Page:Life of Henry Clay (Schurz; v. 1).djvu/220

208 get the wants of our country? Are we to neglect and refuse the redemption of that vast wilderness which once stretched unbroken beyond the Alleghany? I hope for better and nobler things!”

These were captivating appeals, but they involved the largest of latitudinarian doctrines, — namely, that the powers granted by the Constitution must grow with the size of the country. The bill passed the House by a handsome majority; it passed the Senate too, and Monroe signed it on the ground that it provided merely for the collection of information. It resulted in nothing beyond the making of surveys for some roads and canals. However, Clay had on the occasion of this debate not only put the internal-improvement part of his programme once more in the strongest form before Congress and the people, but he had also managed to revive the memory of his opposition to the Monroe administration.

Next came a plunge into the domain of foreign politics. The rising of the Greeks against the Turks was at that time occupying the attention of civilized mankind. The Philhellenic fever, fed partly by a genuine sympathy with a nation fighting for its freedom, partly by a classical interest in the country of Leonidas, Phidias, and Plato, swept over all Europe and America alike. In the United States meetings were held, speeches made, and resolutions passed, boiling over with enthusiasm for the struggling Greeks. It is curious to find even the cool-headed Gallatin, at that period