Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 23.djvu/14

 8 Southern Historical Society Papers.

to the South for actual land. We commence with the fact that in the beginning the Southern Colonies brought into the common prop- erty largely the greatest landed wealth. Take the munificent grant of your own Virginia by its cession of territory to which jurists said and say it had a valid title; look at the gift made by Maryland, North Carolina's donation of Tennessee, and Georgia's cession from the Chattahoochee to the Mississippi; then examine that outlying range of northwestern territory won and held by the backwoods' boys, from Virginia and Kentucky, of which a northern first-rank historian frankly says, ' 'All our territory lying beyond the Allegha- nies north and south was first won for us by Southwesterners fight- ing for their land. ' ' Survey also the regal possessions of the French, then called Louisiana, broadening out from the delta of the Missis- sippi along the right bank of that mighty river, in shape like an eagle's wing whose tip touched the British possessions on the north line of the present Dakotas, and covering ground nearly one-third the United States! That imperial region was seized in peace from Napoleon by the statesmanship of Southern men against the resent- ment of Great Britain and over the protesting fears of our timid country- men who opposed the aggrandizement of our nation by territorial extension. Next came the acquisition of Florida from Spain, by which the same Southern policy secured that inviting realm of beauty, where the gentle climate invites the shivering Northerners to flee the wrath to come and revel in the luscious lures of orange groves. Will they not, while breathing the balm of Indian river and Tampa's strand will they not bless the valor of Andrew Jack- son and the acquisitive statesmanship of his Southern compeers which delivered this glorious peninsula from the oppression of Spain and committed it to the keeping of the American Union? And next in order, great Texas won by annexation and consequent Mexican war, followed by victory, peace and purchase, that brought us for a trifle in money the ownership of New Mexico, the garden fields of all the Californias and a Pacific shore line whose harbors now open to the trade of the Orient. Everybody knows that this magnificent gain was the result of the South' s aggressive policy and occurred through the administration of a Southern President. Last comes Arizona, known in the annals of acquisition as the Gadsden purchase, achieved, as is conceded, by the skill of the South Carolina Senator, who by special mission contrived the trade. Now, take your map of these United States and territories. Survey with all your American pride the broad domain of the American Union in the best portion of the