We approach, at length, Sir, to a more important part of the honorable gentleman’s observations.  Since it does not accord with my views of justice and policy to give away the public lands altogether, as a mere matter of gratuity, I am asked by the honorable gentleman on what ground it is that I consent to vote them away in particular instances.  How, he inquires, do I reconcile with these professed sentiments, my support of measures appropriating portions of the lands to particular roads, particular canals, particular rivers, and particular institutions of education in the West?  This leads, Sir, to the real and wide difference in political opinion between the honorable gentleman and myself.  On my part, I look upon all these objects as connected with the common good, fairly embraced in its object and its terms; he, on the contrary, deems them all, if good at all, only local good.  This is our difference.  The interrogatory which he proceeded to put at once explains this difference.  “What interest,” asks he, “has South Carolina in a canal in Ohio?” Sir, this very question is full of significance.  It develops the gentleman’s whole political system; and its answer expounds mine.  Here we differ.  I look upon a road over the Alleghanies, a canal round the falls of the Ohio, or a canal or railway from the Atlantic to the Western waters, as being an object large and extensive enough to be fairly said to be for the common benefit.  The gentleman thinks otherwise, and this is the key to his construction of the powers of the government.  He may well ask what interest has South Carolina in a canal in Ohio.  On his system, it is true, she has no interest.  On that system, Ohio and Carolina are different governments, and different countries; connected here, it is true, by some slight and ill-defined bond of union, but in all main respects separate and diverse.  On that system, Carolina has no more interest in a canal in Ohio than in Mexico.  The gentleman, therefore, only follows out his own principles; he does no more than arrive at the natural conclusions of his own doctrines; he only announces the true results of that creed which he has adopted himself, and would persuade others to adopt, when he thus declares that South Carolina has no interest in a public work in Ohio.

Sir, we narrow-minded people of New England do not reason thus.  Our notion of things is entirely different.  We look upon the States, not as separated, but as united.  We love to dwell on that union, and on the mutual happiness which it has so much promoted, and the common renown which it has so greatly contributed to acquire.  In our contemplation, Carolina and Ohio are parts of the same country; States, united under the same general government, having interests, common, associated, intermingled.  In whatever is within the proper sphere of the constitutional power of this government, we look upon the States as one.  We do not impose geographical limits to our patriotic feeling or regard; we do not follow