great chief-justice, but more significantly in the tendency of the
separate geographical divisions of the country to follow their own
interests and to make combinations with one another on this basis.

From one point of view the United States, even in this day of its
youth, was more like an empire than a nation. Sectionalism had been
fundamental in American history before the period which we have
reached. The vast physiographic provinces of the country formed the
basis for the development of natural economic and social areas,
comparable in their size, industrial resources, and spirit, to
nations of the Old World. In our period these sections underwent
striking transformations, and engaged, under new conditions, in the
old struggle for power. Their leaders, changing their attitude
towards public questions as the economic conditions of their
sections changed, were obliged not only to adjust themselves to the
interests of the sections which they represented, but also, if they
would achieve a national career, to make effective combinations with
other sections. [Footnote: Turner. "Problems of American History,"
in Congress of Arts and Sciences, St. Louis, II.]

This gives the clew to the decade. Underneath the superficial calm
of the "Era of Good Feeling," and in contradiction to the apparent
absorption of all parties into one, there were arising new issues,
new party formations, and some of the most profound changes in the
history of American evolution.

The men of the time were not unaware of these tendencies. Writing in
1823, Henry Clay declared that it was a just principle to inquire
what great interests belong to each section of our country, and to
promote those interests, as far as practicable, consistently with