354 The Winning of the West 



was dealt by Southern men, to whom all honor 

 should ever be given. 



This anti-slavery compact was the most impor 

 tant feature of the ordinance, yet there were many 

 other features only less important. 



In truth the ordinance of 1787 was so wide- 

 reaching in its effects, was drawn in accordance 

 with so lofty a morality and such far-seeing states 

 manship, and was fraught with such weal for the 

 nation, that it will ever rank among the foremost 

 of American State papers, coming in that little 

 group which includes the Declaration of Indepen 

 dence, the Constitution, Washington's Farewell 

 Address, and Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation 

 and Second Inaugural. It marked out a definite 

 line of orderly freedom along which the new States 

 were to advance. It laid deep the foundation for 

 that system of widespread public education so char 

 acteristic of the Republic and so essential to its 

 healthy growth. It provided that complete religious 

 freedom and equality which we now accept as part 

 of the order of nature, but which were then un 

 known in any important European nation. It guar 

 anteed the civil liberty of all citizens. It provided 

 for an indissoluble Union, a Union which should 

 grow until it could relentlessly crush nullification 

 and secession ; for the States founded under it were 

 the creatures of the Nation, and were by the com 

 pact declared forever inseparable from it. 



In one respect the ordinance marked a new de 

 parture of the most radical kind. The adoption 



