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248 combined wisdom will be relied upon to state to Congress or the proper authority of the Union, or to the agents of this State employed at Washington, all that your sense of the nature of the case may dictate. It would not, probably, be a surprising remark, if in a future age, it shall be said by history, that the States, in the particulars above referred to, had suffered through their own negligence, that trusting to that benevolence which intends to apply the national power to good purposes, they should have found those objects they contemplate for the common welfare, sometimes projected by venality and occupied by lawless ambition, the tariff of duties as many be prescribed and regulated, occasionally conformed to a local interest, and they policy adopted, as having led to the result which will draw forth reproaches as to consolidation of power in this confederacy.

Council Chamber Portland, January 3, 1823

Enoch Lincoln