, if not
prevented by any political folly or mistake.

"It contains more than one-third of the country owned by the United
States-certainly more than one million square miles. Once half as
populous as Massachusetts already is, it would have more than
seventy-five million people. A glance at the map shows that,
territorially speaking, it is the great body of the Republic. The other
parts are but marginal borders to it, the magnificent region sloping
West, from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific, being the deepest and
also the richest in undeveloped resources. In the production of
provisions, grains, grasses, and all which proceed from them, this great
interior region is naturally one of the most important in the World.

"Ascertain from the statistics the small proportion of the region which
has, as yet, been brought into cultivation, and also the large and
rapidly increasing amount of its products, and we shall be overwhelmed
with the magnitude of the prospect presented. And yet this region has
no sea coast, touches no ocean anywhere. As part of one Nation, its
people now find, and may forever find, their way to Europe by New York,
to South America and Africa by New Orleans, and to Asia by San
Francisco.

"But separate our common Country into two nations, as designed by the
present Rebellion, and every man of this great interior region is
thereby cut off from some one or more of these outlets, not, perhaps, by
a physical barrier, but by embarrassing and onerous trade regulations.

"And this is true, wherever a dividing or boundary line may be fixed.
Place it between the now Free and Slave country, or place it South of
Kentucky, or North of Ohio, and still the truth remains, that none South
of it can trade to any port or place North of it, and none North of it
can trade to any port or place South of it except upon terms dictated by
a Government foreign to them.

"These outlets, East, West, and South, are indispensable to the
well-being of the people inhabiting, and to inhabit, this vast interior
region. Which of the three may be the best, is no proper question.
All, are better than either; and all, of right belong to that People,
and to their successors forever. True to themselves, they will not ask
where a line of separation shall be, but will vow rather that there
shall be no such line.

"Nor are the marginal regions less interested in these communications to
and through them, to the great outside World.