If ever this vast country is brought under a single government, it will be one of the most extensive corruption, indifferent and incapable of a wholesome care over so wide a spread of surface. This will not be borne, and you will have to choose between reform and revolution. If I know the spirit of this country, the one or the other is inevitable.
B. L. Rayner, Thomas Jefferson (1834). “Life of Thomas Jefferson: with selections from the most valuable portions of his voluminious and unrivalled private correspondence : with portrait”, p.349
