he facts brought to view are
considered, that American slavery, though of little force unaided, yet
properly sustained, is the great central power, or energizing influence,
not only of nearly all the industrial interests of our own country, but
also of those of Great Britain and much of the Continent; and that, if
stricken from existence, the whole of these interests, with the
advancing civilization of the age, would receive a shock that must
retard their progress for years to come.

This is no exaggerated picture of the present imposing power of slavery.
It is literally true. Southern men, at an early day, believed that the
Protective Tariff would have paralyzed it--would have destroyed it. But
the abolitionists, led off by their sympathies with England, and
influenced by American politicians and editors, who advocated free
trade, were made the instruments of its overthrow. No such extended
mining and manufacturing, as the Protective system was expected to
create, has now any existence in the Union. Under it, according to the
theory of its friends, more than one hundred and sixty millions in
value, of the foreign imports for 1853, would have been produced in our
own country. But free trade is dominant: the South has triumphed in its
warfare with the North: the political power passed into its hands with
the defeat of the Father of the Protective Tariff, ten years since, in
the last effort of his friends to elevate him to the Presidency: the
slaveholding and commercial interests then gained the ascendency, and
secured the power of annexing territory at will: the nation has become
rich in commerce, and unbounded in ambition for territorial
aggrandizement: the people acquiesce in the measures of Government, and
are proud of the influence it has gained in the world: nay, more, the
peaceful aspect of the nations has been changed, and the policy of our
own country must be modified to meet the exigencies that may arise.

One word more on the point we have been considering. With the defeat of
Mr. Clay, came the immediate annexation of Texas, and, as he predicted,
the war with Mexico. The results of these events let loose from its
attachments a mighty avalanche of emigration and of enterprise, under
the rule of the free trade policy, then adopted, which, by the golden
treasures it yields, renders that system, thus far, self-sustaining, and
able to move on, as its friends believe, with a momentum that forbids
any attempt to retu