of humanity gone westward, until, reaching the coast at last, Alaska today lies open to those who wish to find homes in a new country. By 1821 the Union had expanded to include twenty-four states, Louisiana, Missouri and Illinois being the most western.

The "Era of Good Feeling" came in with Monroe, prosperity being the natural result of much that had gone before. In 1819, Spain, finding it impossible to hold Florida advantageously, hemmed in as it had come to be by the United States, ceded it for the sum of $5,000,000 to our government. Another matter of importance during the administration of Monroe was the promulgation of the Monroe Doctrine.

It may be recalled that the Congress of Vienna attempted to set aside the ideas of liberty inculcated by the revolutionary period of 1789 and the years following. Hoping to wipe out the results of Napoleon's quickly established republics, boundaries were set back as they had been before the outbreak of disturbance and rulers restored to their thrones. Under the direction of Prince Metternich of Austria, the Holy Alliance was formed between Austria, Russia and Prussia. Whatever the objects of this alliance as published to the world, its real object was to suppress any demonstration of independence on the part of European subjects. To be sure, the original motive of the three allies was to protect themselves, but they compelled the king of Naples to withdraw a constitution he had granted his people under threatened revolution, and lent their aid willingly for similar assistance wherever it was needed. Spain now besought the Holy Alliance to assist her in rewinning certain colonies in South America which had declared themselves free and independent. Their independence had already been recognized by the United States. It would be plainly a menace to have European powers open a war so near for the purpose of recovering lost territory. More particularly, Russia was making aggressive moves in the northwestern part of North America. Thereupon Monroe issued a proclamation to the effect that the new world was no longer open to colonization by European powers, and that any attempt on the part of such powers to interfere in the affairs of republics already recognized by our government would be interpreted by the United States to be

an unfriendly act.

This had an immediate effect. Spain gave up her plan for coercing her erstwhile possessions and Russia ceased to creep farther down the Pacific coast.

Throughout the eight years that Monroe served as President, and the term filled by John Quincy Adams-singularly uneventful-the growth of material prosperity and the westward expansion were most significant for the future. Five new states were admitted during Monroe's administration alone. The west was fairly teeming with activity.

"Every year the mere scale of affairs, if nothing more, was enlarged and altered, by the tidelike movement of population into the western country, the setting up of new states, the quick transfigurements of economic conditions, the incalculable shiftings and variations of a society always making and to be made. The restless, unceasing, adventurous movement of the nation made a deeper impression upon its politics than did its mere growth. The boatman's song on the long western rivers, the crack of the teamster's whip in the mountain passes, the stroke of the woodman's axe ringing out in the stillness of the forest, the sharp report of the rifle of huntsman, pioneer, and scout on the fast advancing frontier, filled the air as if with the very voices of change, and were answered by events quick with fulfillment of their prophecy."

CHAPTER VI.

FROM JACKSON TO LINCOLN.

The election of Andrew Jackson in 1828 was indicative of the change which unnoticed had gradually come about in the United States. Although not a westerner, the West liked him, feeling that he was one of the people. John Quincy Adams had been a president whom all had found difficult to approach; the West had merely tolerated him. With patriotic intentions and tireless devotion to the round of duties encumbent upon the Chief Executive, he had nevertheless impressed men as belonging to an age already passed away. Jackson was in all senses of the term a self-made man. Self-educated, he had risen into prominence and won distinction in a war with the Indians. In the Seminole war he had acted in such a high-handed way that he had embarrassed the administration and nearly brought on serious trouble with Spain. Yet everyone knew that he had acted from the best motives. His election was hailed by the people generally as a triumph. At last they had a president whom they could understand-who was one of them.

With Jackson came in the "Spoils System," rotation in office, based on the theory that to the victor belongs the spoils. It was popularly believed that the man who had secured the presidency through the instrumentality of his party and his friends was in duty bound to favor the adherents of that party and those friends by dismissing all who held federal offices and giving the positions to his supporters. Accordingly, office holders great and small were summarily turned aside and their places taken by Jackson's friends and co-work

ers.

Until recent years this policy, so extravagant for the country, was followed. Every four years inexperienced men were given federal offices left vacant by others who had just learned the routine of the positions. Thus the government was always educating men, then dismissing them when they had learned their work so they could perform it expeditiously. President Cleveland vigorously opposed the Spoils system,

placing as many offices as possible upon the Civil Service list and allowing the office-holder to remain at his post during good behavior.

As has already been noted, the North had become a manufacturing section; the South, an agricultural region. The culture of cotton was becoming more extensive each year, while rice and tobacco were staple crops. It had been demonstrated that the colored people could thrive well in the warm, moist atmosphere of the southern states, while white laborers found the climate oppressive and often unhealthy. Consequently the South had built up on slave labor, while the North had almost entirely abolished it.

In 1828, congressmen of the North passed a new tariff bill, placing a high duty upon imports, which they wished to keep out of the country for the purpose of encouraging the manufactures of New England. This bill was strenuously fought by southerners, because it appeared to be ruinous to their section. When the bill went into effect its disastrous features were immediately apparent to the South. While cotton brought no more than before, the goods which the South had to buy in exchange cost much more. The condition seemed unbearable. Now it was that the afflicted states harked back to the theory of State Sovereignty and Nullification. South Carolina was foremost in the defense. John C. Calhoun resigned his position as Vice-President, went home and was returned to the United States Senate, there to debate the matter in the interests of his constituents who looked to him for help. Calhoun hoped to see a peaceful adjustment, but he went to the full length of his argument and showed that if one section of the country set up conditions unbearable to the other the afflicted states must seek redress. He held that the Constitution was a compact by which the states relegated certain of their functions to a federal government; that if this federal government usurped other functions, the states might nullify its exercise of power in these directions. He held that Congress had no authority to levy tariffs except for revenue, hence those levied for the fostering of home industries were unconstitutional. While the whole South shared these ideas, they are often spoken of as the Hayne or Calhoun doctrines because these men advocated them so strenuously.

Daniel Webster took the opposing side. He said that nullification on the part of a state of any act passed by Congress was nothing short of rebellion. The speeches made by Hayne, Calhoun and Webster are masterpieces of oratory, and have passed into our recorded history.

Clay came forward with a compromise, providing that the objectionable tariff should be reduced each year until 1842, and thereafter 20 per cent duty should be levied on articles which had been placed upon the dutiable list. This would not be sufficient to "protect" home industries, so the South acquiesced and harmony was again restored. Nevertheless, the theory of Nullification had been only set aside, not exploded.

Jackson opposed the idea of a national bank, so when the charter came up for renewal in 1836, he vetoed it. Instead, the deposits of the government were to be distributed among the various states. As collected, the revenue was deposited in a few favored banks which made such hazardous speculations that during the next administration the whole country was thrown into a serious panic. Plainly finance was a department in which this man of the people was not at home.

The great question which agitated the country from this time forward concerned the extension of slavery. To be sure, marked prosperity attended the United States after the effects of the great panic were passed. Inventions of various kinds opened the way for the utilization of the vast reSources abounding in the new land. In spite of such material advancement, however, there was growing a momentous subject of contention, which, brushed aside for the time, asserted itself again and again, and finally expanded to such proportions that it overshadowed all else.

In 1619, it will be recalled, a Dutch trading vessel brought the first boat-load of Negro slaves to Virginia. They continued to be imported until the year 1808, that being the date specified in the Constitution to terminate such importation. Before the Revolutionary war the North, for the most part, had discontinued slave labor. The social and industrial order gave no such opportunity for slaves to be profitably used as was the case in the South. The Ordinance of 1789 for