way to complete disinthralment. The Spanish-American Provinces revolted,
and seven new Republics, with constitutions not widely differing from our
own--Buenos Ayres, Guatamala, Colombia, Mexico, Chili, Central America,
and Peru--suddenly claimed audience and admission among the nations of the
earth. The people of those countries were but doubtfully prepared to
maintain their contest for independence, or to support republican
institutions. But on the other side Spain was enervated and declining. She
applied to the Holy League of Europe for their aid, and the new Republics
applied to the United States for that recognition which could not fail to
impart strength. The question was momentous. The ancient colonial system
was at stake. All Europe was interested in maintaining it. The Holy League
held Europe fast bound to the rock of despotism, and were at liberty to
engage the United States in a war for the subversion of their
independence, if they should dare to extend their aid or protection to the
rebellious Colonies in South America.

Such a war would be a war of the two continents--an universal war. Who
could foretell its termination, or its dread results? But the emancipation
of Spanish America was necessary for our own larger freedom, and our own
complete security. That freedom and that security required that the
nations of Europe should relax their grasp on the American Continent. The
question was long and anxiously debated. The American people hesitated to
hazard, for speculative advantages, the measures of independence already
obtained. Monroe and Adams waited calmly and firmly. The impassioned voice
of Henry Clay rose from the Chamber of Representatives. It rang through
the continent like the notes of the clarion, inspiring South America with
new resolution, and North America with the confidence the critical
occasion demanded. That noble appeal was answered. South America stood
firm, and North America was ready. Then it was that John Quincy Adams,
with those generous impulses which the impatient blood of his
revolutionary sire always prompted, and with that enlightened sagacity
which never misapprehended the interests of his country, nor mistook the
time nor the means to secure them, obtained from the administration and
from Congress the acknowledgment of the independence of the young American
nations. To give decisive effect to this great measure, Monroe, in 1823,
solemnly declared to the world, that thenceforth an