the country ? Why sir, from the first outbreak, with traitors for his Cabinet counsellors, he aided and abetted the rebels in arms against their country—against your Government and mine. James Buchanan in his message to Congress on the 3d day of December, 1860, declared: “This Government, therefore, is a great and powerful Government, invested with all the attributes of sovereignty over the special subjects to which its authority extends. Its framers never intended to implant in its bosom the seeds of its own destruction p. nor were they, at its creation, guilty of the absurdity of providing for its own dissolution. It was not intended by its framers to be the baseless fabric of a vision, which, at the touch of the enchanter, would vanish into thin air; but a substantial and mighty fabric, capable of resisting the slow decay of time, and of defying the storms of age. Indeed, well may the jealous patriots of that day have indulged fears that a Government of such high powers might violate the reserved rights of the States; and wisely did they adopt- the rule of a strict construction of these powers to prevent the danger. But they did not fear, nor had they any reason to imagine, that the Constitution would ever be so interpreted as to enable any State, by her own act, and without the consent of her sister States, to discharge her people from all or any of their Federal obligations.” And again he says, in strict accordance with the spirit that has inspired all those who oppose the present Administration in its efforts to put down the rebellion and maintain the Constitution : “The question fairly stated, is: Has the Constitution delegated to Congress the power to coerce a State into submission which is attempting to withdraw or has actually withdrawn from the Confederacy? If answered in the affirmative, it must be on the principle that the power has been conferred upon Congress to declare and make war against a State. After much serious refection, I have arrived at the conclusion that no such power has been delegated to Congress or to any other department of the Federal Government^ At this time no loyal man attempted to justify this monstrous doc- tri ne, and it was generally denounced by one shout of universal indig' nation from the people. This, as every patriotic man knew was adeliber* ate invitation to treason, and if acted upon must destroy the Republic But not so with my colleague [Mr. Vallandigham] he approved of this message of the persecutor of Douglas; and at a convention of his friends in Columbus, Ohio, on the 23d day of January, 1861, was passed the following resolution, sustaining Mr. Buchanan in his traitorous course: "Resolved, That the two hundred thousand Democrats of Ohio, send to the people of the United States, both North and South greeting : and when the people of the North shall have fulfilled their duties to the Constitution and the South, then, and not until then, will it be proper for them to take into consideration the question of the right and propriety of coercion.” Our country then had been at war for some time; men had confederated together to prevent the execution of the laws; they had forcibly seized upon custom houses, post offices, forts, arsenals, vessels, and other property belonging to the United States, and had actually fired upon vessels bearing the United States flag and carrying United States troops. But my colleague, and his friends at this time, were not prepared to consider even, the question of coercion. Mr. Buchanan would not, and did not consider it. The rebels persisted in their work of destroying the Union, without any effort being made to put them down. Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated on the 4th of March, W61; and because he would not pursue the policy of my colleague, and his friend James Buchanan, and not even consider the question of coer- io n ; because he dared to lay his strong hand upon the slaveholders
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