om the United States.

Well, Sir, we know what followed. The age of cotton became the golden
age of our Southern brethren. It gratified their desire for improvement
and accumulation, at the same time that it excited it. The desire grew
by what it fed upon, and there soon came to be an eagerness for other
territory, a new area or new areas for the cultivation of the cotton
crop; and measures leading to this result were brought about rapidly,
one after another, under the lead of Southern men at the head of the
government, they having a majority in both branches of Congress to
accomplish their ends. The honorable member from South Carolina[6]
observed that there has been a majority all along in favor of the North.
If that be true, Sir, the North has acted either very liberally and
kindly, or very weakly; for they never exercised that majority
efficiently five times in the history of the government, when a division
or trial of strength arose. Never. Whether they were outgeneralled, or
whether it was owing to other causes, I shall not stop to consider; but
no man acquainted with the history of the Union can deny that the
general lead in the politics of the country, for three fourths of the
period that has elapsed since the adoption of the Constitution, has been
a Southern lead.

In 1802, in pursuit of the idea of opening a new cotton region, the
United States obtained a cession from Georgia of the whole of her
western territory, now embracing the rich and growing States of Alabama
and Mississippi. In 1803 Louisiana was purchased from France, out of
which the States of Louisiana, Arkansas, and Missouri have been framed,
as slave-holding States. In 1819 the cession of Florida was made,
bringing in another region adapted to cultivation by slaves. Sir, the
honorable member from South Carolina thought he saw in certain
operations of the government, such as the manner of collecting the
revenue, and the tendency of measures calculated to promote emigration
into the country, what accounts for the more rapid growth of the North
than the South. He ascribes that more rapid growth, not to the operation
of time, but to the system of government and administration established
under this Constitution. That is matter of opinion. To a certain extent
it may be true; but it does seem to me that, if any operation of the
government can be shown in any degree to have promoted the population,
and growth, and wealth of the North, it is much more su