7747. SECESSION, Missouri question and.—
Should time not be given, and the
schism [Missouri] be pushed to separation,
it will be for a short term only; two or three
years' trial will bring them back, like quarrelling
lovers to renewed embraces, and increased
affections. The experiment of separation
would soon prove to both that they
had mutually miscalculated their best interests.
And even were the parties in Congress
to secede in a passion, the soberer people
would call a convention and cement again the
severance attempted by the insanity of their
functionaries.—
To Richard Rush. Washington ed. vii, 182.
(M.
1820)
