s the pet
of Senator Douglas, increased its business in marvelous manner during
the decade. It soon distanced St. Louis in the race for wealth and
population, and before 1854 conceived of the scheme of building a great
railway, long ago proposed by Asa Whitney, of Michigan, to the Pacific.
This road was to connect with the Illinois Central in Iowa, thread its
way through the Indian lands in Nebraska, and finally bring San
Francisco and the Far East into touch with the commercial center of the
Middle West. It was a magnificent undertaking, not unlike that of the
Erie Canal, which had made New York the Emporium of the East; it was
even more daring for a section already in debt to the limit of its
ability to pay. But these ambitious Northwestern men and politicians
had already won the support of the railway men of New York and Boston,
and their agents still borrowed money with ease in London and Liverpool.
And with States like Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa doubling their
population each decade, and hence increasing their land values three or
fourfold, even the impossible became possible. The most ambitious
section of the Union during the Pierce Administration was the Northwest,
and it need not surprise us to learn that Douglas, her mouthpiece, was
the most ambitious leader of his party.

As compared with all former standards, the country of 1850-60 was
exceedingly prosperous. A series of good crop years, the low tariff of
the United States, and the free-trade policy of England stimulated the
unprecedented commercial activity. The financial system was more stable
than it had ever been before, and the inter-sectional trade was assuming
proportions never dreamed of in the earlier days of the Republic. The
manufactures of the East, which approximated $800,000,000 in value each
year, were sold to the South in exchange for bills on Liverpool or
London, or to the West in return for its grain and other foodstuffs. The
banks and railroads brought all sections closer together, especially the
East and the West; while the expanding merchant marine promised soon to
give the United States the mastery of international commerce.

Thus the East had learned to prosper without a high tariff, and the
South was voting for large subsidies to Eastern shipping. The West had
found a way to develop her resources in spite of Southern and Eastern
jealousy, and the laws of commerce were daily weakening the influence of
state rights and sectional disl