Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 9).djvu/16

 *gation of Western conditions assumed a new phase. No longer the passing traveller, noting the novelties and peculiarities of the people, Flint began a systematic observation of American institutions in general, and particularly the political, social, and economic life of the Middle West. In his succinct but comprehensive study of the national constitution and local state governments, he anticipates De Tocqueville and Bryce. His comments upon the judicial system show an appreciation of the stern necessities of primitive justice, coupled with the law-abiding spirit characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon race. His notes upon the power of public opinion as a restraining force in political life, and upon the universal veneration for the constitution, show that he discovered the fundamental principles underlying American political life. His comprehension of the historical development of the West is remarkable for keen insight and prophetic vision. He realized what the acquisition of Louisiana had meant in dispelling the dangers of a Western secession from the republic; and showed that the true interests of the West allied her with Eastern markets.

Looming large on the horizon, Flint discerned the second factor which was to rend American life. The discussion of the Missouri Compromise had scarce begun, but already he saw that the nation could not always exist half-slave and half-free. He saw also that the long border line forming a kind of moral boundary, was the crucial difficulty, and that the acute stage in the controversy would be reached over the question of fugitive slaves. To the present generation these seem self-evident truths; but few Americans and fewer foreigners had the keenness to perceive this before 1820. Flint, however, unlike many Englishmen of his day, was no radical condemner of slav