294 HOW COULD THE DECLARATION BE MADE GOOD? ican should understand and remember, between the allegiance by which the Colonies held themselves bound to the king, and any and all obligations of obedience to Parliament. They disclaimed the authority of Parliament altogether. The tie,' he says, which our Revolution was to break, did not subsist between us and the British Parliament, or between us and the British Government in the aggregate, but directly between us and the king himself. They had uniformly denied that Parliament had authority to make laws for them. There was, therefore, no subjection to Parliament to be thrown off. Parliament is not so much as mentioned in the whole instrument. Hence, there was this clear and obvious necessity of founding the Declaration on the misconduct of the king himself; and this gives to that instrument its personal application, and its character of direct and pointed accusation.' ' An American Party in Great Britain, and on the Continent.-The act of Declaration was, however, applauded by the enlightened and liberal portion of the British nation; and, from that day to this, the noblest Englishmen have been proud to rank themselves among the friends of America. As had been clearly predicted also, by the most sagacious members of the Continental Congress, that final announcing ourselves as a nation, commanded the respect of every cabinet on the Continent of Europe, and opened the way for diplomatic intercourse, and confidential and public negotiations with France, Holland, and other States. They soon afterwards saw their way to aid the American cause; and at a not late period, to recognize our independence. How was the Declaration to be Made Good?-This was the next great question before the nation. The Declaration itself announced the American Theory in words, the memory of which,' said Buckle, 'can never die.' The existence of a new political sovereignty de jure, implied the necessity of establishing it de facto. In this manner only, by the usages of international law, could the new Power claim admission into the society of nations. In a letter to James Warren, Samuel Adams had said in the preceding April:- The child Independence is now struggling for birth: I trust in a short time it will be brought forth; and in spite of Pharaoh, all America will hail the dignified stranger.' It did; events alone were to determine if it was to be thus hailed by mankind. Resources for Achieving Independence. They should be considered in the following order: TERRITORY:-In 1783, the area of the United States was estimated at 820,680 square miles. In 1854, at 2,936,166. In 1868, at about 3,466,000. The following are the statistics: 1 In Jefferson's draught of the Declaration of Inde pendence had inserted these words :-That in constituting indeed our several forms of government, we had adopted one common king, thereby laying a foundation for perpetual league and amity with them; but that submission to their Parliament was no part of our Constitution, not even in idea,'-Congress would not go so far as to recognize the existence of the British Parliament, and therefore the passage was struck out. RESOURCES OF THE COUNTRY. Original limits of the Thirteen States. Louisiana, purchased of France in 1803, for $15,000,000. Territory, confirmed by the Oregon Treaty in 1842, and 1846.. New Mexico and California in 1847 (cost of the war), $15,000,000... 295 SQUARE MILES 820,680 899,579 66,900 308,052 318,000 522,955 30,000 500,000 3,466,166 Of that portion of the territory of North America, which lies between the Alleghany Mountains and the Atlantic coast then occupied by the Thirteen Colonies, Frothingham says: This region, of a mean breadth of about one hundred miles, and nine hundred miles in length, is characterized as a long ridge of rock and sand, presenting obstacles, rather than offering temptations, to the husbandman. It had, however, no wastes like the deserts of Africa, and no impassable barriers between the north and the south; while parts of it were enriched by nature with the most luxuriant fruitfulness of the torrid zone. Its coasts were admirably adapted to foster the growth of a commercial marine; and its long, wide, and deep rivers invited inter-communication.' To the rear of this region was the valley of the Mississippi which De Tocqueville declares in his 'Democracy in America,' to be, 'the most magnificent dwelling-place prepared by God for man's abode;' while the whole continent seemed to be fashioned by providence for the uses of a great nation.' Writing to Lord Kames in 1776, Franklin said: 'America, an immense territory, favored by nature with all advantages of climate, soils, great navigable rivers, lakes, etc., must become a great country, populous and mighty.' In No. 2 of the Federalist, written by John Jay 'to the people of the State of New York,' printed in 1787, in speaking of 'independent America as one connect. ed, fertile, wide-spreading country, blest with a variety of soils, and productions, and watered with innumerable streams for the delight and accommodation of its inhabitants,' he says 'it appears as if it was the design of Providence that an inheritance so proper and convenient for a band of brethren united to each other by the strongest ties, should never be split into a number of unsocial, jealous and alien sovereignties.' Agriculture. It was in its infancy. Little more was produced from the soil than the necessities of the people required. All the implements of tillage were of primitive simplicity, and the labor put forth upon the land was mainly by sheer brute force. For agricultural reliances this much only was certain that when the fields were not trampled by the hoof of war,' there 1 In the second volume of Webster's Works, page 607, he cites as of authority the following facts from Gallagher's address before the Ohio Historical Society: "Prior to the year 1800, eight or ten keel boats of about twenty-five tons each, performed all the carrying trade between Cincinnati and Pittsburg. The first government vessel appeared on Lake Erie in 1802; the first steamboat was launched at Pittsburg in 1811; the first on Lake Michigan in 1826; and they first appeared at Chicago in 1832. 296 AGRICULTURE AND POPULATION. would be always a prospect of enough food for the people, no matter how many of its men were sent to fight its battles, nor how many years the war might last. This general statement must suffice, till we reach the close of the Revolution, when it will be necessary to look more carefully into the methods and extent of agriculture, and how its products were increased. Population.