1863.] 263 [Sharswood. 



itself. There is no way in which it can be remedied. So it would 

 seem that men must in the end be obliged to live under the govern- 

 ment of one, if a species of constitution had not been devised 

 which has all the internal advantages of a republic and external 

 force of a monarchy. I speak of a Federal Republic." (Montesq. 

 De I'Esprit des Lois, lib. ix, chap. 1.) Tliis was the deliberate con- 

 clusion of Mr. Ingersoll's judgment; that sovereign states, each small 

 in territory, and organized as a Representative Democracy, but com- 

 bined together in a Federal Union, was the system most adapted to 

 educate the individual citizen, develop the resources, secure the in- 

 dustry, and strengthen the defences of a country. This seemed to 

 him the voice of history; for what form of government has stood 

 longer, borne the storms of faction, weathered the tempests of foreign 

 war, and at the same time afforded the citizen the political education 

 which elevated his character, and made nations of great men, like 

 the Federal League of Achaia, the Confederation of the Swiss Can- 

 tons, and the United Provinces of Holland ? Right or wrong, this was 

 the principle of Mr. Ingersoll's political life He cherished an un- 

 shaken confidence in the power of a Federal Union of States to ex- 

 tend the benefits of republican institutions over the widest extent of 

 territory. He gave his cordial support to the Constitution of the 

 United States, as on the whole the best compromise that could have 

 been devised, and kept steadily in view as his polar star, " the sup- 

 port of the State governments in all their rights, as the most com- 

 petent administrations for our domestic concerns, and the surest bul- 

 warks against anti-republican tendencies; the preservation -of the 

 General Government in its whole eon.stitutional vigor, as the sheet 

 anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad." (Mr. Jeiferson's 

 Inaugural, March 4th, 1801.) 



In 1808, Mr. Ingersoll published "A View of the Rights and 

 Wrongs, Power and Policy of the United States of America." It 

 was an elaborate and extended vindication of the rights of neutral 

 commerce, on the subjects of contraband, paper blockade, and impress- 

 ment, and plainly declared his conviction of the result to which the 

 civilized nations of the world must come at last in the progress of 

 reason and religion, — the immunity of all private property in war on the 

 ocean, as it had already been well established in war on land. " If," 

 said he, " a concert with Russia, France, Holland and Spain, all of 

 whom with Denmark must desire it, could be effectuated for freeing 

 the ocean of privateers and search ships, and directing by common 

 agreement the operations of war against ships of war, leaving the 



