domain.
Blessed, too, with a fertile soil, our produce has always been very
abundant, leaving, even in years the least favorable, a surplus for
the wants of our fellow-men in other countries. Such is our peculiar
felicity that there is not a part of our Union that is not particularly
interested in preserving it. The great agricultural interest of the
nation prospers under its protection. Local interests are not less
fostered by it. Our fellow-citizens of the North engaged in navigation
find great encouragement in being made the favored carriers of the
vast productions of the other portions of the United States, while
the inhabitants of these are amply recompensed, in their turn, by the
nursery for seamen and naval force thus formed and reared up for
the support of our common rights. Our manufactures find a generous
encouragement by the policy which patronizes domestic industry, and the
surplus of our produce a steady and profitable market by local wants in
less-favored parts at home.

Such, then, being the highly favored condition of our country, it is
the interest of every citizen to maintain it. What are the dangers
which menace us? If any exist they ought to be ascertained and guarded
against.

In explaining my sentiments on this subject it may be asked, What raised
us to the present happy state? How did we accomplish the Revolution?
How remedy the defects of the first instrument of our Union, by infusing
into the National Government sufficient power for national purposes,
without impairing the just rights of the States or affecting those of
individuals? How sustain and pass with glory through the late war?
The Government has been in the hands of the people. To the people,
therefore, and to the faithful and able depositaries of their trust is
the credit due. Had the people of the United States been educated in
different principles, had they been less intelligent, less independent,
or less virtuous, can it be believed that we should have maintained the
same steady and consistent career or been blessed with the same
success? While, then, the constituent body retains its present sound and
healthful state everything will be safe. They will choose competent
and faithful representatives for every department. It is only when
the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into
a populace, that they are incapable of exercising the sovereignty.
Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. T