These facts may serve to suggest the value of the various commercial
facilities as means of political unitization. A country without the
means of travel and transportation may readily separate into independent
fragments whenever any arbitrary institution, as that of slavery,
develops antagonism between different geographical sections; and in that
case the arbitrary institution would triumph, and civilization would be
thrown backward. But in a country which speaks the same language, and is
checkered all over by the pathways of commercial and social
intercourse--since there is no place for division except by the rupture
of innumerable ligaments--the integrity of its oneness will maintain
itself; and if necessary to this end, the arbitrary institution, or
cause of attempted rupture, whatever It may be, will be swept out of
existence.
The vindication of national unity is the great issue; the abasement of
slavery a subordinate one.
Here, then, may we perceive some reasons why our labor and sacrifice for
the restoration of the Union are not given in vain; that we are not
struggling to sustain a structure which will be liable at any time to
pass into the history of the 'fall of empires.' We have the
encouragement of new conditions--of conditions which give a warrant,
wherever they obtain, for the permanence of political unity.
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