The task was by no means an easy one, and required for its performance the application of other political principles than that of freedom.

The men who were responsible for this great work were not, perhaps, entirely candid in recognizing the profound modifications in their traditional ideas which their constructive political work had implied; but they were at all events fully aware of the great importance of their addition to the American idea.

That idea, while not ceasing to be at bottom economic, became more than ever political and social in its meaning and contents.

The Land of Freedom became in the course of time also the Land of Equality.

The special American political system, the construction of which was predicted in the "Farmer's" assertion of the necessary novelty of American modes of thought and action, was made explicitly, if not uncompromisingly, democratic; and the success of this democratic political system was indissolubly associated in the American mind with the persistence of abundant and widely distributed economic prosperity.