resigning their positions and flying to the south. A union cabinet at once took its place.

In this cabinet was Edwin M. Stanton, a pronounced union man, and John A. Dix, who on assuming his duties as secretary of the treasury roused the patriotism of the whole north by his thrilling dispatch to his revenue officer in New Orleans, "If any one attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot." These vigorous northern Democrats saved Buchanan's administration in its final days from complete collapse, and restored confidence in the stability of the national government.

476. Last Efforts at Compromise-The Peace Convention.—In the meantime, Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky proposed the "Crittenden Compromise," which asked that an amendment be added to the constitution separating the territory of the United States into a slave-state and a free-state portion, the boundary between them to be the old line of 36° 30′. The compromise provided, among other things, that the United States should pay the owner for all fugitive slaves rescued. The compromise was not looked upon with favor in congress. On the suggestion of the Virginia legislature, a peace conference was called to consider the state of public affairs. Accordingly, delegates from twenty-one states met at Washington on February 4, 1861, and proposed an amendment to the constitution prohibiting slavery north of the parallel of 36° 30′, and permitting it south of that line. By its provisions no state could pass a law giving freedom to a fugitive slave or to slaves accompanying a master temporarily into a free state. Congress could in no way interfere with slavery south of the dividing line. The slave trade was to be prohibited forever in the United States. Like the Crittenden Compromise, the recommendation of the peace conference fell by the wayside, a general feeling had obtained in congress and throughout the north that there should be no further compromise with slavery.

477. Government Property Seized: Star of the West Fired Upon. Meanwhile, officers were resigning from the army and the civil service, and joining their fortunes with the seceded states. Arsenals, custom houses, and postoffices were taken possession of, and government property was seized on all sides. Of the southern fortresses, Fortress Monroe, at the entrance of Chesapeake Bay, Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, Fort Pickens at Pensacola, and the defences near Key West, alone remained in possession of the government. Fort Sumter had, after the hostile act of South Carolina, been taken possession of by Major Robert Anderson, who was in command of a small force of United States troops at that point. His action was approved by congress, although he received but little encouragement from the president. The steamer Star of the West was sent with supplies to Fort Sumter, but on nearing the fort was fired upon by a confederate battery, whereupon it returned to the north and left Major Anderson to provision his garrison as best he could. Nothing was being done by either president or congress; the ship of state seemed becalmed in the face of a threatening storm.

478. New States: The Census: Relative Strength of North and South. The federal union, at this time, comprised thirty-four states-Minnesota having been admitted in 1858 as the thirty-second state; Oregon in 1859 as the thirtythird; and Kansas in 1861 as the thirty-fourth. While all three came into the union as free states, the constitution of Oregon was peculiar in that it forbade colored persons settling within the borders of that state.

The total population in 1860, according to the eighth census, amounted to 31,443,332,- -an increase of more than eight million people in ten years. Of the white population, 18,791,159 persons were in the free states, as opposed to 8,182,684 in the slave states. There were 225,967 free colored persons in the north, and 262,003 in the south. In the north there remained but sixty-four slaves, while the

south had a slave population of 3,953,696. Many people in the north urged that the south would never take up arms against the government for fear of provoking a slave insurrection in its very midst. The north, it will be seen, had a population of more than double that of the south, and in wealth and resources it far surpassed the southern section. The spirit of nationality was strong. Free schools and colleges had been planted everywhere. northwest states had increased more rapidly in population than any other section. The third largest state of the union, Ohio (white population 2,302,838), was in this section, as were also Indiana (white population 1,339,000) and Illinois (white population 1,704,323), each with a larger population than either Virginia or Missouri,-the only two southern states whose white population reached over a million.

The great west and

Slavery had retarded the growth of the south in every conceivable way excepting in the raising of cotton and the cultivation of sugar-cane, and no doubt these industries would have thrived as well, if not better, in the hands of free labor. Indeed, as Helper had argued in his "Impending Crisis," free labor in the south had been robbed of its just rewards. Free schools were lacking, railroads and means of intercommunication had not multiplied rapidly; hence travel between the north and south was not fostered. On the other hand, railroads were numerous in the north, and had bound the east firmly to the west by commercial ties which could not be severed. Side by side, two civilizations had grown up in America, the one, dedicated to progress, had kept step with the spirit of the age,-for the best portion of the civilized world had long since turned its back on slavery; the other had held tenaciously to a system in which it did not at first believe and which even in colonial days had been abhorred. Its whole social and political life had come under the iron rule of a landed aristocracy with slavery as the chief excuse for its existence. The people of the two sections had little in common.

Neither understood the other. Since the Com

promise of 1850 they had been drifting rapidly apart, and refused to be reconciled on the question of slavery. To protect that institution, the threat of secession had been carried out, and when Abraham Lincoln entered Washington, it was as the president of a severed republic.

CHAPTER XII

GROWTH OF THE REPUBLIC

1830-1860

479. The Close of an Era.-The year 1860 marked the close of an era in national development which had begun about Jackson's time. The union had grown until it could compete for its rights with the states. The various sections had been held together by compromises which never did more than settle the dispute for the time being. An appeal was now to be made to the sword. The westward movement of the people had brought about a practical application of the question of slavery or freedom to soil hitherto unoccupied,― a question not then decided. The increase of means of communication made migration to the new lands so easy that the troublesome question could no longer be compromised.

480. Territorial Growth.-In 1860 the expanding United States had rounded out the home territory it was to occupy permanently. Like a great band it stretched across the middle of the continent from ocean to ocean. Its commerce could find protection along five-sixths of the habitable coast on the Atlantic; around three-fourths of the Gulf shore proper on the south; and over a thousand miles on the Pacific coast. Not a serious boundary dispute remained to cause anxiety about rights to the soil in the future. With the exception of a few places like the valley of the Red River of the North, the United States occupied the land as far north as was desirable owing to the cold, and as far south as the heat would allow the development of a vigorous people.

POPULATION

481. Growth in Numbers.-So many things depend upon the growth of population, that it must be considered con