Page:Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs (Volume One).djvu/290

Rh assume that resistance to the inauguration of Lincoln is a part of their well-laid scheme. No man can now tell whether this scheme will be abandoned, whether it will be tried and fail, or whether it will be tried with success. I believe it will be tried.

“True, the administration has put itself on the side of order; the city is alarmed for its existence, knowing full well that if it is given up to the military or the mob, and the representatives of eighteen free States are, for a single hour only, fugitives from the capital of the country, its re-occupation will be upon terms less agreeable to the inhabitants of the District and the neighboring States. The possession of Washington does, in a considerable degree, control the future of this country. Believing, as I do, in the stern purposes of these men; knowing, also, that Maryland and Virginia can command on the instant the presence of large bodies of volunteers,—I deem it only an act of common prudence, for the free States, without menaces, without threats, with solemn and official declarations even that no offensive movement will be undertaken, to organize, and put upon a war footing, a force of one hundred thousand men, who may be moved at any moment when desired by the authorities of the country.

“What, then, will be our position? The way ought to be open for the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln; but there are those who demand a compromise as a step necessary and preliminary to that event. I do not now speak of the demand made upon States, in their sovereign capacity, to repeal certain laws, concerning personal liberty, alleged to be unconstitutional.

“The compromises of which I speak are the various propositions, which proceed upon the idea that the election by the people of a President of the Republic, in constitutional ways