602 



PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



acquiesce the majority must, or the Government must 

 cease. There is no other alternative ; for continuing 

 the Government is acquiescence on one side or the 

 Other. If a minority in such case will secede rather 

 than acquiesce, they make a precedent which, in turn, 

 will divide and ruin them ; for a minority of their own 

 will secede from them whenever a majority refuses to 

 be controlled by such minority. For instance, why 

 may not any portion of a new Confederacy, a year or 

 two hence, arbitrarily secede again, precisely as por- 

 tions of the present Union now claim to secede from 

 it? All who cherish disunion sentiments are now 

 being educated to the exact temper of doing this. 



Is there such perfect identity of interests among the 

 States to compose a new Union, as to produce harmo- 

 ny only, and prevent renewed secession ? 



Plainly, the central idea of secession is the essence 

 of anarchy. A majority held in restraint by constitu- 

 tional checks and limitations, and always changing 

 easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and 

 sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. 

 Whoever rejects it, does, of necessity, fly to anarchy 

 or to despotism. Unanimity is impossible; the rule 

 of a minority, as a permanent arrangement, is wholly 

 inadmissible; so that, rejecting the majority princi- 

 ple, anarchy or despotism in some form is all that is 

 left. 



I do not forget the position assumed by some, that 

 constitutional questions are to be decided by the Su- 

 preme Court ; nor do I deny that such decisions must 

 be binding, in any case, upon the parties to a suit, as 

 to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled 

 to very high respect and consideration in all parallel 

 cases by all other departments of the Government. 

 And while it is obviously possible that such decision 

 may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect 

 following it, being limited to that particular case, with 

 the chance that it may be overruled, and never become 

 a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than 

 could the evils of a different practice. At the same 

 time the candid citizen must confess that if the policy 

 of the Government upon vital questions, affecting the 

 whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions 

 of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in 

 ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions 

 the people will have ceasea to be their own rulers, 

 having to that extent practically resigned their gov- 

 ernment into the hands of that eminent tribunal. 



Nor is (here in this view any assault upon the Court 

 of the Judges. It is a duty from which they may not 

 shrink to decide cases properly brought before them, 

 and it is no fault of theirs if others seek to turn their 

 decisions to political purposes. One section of our 

 country believes slavery is right, and ought to be ex- 

 tended", while the other believes it is wrong, and ought 

 not to be extended. This is the only substantial dis- 

 pute. The fugitive slave clause of the Constitution, 

 aud the law for the suppression of the foreign slave 

 trade, are each as well enforced, perhaps, as any law 

 can ever be in a community where the moral sense of 

 the people imperfectly supports the law itself. The 

 great body of the people abide by the dry legal obliga- 

 tion in both cases, and a few break over in each. This, 

 I think, cannot be perfectly cured ; and it would be 

 worse in both cases after the separation of the sections 

 than before. The foreign slave trade, now imperfectly 

 suppressed, would be ultimately revived without re- 

 striction in one section ; while fugitive slaves, now 

 only partially surrendered, would not be surrendered 

 at all, by the other. 



Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot 

 remove our respective sections from each other, nor 

 build an impassable wall between them. A husband 

 and wife may be divorced, and go out of the presence 

 and bevond the reach of each other; but the different 

 parts o"f our country cannot do this. They cannot but 

 remain face to face ; and intercourse, either amicable 

 or hostile, must continue between them. Is it possi- 

 ble, then, to make that intercourse more advantageous 

 or more satisfactory after separation than before? 

 Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make 



laws? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced be- 

 tween aliens than laws can among friends ? Suppose 

 you go to war, you cannot fight always ; and when, 

 after much loss on both sides, and no gain on either, 

 you cease fighting, the identical old questions, as to 

 terms of intercourse, are again upon you. 



This country, with its institutions, belongs to the 

 people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow 

 weary of the existing Government, they can exercise 

 their constitutional right of amending it, or their revo- 

 lutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. I can- 

 not be ignorant of the fact that many worthy and pat- 

 riotic citizens are desirous of having the National Con- 

 stitution amended. While I make no recommendation 

 of amendments, 1 fully recognize the rightful authority 

 of the people over the whole subject, to be exercised 

 in either of the modes prescribed in the instrument 

 itself; and I should, under existing circumstances, 

 favor rather than oppose a fair opportunity being 

 afforded the people to act upon it. I will venture to 

 add that to me the convention mode seems preferable, 

 in that it allows amendments to originate with the 

 people themselves, instead of only permitting them to 

 take or reject propositions originated by others, not 

 especially chosen for the purpose, and which might 

 not be precisely such as they would wish to either ac- 

 cept or refuse. I understand a proposed amendment 

 to the Constitution which amendment, however, I 

 have not seen has passed Congress, to the effect that 

 the Federal Government shall never interfere with the 

 domestic institutions of the States, including that of 

 persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of 

 what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to 

 speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, 

 holding such a provision now to be implied constitu- 

 tional law, I have no objection to its being made ex- 

 press and irrevocable. 



The Chief Magistrate derives all his authority from 

 the people, and they have conferred none upon him to 

 fix terms for the separation of the States. The people 

 themselves can do this also if they choose ; but the 

 Executive, as such, has nothing to do with it. His 

 duty is to administer the present Government, as it 

 came to his hands, and to transmit it, unimpaired by 

 him, to his successor. 



Why should there not be a patient confidence in tho 

 ultimate justice of the people ? Is there any better or 

 equal hope in the world ? In our present differences 

 is either party without faith of being in the right ? If 

 the Almighty Ruler of Nations, with his eternal truth 

 and justice, be on your side of the North, or on yours 

 of the South, that truth and that justice will surely 

 prevail, by the judgment of this great tribunal of the 

 American people. , 



By the frame of the Government under which we 

 live, the same people have wisely given their public 

 servants but little power for mischief ; and have, with 

 equal wisdom, provided for the return of that little to 

 their own hands at very short intervals. While the 

 people retain their virtue and vigilance, no Adminis- 

 tration, by any extreme of wickedness or folly, can 

 very seriously injure the Government in the short 

 space of four years. 



My countrymen, and all, think calmly and well upon 

 this whole subject. Nothing valuable can be lost by 

 taking time. If there be an object to hurry any of 

 you, in hot haste, to a step which vou would never 

 take deliberately, that object will be frustrated by 

 taking time ; but no good object can be frustrated by 

 it. Such of you as are now dissatisfied, still have the 

 old Constitution unimpaired, and, on the sensitive 

 point, the laws of your own framing under it ; while 

 the new Administration will have no immediate power, 

 if it would, to change either. If it were admitted that 

 you who are dissatisfied hold the right side in the dis- 

 pute, there still is no single good reason for precipitate 

 action. Intelligence, patriotism, Christianity, and a 

 firm reliance on Him who has never yet forsaken this 

 favored land, are still competent to adjust, in the best 

 way, all our present difficulty. 



In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, 



