A Southern Population,
Therefore, Of Five Thousand Free Men And Five Thousand Slaves Would
Claim As Many Representatives As A Northern Population Of Eight
Thousand Free Men, Although The Voting Would Be Confined To The
Free Population.
This has ever since been the law of the United
States.
The Western power is nearly equal to that of the North, and this
fact, somewhat exaggerated in terms, is a frequent boast in the
mouths of Western men. "We ran Fremont for President," they say,
"and had it not been for Northern men with Southern principles, we
should have put him in the White House instead of the traitor
Buchanan. If that had been done there would have been no
secession." How things might have gone had Fremont been elected in
lieu of Buchanan, I will not pretend to say; but the nature of the
argument shows the difference that exists between Northern and
Western feeling. At the time that I was in the West, General
Fremont was the great topic of public interest. Every newspaper
was discussing his conduct, his ability as a soldier, his energy,
and his fate. At that time General McClellan was in command at
Washington on the Potomac, it being understood that he held his
power directly under the President, free from the exercise of
control on the part of the veteran General Scott, though at that
time General Scott had not actually resigned his position as head
of the army. And General Fremont, who some five years before had
been "run" for President by the Western States, held another
command of nearly equal independence in Missouri.
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