Page:Works of John C. Calhoun, v1.djvu/320

 over the constituents of the members of Congress, belonging to his party, as to make their election dependent, not on their fidelity to the constitution or to the country, but on their devotion and submission to party and party interest — his power would become absolute. They then would cease, virtually, to represent the people. Their responsibility would be, not to them, but to him; or to those who might control and use him as an instrument. The Executive, at this stage, would become absolute, so far as the party in power was concerned. It would control the action of the dominant party as effectually as would an hereditary chief-magistrate, if in possession of its powers — if not more so; and the time would not be distant, when the President would cease to be elective; when a contested election, or the paid corruption and violence attending an election, would be made a pretext, by the occupant, or his party, for holding over after the expiration of his term.

Such must be the result, if the process of absorption should be permitted to progress regularly, through all its stages. The causes which would control the event, are as fixed and certain as any in the physical world. But it is not probable that they would be permitted to take their regular course, undisturbed. In a country of such vast extent and diversity of interests as ours, parties, in all their stages, must partake, as I have already shown, more or less of a sectional character. The laws which control their formation, necessarily lead to this. Distance, as has been stated, always weakens, and proximity —