been lessened by the operation of these causes, can only be conjectured; we may be sure however that it is very considerable. The amount of the annual expenditure of the Government, under the subjugation policy, can only be estimated approximately; but it is believed that we shall be safe in assuming it to be, at the very lowest calculation, $216,000,000 for the Army, (300,000 men); $100,000,000 (five per cent. upon $2,000,000,000), for the interest on the debt; $50,000,000 for the navy, (estimate for 1864-5, $142,618,785), and $50,000,000 for the civil service, pensions, Indians, and miscellaneous items, (estimate for same year, $47,604,498). These figures foot up at $416,000,000, being about two and a half per centum per annum on the whole taxable property of the country, as it existed before the war broke out, including slaves. To this is to be added the local taxation, swollen in the loyal States to an enormous bulk by the bounties and other expenses of the warthe two together probably exceeding at the North, five per centum per annum upon the actual value of all the property in the country; or if the same ratio of valuation prevails elsewhere, as in the rural districts of New York, about fifteen per centum per annum upon the assessed valuation. The Secretary of the Treasury estimates the probable receipts, under existing laws, for the next fiscal year (exclusive of loans) as follows: From customs, From internal revenue, From lands, From miscellaneous sources, $ 70,000,000. $201,000,000. So that our present rate of federal taxation, onerous as it is, must be more than doubled. Possibly a legislature, elected by universal suffrage, will continue to pass the necessary laws to compel the people to pay such sums of money, in & period of distress and scarcity, as well as of plenty; but I am very confident that the time will come, when holders of Government securities will fancy (upon grounds either solid or insufficient), that their interest requires that the masses of the people shall no longer enjoy the power, to decide this question for themselves. In considering these figures, and following out the train of reflections to which they give rise, two grave questions, and the consequences to which affirmative answers will lead, also force themselves upon the mind. Will not national bankruptcy overtake us before we have completed the subjugation of the South? or, if we can sustain our national credit so long, can even a military government continue for any length of time to collect such fearful taxes from the people? I suggest these questions for the reader's reflection; they have not escaped my attention; but this work was written with a specific object, and its plan precludes me from discussing them. I have assumed for the sake of the argument, that our arms would ultimately triumph ; and I have attempted to point out the consequences to which successful subjugation would lead. But in doing so I have arrested the discussion at the point where popular liberty falls. CHAPTER XII. The Danger to Poplar Institutions from Party Spirit was overlooked by the Authors of The Federalist-The Honesty and Patriotism of the present Executive and his Party concededBut their Political Training menaces Public Liberty with Destruction-The Dangerous Tendency of the Doctrine that Rulers must be Unconditionally Supported, pending a Great National Crisis— Causes of the excessive Party Spirit which has hitherto ragedAlarming Results which it has already produced-Further Excesses which it threatens during the state of Civil Commotion which will follow the Military Repression of the South-They will render the Preservation of Popular Liberty impossible-The situation of the President and his Necessities-Inefficiency of the restraining Power of Conscience over a Ruler so situated-The manner in which the Constitution will probably be overthrown and the Pretexts by which its Overthrow will be justified-Virulency of Party Spirit during Washington's Administration-His Warning to his Fellow-countrymen against its Effects-His Warning against Usurpation-Results of the Teachings of all the Writers upon the Constitution-Incidents of the Marvland Election of November, 1863. HAVING thus shown in what manner the policy of subjugation, in combination with the political principles and administrative practices involved in its adoption, will enable the Executive to accomplish the ruin of public liberty; and having also explained how two causes will operate, the one to create a powerful class disposed to sustain him in an attempt to accomplish that result, the other to prepare the popular mind to acquiesce in its success; I will now proceed to consider what in fluences will reconcile the President's conscience to the commission of such an act, and overcome, in the minds of his supporters, their attachment to the principles which underlie our existing system of government. And the causes which will produce such results may be all comprehended in one brief sentence-they are the effects of excessive party spirit. The authors of The Federalist, far-seeing and sagacious as they proved themselves to be in other respects, had evidently no adequate conception of the extent and violence which party spirit is capable of attaining, in a country in which the whole policy of the Government, and the enjoyment of all the sweets of power in an immense empire, depend upon the direct result of popular suffrage. In truth, the political and social condition of our ancestors was such that party spirit, although it gave rise to numerous cabals, follies, and crimes, during the Revolution, could not have full scope to display itself in all its deformity, until the adoption of the Constitution relieved it from the trammels which had previously restrained its action, and afforded it an ample field for the display of its vices. For this reason, the argument of The Federalist, relative to the perpetuity of our system of government, admirable as it is in all other respects, contains a fatal flaw. It assumes that the principal danger to public liberty would proceed from the corruption, or the unprincipled ambition of rulers, acting in antagonism to the mass of the people; and having succeeded in demonstrating that those crimes would be ineffectual to deprive a people, living under such a government as it was proposed to establish, of liberties which they should unite to defend, the distinguished writers supposed that they had exhausted the argument. As we have already seen, from the copious extracts which I have made from their work, while they were considering the danger of the overthrow of the State governments and of popular liberty, through the encroachments and usurpations of the general Government, they overlooked the possibility of the existence of a political party in the States themselves, acting in harmony with those who were administering the general Government, to the ultimate destruction of the power and sovereignty of the States, and of the liberties of the people. But time has revealed the existence of this flaw in the panoply of the Constitution, and through it popular institutions are even now receiving the deathstroke. Unless we shall at once arrest the hand which is dealing the fatal blows, we may expect with entire confidence to witness at an early day their utter overthrow and destruction. |