Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/96

66 under one government. Wide extent of territory involves the union of these several sections under better safeguards for the protection of their conflicting interests than could be obtained under separate governments. No lover of mankind could wish to see them united upon the plan of the spoliation of one section, or the neglect of its interests, for the aggrandizement of the other sections.

Our ancestors did not rush into union blindly. They pondered deeply and cautiously, often hesitating over the questions at issue. Gradually and firmly there grew up an abiding confidence in the benevolence, moderation and good faith of the several States and sections. A confederated republic, with its limitations and "checks and balances," was the result. The Union was built by many factors. No one factor could have built it; neither the North, nor the South, nor the East, nor the West. It needed the distinctive genius of each, and the combined energy of all. No similar spectacle of national development has ever been presented to the world; so vast, so excellent, so progressive, so permanent. Even its internal struggles are evidences of its strength, and its powers of recuperation prove its healthy constitution.

Every step in the formation, growth and preservation of the Union has been almost a historical miracle. It is wonderful that thirteen separate and independent sovereignties, scattered over a wide extent of territory, should voluntarily unite themselves under one government. It is no less wonderful that such a union should survive the reaction of local jealousies and conflicting interests in the earlier periods, when no effort at coercion would have been entertained.

The first century of national government witnessed many tests of the relative strength of its centrifugal and centripetal forces. In the first reaction, in the early periods of the government, there were minor insurrections. They were easily quelled. As the government