But Germany is the most instructive example. Here, from generation to generation, have State pretensions triumphed, perversely postponing that National Unity which is the longing of the German heart. Stretching from the Baltic to the Adriatic and the Alps, penetrated by great rivers, possessing an harmonious expanse of territory, speaking one language, filled with the same intellectual life, and enjoying a common name, which has been historic from the days of Tacitus, Germany, like France, seems formed for unity. Martin Luther addressed one of his grand letters An die Deutsche Nation (To the German Nation); and these words are always touching to Germans as the image of what they desire so much. Thus far the great longing has failed. Even the Empire, where all were gathered under one imperial head, was only a variegated patchwork of States. Feudalism, in its most extravagant pretensions, still prevails. Confederation takes the place of Nationality, and this vast country, with all its elements of unity, is only a discordant conglomerate. North and South are inharmonious, Prussia and Austria representing two opposite sections. Other divisions have been more perplexing. Not to speak of Circles, or groups, each with a diet of its own, which once existed, I mention simply the later division into thirty-nine States, differing in government and in extent, being monarchies, principalities, dukedoms, and free cities, all proportionately represented in a general council or diet, and proportionately bound to the common defence, but every one filled with State egotism. So complete was this disjunction, and such its intolerable pretensions, that internal commerce, the life-blood of the Nation, was strangled. Down to a recent day, each diminutive state had its own custom-house, where the traveller was compelled to exhibit his passport and submit to local levies. This universal obstruction slowly yielded to a Zollverein, or Customs-Union, under which these barriers were obliterated and customs were collected on the external frontiers. Here was the first triumph of Unity. Meanwhile the perpetual strife between Prussia and Austria broke out in terrible battle. Prussia has succeeded in absorbing several of the smaller states. But the darling passion of the German heart is still unsatisfied. Not in fact, but in aspiration only, is Germany one nation. Patriot Poetry takes up the voice, and, scorning the claims of individual states, principalities, and cities, scorning also the larger claims of Prussia and Austria alike, exclaims, in the spirit of a true Nationality:—
“That is the German’s fatherland
Where Germans all as brothers glow;
That is the land;
All Germany’s thy fatherland.”
God grant that the day may soon dawn when all Germany shall be one!
Confessing the necessity of a true national life, we have considered what is a Nation, and how the word itself implies indestructible unity under one government with common rights of citizenship; and then we have seen how this idea has grown with the growth of civilization, slowly conquering the adverse pretensions of States, until at last even Italy became one nation, while Germany was left still struggling for the same victory. And now I come again to the question with which I began.
Are we a Nation? Surely we are not a City-State, like Athens and early Rome in antiquity, or like Florence and Frankfort in modern times; nor, whatever the extent of our territory, are we an Empire cemented by conquest, like that of later Rome, or like that of Charlemagne; nor are we a Feudal Confederation, with territory parcelled among local pretenders; nor are we a Confederation in any just sense. From the first settlement of the country down to the present time, whether in the long annals of the Colonies or since the Colonies were changed into States, there has been but one authentic voice: now breaking forth in organized effort for Union; now swelling in that majestic utterance of a united people, the Declaration of Independence; now sounding in the scarcely less majestic utterance of the same united people, the opening words of the National Constitution; and then again leaping from the hearts of patriots. All these, at different times and in various tones, testify that we are one people, under one sovereignty, vitalized and elevated by a dedication to Human Rights.
There is a distinction for a long time recognized by German writers, and denoted by the opposite terms Staatenbund and Bundesstaat,—the former being “a league of states,” and the latter “a state formed by a league.” In the former the separate states are visibly distinct; in the latter they are lost in unity. And such is the plain condition of our republic.