The latter class began to
distrust universal suffrage, to lose faith in the people, and to
dream of modifying the American constitution so as to make it
conform more nearly to the English model. The war has proved
that the were wrong, for nothing is more certain than that the
people have saved the national unity and integrity almost in
spite of their government. The General government either was not
disposed or was afraid to take a decided stand against secession,
till forced to do it by the people themselves. No wise American
can henceforth distrust American democracy. The people may be
trusted. So much is settled. But as the two extremes were
equally democratic, as the secessionists acted in the name of
popular sovereignty, and as the humanitarians were not unwilling
to allow separation, and would not and did not engage in the war
against secession for the sake of the Union and the integrity of
the national domain, the conviction becomes irresistible that it
was not democracy in the sense of either of the extremes that
made the war and came out of it victorious; and hence the real
American democracy must differ from them both, and is neither a
personal nor a humanitarian, but a territorial democracy. The
true idea of American democracy thus comes out, for the first
time, freed from the two extreme democracies which have been
identified with it, and henceforth enters into the understandings
as well as the hearts of the people.
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