The people, as usual, did not suspect the existence of this concentrated power till 1820. They made a brave militia fight then against the aristocracy, and compelled it to acknowledge a drawn battle by the admission of Maine to balance Missouri, and the establishment of a line of compromise, which would leave all territory north of 36 deg. 30' consecrated to freedom. The Slave Power submitted with anger, intending to break the bargain as soon as it was strong enough, and continued on its relentless struggle for power. It determined to gain possession of the Senate of the United States; make it a house of nobles; control through it the foreign policy, the Executive, and the Supreme Court; and, with this advantage, reckoned it could always manage the House of Representatives and govern the nation. The key to all the political policy of the Slave Power through these last forty years is this endeavor to capture the Senate of the United States, and hold it, by bringing in a superior _number_ of Slave States. So well did it play this card that, till 1850, it maintained an equality of senatorial representation, and, by the help of Northern allies and the superior political dexterity of the aristocracy, controlled our foreign policy; kept its own representatives in all the great courts of Europe; made peace or war at will; managed the Executive through a veto on his appointments; and endeavored to fill the Supreme Court with men in favor of its policy, while the House of Representatives never was able to pass a measure without its consent. Under the past forty years' reign of the Slave Power, the Senate of the United States has been a greater farce in the republic than the crown and House of Lords in the British empire. Indeed, so well did this aristocracy play its part, _that it was supposed by the whole world to be the American Government_; and the news that the people of the United States had refused, in 1860, to register its behests, was received abroad with the same astonishment and indignation as if there had been a revolt of the subjects of any European nation against their anointed rulers. But spite of these great advantages at the outset--spite of its incredible political activity and admirable concentration, the slave aristocracy was finally defeated by the people. How this was done is the most interesting narrative in modern history. Never has the intrinsic superiority of a democratic over an aristocratic order of society been so magnificently vindicated as during the last forty years of our national career. During that period the free portion of this Union has grown to an overwhelming superiority over the slave portion, and compelled the slaveholders to draw the sword to save themselves from material and providential destruction.