-Until the year 1790, when the first census of the population of the United States was taken, there were no means of ascertaining their exact number. The estimates differ widely, ranging at the beginning of the Revolution, from two millions and a quarter, as high as three millions and twenty-six thousand, the latter being the estimate of Congress. It is believed, however, that the estimate was too large, and that this number could not have been reached before the Declaration of Independence. I am inclined to regard the calculation of Professor Tucker, in his History of the United States, volume i., page 96, as being the most reliable yet made. At the date of the opening of the Revolution, he makes the following apportionment, which doubtless gives the relative importance of the Colonies as satisfactorily as we are ever likely to obtain : In this case, however, the resources of the country should not be measured by the ordinary standard as to population. It will give a better idea, if we show the pro rata of men furnished for the Revolutionary armies drawn from the whole body of the people. When in 1790, in the first Congress under the Constitution, a call was made for the number of men furnished for the war by each State, and the number of the militia, the answer from the War Department, then under the charge of General Knox, gave the following table, which is copied from the first volume of American Archives: REVOLUTIONARY TROOPS AND MILITIA. Statement of the number of troops and militia furnished by the several States, for the support of the Revolutionary war, from 1775 to 1783, inclusive. Number of 291 Total militia Conjectural and continental estimate of Number of continental troops. It should be understood that, at this time, there was but little difference in numbers between the population of the Southern States and that of the Northern States. By the census of 1790, the Southern had a population of 1,956,354; the Northern had a population of 1,968,455. But, notwithstanding this comparative equality of population in the two sections, the North furnished vastly more men than the South. Of continental troops, the Southern States furnished 58,421; the Northern furnished 172,496; making about three men furnished to the continental army by the Northern States, to one from the Southern. But these figures, surprising as they are, would not alone account for the great results achieved during the War for Independence. For this, we must look at the character of the men whose qualifications were so peculi arly adapted to the hard services they performed. In some respects, they differed from the great body of armies ordinarily serving in campaigns. First:-The rank and file was made up of primitive men, and mostly in the full vigor of manhood; for as a rule, the youth of the country staid at home to go to school, or work in the shops, or on the farms. They had not only been enervated by no luxury, but they had been inured to health, and continuous labor, and by consent of the military men of the Revolution, both American and foreign officers, they were unequalled by the troops of any nation, in their ability to endure exposure, privation, and fatigue. With scarcely an exception, they had been accustomed from boyhood to the use of firearms. The rifle has always been the toy of the American boy, and in 298 ELEMENTS OF THE REVOLUTIONARY ARMY. subduing the continent, it has been the chief reliance of the pioneer settler. Second-Intelligence. What is popularly called ignorance, was unknown from the earliest life of the Colonies; and just so far as intelligence, linked with independent thinking, and the ingenuity which is begotten by necessity for economy and improvised contrivances, with habits of reliance on selfjudgment, make men useful and strong, just in that proportion did the American soldiers surpass in efficiency those brought against them. Third:-Devotion to country. To be patriotic was the habit of men in those days; to be true to the flag was the law-to betray it,—the cases were too rare to mention. The records of the Revolution are filled with instances of devotion to the cause of Independence, which, however admirable, became too common to be distinguished. When men went into that war, they made up their minds to win or lose all; hence there was no half-way work. Every man put his whole strength into the work of every day. There was deliberation in council, but there was no slow acting. When an officer was asked for a man to perform some special service, he was at a loss whom to choose amongst so many. It grew into a proverb when some man of special qualities was called for, 'Take the first man you lay your hands on.' From the highest to the lowest, they all had a common interest-everything was at stake for every man. It is evident enough that few armies have been made up of such material. As fast as European officers became acquainted with these characteristics, just as fast did the words fall from their mouth: 'Such men can never be conquered.' 1 These were about all the resources the Americans had to carry on the war for the first two or three years. The Colonies were poor. There was no money; there was no machinery for manufacturing firearms, or other munitions of war. The raw material was obtained only by the hardest, and almost everything had to be done by hand.' As for credit, it scarcely occurred to anybody to ask it. Some of the Colonies, especially Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New York, had indeed built up a considerable commerce with the West Indies, and other foreign countries; and the hardy mariners of New England were cultivating the fisheries of Newfound land, and even chasing the whale of the Northern Ocean. But hereafter, any American vessel which ventured to sea, could expect to escape capture only by fast sailing, or cutting her way against odds. The whole Atlantic seaboard was blockaded. No help could for a long time be looked for from abroad, and nothing was left but for the brave Colonists who had defied the mightiest empire on the globe, but to go into battle trusting to their own valor, the justice of their cause, and the help of Heaven. How Effectually this Work was to be Done.--It is no part of my plan to 1 It reminds us of a well-known incident in the beginning of the Civil War, when an accident disabled the engine of a train carrying the 6th Massachusetts regi ment through Maryland. The cominander asked any body who could repair it, to come forward-twenty-six engineers instantly stepped from the ranks. |