as that incident. A hostile legislature and a hostile executive were
so tied together, that the legislature tried, and tried in vain, to
rid itself of the executive by accusing it of illegal practices. The
legislature was so afraid of the President's legal power that it
unfairly accused him of acting beyond the law. And the blame thus
cast on the American Constitution is so much praise to be given to
the American political character.

Few nations, perhaps scarcely any nation, could have borne such a
trial so easily and so perfectly. This was the most striking
instance of disunion between the President and the Congress that has
ever yet occurred, and which probably will ever occur. Probably for
very many years the United States will have great and painful reason
to remember that at the moment of all their history, when it was
most important to them to collect and concentrate all the strength
and wisdom of their policy on the pacification of the South, that
policy was divided by a strife in the last degree unseemly and
degrading. But it will be for a competent historian hereafter to
trace out this accurately and in detail; the time is yet too recent,
and I cannot pretend that I know enough to do so. I cannot venture
myself to draw the full lessons from these events; I can only
predict that when they are drawn, those lessons will be most
important, and most interesting. There is, however, one series of
events which have happened in America since the beginning of the
Civil War, and since the first publication of these essays, on which
I should wish to say something in detail--I mean the financial
events. These lie within the scope of my peculiar studies, and it is
comparatively easy to judge of them, since whatever may be the case
with refined statistical reasoning, the great results of money
matters speak to and interest all mankind. And every incident in