greatness....

We are now, thank God, once more at peace. Our belligerent rights may
therefore sleep for a season. May their repose be long and profound! But
the time must arrive when the interests and honor of this great nation
will command them to awake; and when it does arrive, I feel undoubting
confidence that they will rise from their slumber in the fullness of
their strength and majesty, unenfeebled and unimpaired by the judgment
of this high court.

The skill and valor of our infant navy, which has illuminated every sea,
and dazzled the master states of Europe by the splendor of its triumphs,
have given us a pledge which I trust will continue to be dear to every
American heart, and to influence the future course of our policy, that
the ocean is destined to acknowledge the youthful dominion of the West.

* * * * *

=_James Madison, 1751-1836._= (Manual, p. 486.)

From his "Report of Debates in the Federal Convention."

=_72._= VALUE OF A RECORD OF THE DEBATES.

The close of the war, however, brought no cure for the public
embarrassments. The states relieved from the pressure of foreign danger,
and flushed with the enjoyment of independent and sovereign power,
instead of a diminished disposition to part with it, persevered in
omissions, and in measures, incompatible with their relations to the
federal government, and with those among themselves.

... It was known that there were individuals who had betrayed a bias
towards monarchy, and there had always been some not unfavorable to a
partition of the Union into several confederacies; either from a better
chance of figuring on a sectional theatre, or that the sections would
require stronger governments, or by their hostile conflicts lead to a
monarchical consolidation. The idea of dismemberment had recently made
its appearance in the newspapers.

Such were the defects, the deformities, the diseases, and the ominous
prospects, for which the convention were to provide a remedy, and
which ought never to be overlooked in expounding and appreciating the
constitutional charter--the remedy that was provided.

The curiosity I had felt during my researches into the history of the
most distinguished confederacies, particularly those of antiquity, and
the deficiency I found in the means of satisfying it, more especially
in what related to the process, the principles, the reasons, and the
anticipations, which prevailed in the formation