fact that the industry and persevering
intelligence of the North has placed her
mechanical skill in the front rank of the
civilized world-that our mother country,
whose naughty Minister; some eighty odd
years ago, declared. that not hob-nail
should be made in the colonies. which are
now the United States, was brought some
four years ago to recognize our pre-emi-
nence by sending a commission to our
country TO examine eur workshops and
our machinery, to perfect their own man.
ufacture of the arms necessary for their
defense?
Do not our whole people. interior and
seaboard, North and South, East and West
alike feel proud of the hardihood. the en-
terprise, the skill and the courage of the
Yankee sailor, who has borne our flag far
as the ocean bears its foam, and caused
the name and character of the United
States to be known and respected wherever
there is wealth enough to WOO commerce,
and intelligence enough to honor merritt
So long as we appreciate the achievements
of Jefferson and Adams, of Franklin and
Madison, of Hamilton, Of Hancock, and
OF Rutledga, men who labored for the good
of the whole country and lived for man.
kind, we cannot sink to the petty strife
which would sap the foundations and de-
stroy the fabric our fathers erected and be-
quea;hed as an inheritance to our posterlty
forever. Since the formation of the Con-
stitution, a vast extension of territory, and
the various relations arising therefrom,
have presented problems which could not
have been foreseen. 1t is just cause fol
admiration, even wonder, that the provis-
ions of the fundamental law should have
been found so fully adequate to all the
wants of government, new in its organiza.
ton. and new in many of the principles on
which it was founded. Whatever fears
may have once existed as to the conse.
quence of territorial expansion. must give
way before the evidence which the pas
affords.
The General Government, strictly con.
fined to its delegated functions, and the
States left in the undisturbed exercise O
all else. we have theory and practice
which fits our government for immeasu ra
; bic domain, and might, under a millenni
um of nations, embrace mankind. Fron
the slope of the Atlantic, our population
with ceaseless tide, has poured into the
wide and fertile valley of the Mississippi
Its eddying whirl has passed to the coas
; of the Pacific. From the West and thu
East. the tides are rushing toward eacf
other-and the mind is carried to the da,
l when all the cultivable land will be inhab
} tied. and the American people will sigl
, for more wilderness to conquer. But ther,
is here a physco-political problem present
7 ed for cur solution. Were it purely phys
i ical, your past triumpbs would leave bu
S little doubt of your capacity to solve it.
i community which, when less than twenty
1 thousand, conceived the grand project o
), crossing the White Mountains, and, unaid
b ed, save by the jeers and prophecies of
e failure gave, successfully executed tn
n Herculean work, might we'll be impatient
Q if it were suggested that physical prob
S lem wss before us too difficult for thei
d mastery. The history of man teaches tha
e high mountains aud wide deserts have re
e sisted the permanent extension of empire
# and have formed the immutable boundarie
Q of States.
d From time to time, under some abl
o leader, have the hordes of the upper plain