Page:Life and Works of Abraham Lincoln, v6.djvu/58

36 SPEECHES [Feb. 27

But you will break up the Union rather than submit to a denial of your constitutional rights.

That has a somewhat reckless sound ; but it would be palliated, if not fully justified, were we proposing, by the mere force of numbers, to deprive you of some right plainly written down in the Constitution. But we are proposing no such thing.

When you make these declarations you have a specific and well-understood allusion to an assumed constitutional right of yours to take slaves into the Federal Territories, and to hold them there as property. But no such right is specifically written in the Constitution. That instrument is literally silent about any such right. We, on the contrary, deny that such a right has any existence in the Constitution, even by implication.

Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the government, unless you be al- lowed to construe and force the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.

such an argument, slavery would have been doomed to destruction, for certainly seven voters out of ten in the slave States were non-slaveholding whites. It was this consideration that made Southern congressmen so furious, for to retain their power they must continue to hoodwink their poorer neighbors."

The book grew in favor in the North, and in 1859. it was published for propagandist purposes in a cheap edition, which received the written approval of a number of Republican Congressmen, including John Sherman, the candidate of his party for Speaker. Although Sherman explained that he had signed the indorsement by proxy in a moment of thoughtlessness, he could not dissipate the distrust of moderate Republicans whose votes were necessary for his election. A long contest ensued, which Sherman ended by retiring in favor of William Pennington of New Jersey, who was thought to be more conservative. Mr. Pennington was promptly elected.

In 1861 Lincoln arpointed Helper consul to Buenos Ayres.