and prosecute it as the Nation's matter, with a
liberal-mindedness learned from the conduct of a great war. Next to the
salvation of the Union, the completion of the Pacific Road most fully
justifies prompt action and comparative disregard of expenditure.

It is not our purpose, nor is this the place, to dictate to our
legislators either the precise line of their own action or that of the
road. It is still proper to say that the arrangements thus far entered
into with private contractors have proved inadequate to the
accomplishment and unworthy of the character of the enterprise. Whatever
may be the details of the improved plan, it must embrace a sterner
national surveillance over the execution of the project, and a direct
national assumption of its prime responsibility.

It is a mistaken notion to suppose that the Pacific-Railroad question
rests on the same principles as that of our minor internal improvements.
It calls for no reopening of the long-hushed controversy between
Democracy and Whiggism. The best thinkers of the day are universally
agreed to deprecate legislation in every case where private enterprise
will do its office. No good political economist approves the
emasculation of private effort by Government subsidy. The people are
averse to statutory crutches and go-carts, wherever it is possible for
them to walk alone. We feel distrust of the railroad which asks
monopoly-privileges. The sight of a Governmental prop under any
ostensibly commercial concern warns an American from its neighborhood.
He has learned that true prestige lies with the people,--that there is
no vital warmth in official patronage. Even within the memory of young
men a great change for the better has taken place in our commercial
manliness. Out first-class public enterprises blush to take Government
help, as their directors might blush, if at the close of an interview
Mr. Lincoln "tipped" them like school-boys with a holiday handful of
greenbacks. There is no doubt that the ideal principle of democratic
progress demands the absolute non-interference of Government in all
enterprises whose benefit accrues to a part of its citizens, or which
can be stimulated into life by the spontaneous operation of popular
interest.

But facts are not ideal, and absolute principles in their practical
application make head only by a curved line of compromise with the
facts. The philosopher cannot go faster than the people. Certain courses
are proper for