Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 1

by Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle

Hence is it that a Canadian, residing, as it were, on the Neutral Ground, can so much better appreciate the tone of feeling in America, as the United States' people love to call their country, than an Englishman, Scotchman, or Irishman can; for here are visible the very springs that regulate the machinery, which are covered and hidden by the vast space of the Atlantic. You can form no idea of the American character by the merchants, travelling gentry, or diplomatists, who visit London and the sea-ports. You must have lengthened and daily opportunities of observing the people of a new country, where a new principle is working, before you can venture safely to pronounce an attempt even at judgment.

Monsieur Tocqueville, who is always lauded to the skies for his philosophic and truly extraordinary view of American policy and institutions, has perhaps been as impartial as most republican writers since the days of the enthusiast Volney, on the merits or demerits of the monarchical and democratic systems; yet his opinions are to be listened to very cautiously, for the leaven was well mixed in his own cake before it was matured for consumption by the public.

Weak and prejudiced minds receive the doctrines of a philosopher like Tocqueville as dictations: he pronounced ex cathedra his doctrines, and it is heresy to gainsay them. Yet, as an able writer in that universal book, "The Times," says, reason and history read a different sermon.

That democracy is an essential principle, and must sooner or later prevail amongst all people, is very analogous to the prophecy of Miller, that the material world is to be rolled up as a garment, and shrivelled in the fire on the thirteenth day of some month next year, or the year after.

These fulminations are very semblable to those of the popes—harmless corruscations—a sort of aurora borealis, erratic and splendid, but very unreal and very unsearchable as to cause and effect.

There can be, however, very little doubt in the mind of a person whose intellects have been carefully developed, and who has used them quietly to reason on apparent conclusions, that the form of government in the United States has answered a purpose hitherto, and that a wise one; for the impatience of control which every new-comer from the Old World naturally feels, when he discovers that he has only escaped the dominion of long-established custom to fall under the more despotic dominion of new opinions, prompts him, if he differs, and he always naturally does, where so many opinions are suddenly brought to light and forced on his acquiescence, to move out of their sphere. Hence emigration westward is the result; and hence, for the same reasons, the old seaboard States, where the force of the laws operates more strongly than in the central regions, annually pour out to the western forests their masses of discontented citizens.

The feeling of old Daniel Boone and of Leather Stockings is a very natural one to a half-educated or a wholly uneducated man, and no doubt also many quiet and respectable people get harassed and tired of the caucusing and canvassing for political power, which is incessantly going on under the modern system of things in America, and take up their household gods to seek out the land flowing with milk and honey beyond the wilderness.

No person can imagine the constant turmoil of politics in the Northern States. The writer already quoted says, that there is "one singular proof of the general energy and capacity for business, which early habits of self-dependence have produced;—almost every American understands politics, takes a lively interest in them (though many abstain under discouragement or disgust from taking a practical part), and is familiar, not only with the affairs of his own township or county, but with those of the State or of the Union; almost every man reads about a dozen newspapers every day, and will talk to you for hours, (tant bien que mal) if you will listen to him, about the tariff and the Ashburton treaty."

And he continues by stating that this by no means interferes with his private affairs; on the contrary, he appears to have time for both, and can reconcile "the pursuits of a bustling politician and a steady man of business. Such a union is rarely found in England, and never on, the Continent."

But what is the result of such a union of versatile talent? Politics and dollars absorb all the time which might be used to advantage for the mental aggrandizement of the nation; and every petty pelting quidnunc considers himself as able as the President and all his cabinet, and not only plainly tells them so every hour, but forces them to act as he wills, not as wisdom wills. There is a Senate, it is true, where some of this popular fervour gets a little cooling occasionally: but, although there are doubtless many acute minds in power, and many great men in public situations, yet the majority of the people of intellect and of wealth in the United States keep aloof whilst this order of things remains: for, from the penny-postman and the city scavenger to the very President himself, the qualification for office is popular subserviency.