hope you will send stiffback men or none. The whole thing was gotten up against my judgment and advice and will end in thin smoke. Still I hope as a matter of courtesy to some of your erring brethren that you will send the delegates. Truly your friend. Z. Chandler.

"His Excellency, Austin Blain."

"P. S.-Some of the manufacturing States think that a fight would be awful. Without a little blood-letting this Union will not, in my estimation, be worth a rush."

This letter shows that States which had voted the Republican ticket were "caving in"; that is, were taking part in a plan for peace. This fact brought alarm to Z. Chandler, and J. K. Bigham, the Senators of Michigan. They had at first opposed Michigan's participation in the Peace Congress. Bingham had objected because it was "a step toward obtaining that concession which the imperious slave-power so insolently demands. "They have now changed their opinion; they are alarmed; they are urgent and want stiffback men or none. What scheming, what intrigue, what vigilance, what concern was not theirs! What effort did they not put forth to save Ohio, Indiana, Rhode Island, and Illinois from "caving in!"

The North had been the aggressors in every agitation. When the South protested, demanding only simple justice in the name of the compact of the States, she was denounced as "the imperious slave-power"; and her demands were regarded as insolent. The dominant party opposed every measure tending to compromise or pacification. They sought neither compromise nor pacification. They treated with levity all proseptcts of war, declaring "The Union would not be worth a rush" without a little blood-letting.

Twenty-one States, fourteen of them Northern had signified their intention of being represented in the Peace Congress. This was cause for alarm. Besides the Congress was called at the suggestion of Virginia, a Southern State. To them this fact had a meaning. It deepened their concern. It called forth their shrewdest scheming, and their best efforts to defeat the purpose of that Congress. Never was purpose more laudable :Peace And a Reunited Country. The hour was that of ex

treme peril. Was ever purpose more timely, more noble, more patriotic? A great crisis was at hand, and those whose duty it was to have correctly interpreted its nature, treated it as a mere trifle. War clouds dark and threatening were looming on the political sky. Yet they spoke of "a little blood-letting" as a much needed blessing, and then ruthlessly opened the fountains of the great deep, and the rivers of blood flowed down our valleys. Standing on the brink of the terrible crisis, they said we will collect a little "revenue," and then by the surprising result justified themselves in emptying the Governmental treasury of billions of revenue. They said we will "enforce the law," and then in self-justification violated every law in both the mora! and civil code.

LINCOLN'S FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

This address is most remarkable. Professing to be Constitutional, it rejects the voice of the only authority qualified to speak for that instrument. Representing the Constitution as ambiguous, it adopts its own construction. Professing to be conciliatory, it declares its policy to be that of coercion. Tender and pathetic in its appeals to the Northern masses, to the South it is the threatening voice of the autocrat.

All men are human. No human is perfect. Lincoln was human and therefore imperfect. All mankind are more or less ambitious. The character of the ambition of each depends upon his environment, and opportunities and to a great extent upon the stamina of the man himself. When Abraham Lincoln, on the 12th of January, 1848, speaking in the House of Congress, said: "Any people anywhere have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government and to form a new one that suits them better," the presidency was not in sight. But the inborn ambition was his. It had elevated him from the ranks of the ordinary to that of an honorable representative in Congress.

Twelve years later it was very different. In the meantime he had measured swords with the great Douglas on no less than twenty-one different platforms; and had won distinction as a debater. Then it was the presidency loomed portentious before his eyes. Then it was that weak human nature was put to the test, and ambition triumphed. All ambition is more or less selfish, more or less unjust, more or less cruel. Its inordinate desires increase in proportion to the greatness and dignity and majesty of the position sought. The opportunity to be numbered among the great rulers of the world too often renders the aspirant ruthless as to the use of means. When finally success has crowned the ambitious, the means ly overlooked and forgotten; especially is this true when great prosperity follows in the wake of triumphant ambition.

are too frequent

Napoleon, in spite of his inordinate ambition, in spite of all the blood through which he waded, is today ranked among the

truly great because of his achievements. So too Lincoln, in spite of his defiance of the Constitution-in spite of all the fratricidal blood that made red our hills and valleys from Gettysburg to Ocean Pond, is ranked among the illustrious great, because he succeeded; and his success was followed by unrivaled prosperity. As success did not make Napoleon right, so success did not make Lincoln right. As Napoleon would have been condemned to infamy had he failed, so failure would have conWrong often overcomes right. signed Lincoln to condemnation. When Christ But "truth crushed to earth will rise again." hung on the tree all the world thought his great life a failure; but today "the ages circle around the cross.'

As an introduction and a background to our criticism of this first inaugural address of Lincoln we record the testimony of a few very distinguihsed and very creditable witnesses-than whom there are no better. Madison, the father of the Constitution testified that the thirteen original States were "thirteen Sovereignties." Hamilton the rock-ribbed Centralist of the Philadelphia Convention, said, "The Attributes of sovereignty are now enjoyed by every State in the Union." Benjamin Franklin, the great diplomat, said in advocacy of the equality of suffrage in the Senate, that he did it, "as the means of securing John Wilson, anthe sovereignty of the individual States." other strong centralist of the Constitutoinal Convention, said, Gouverneur "The thirteen States are thirteen sovereignties." Morris, the centralist of the same Convention, testified that "the Constitution is a compact;" and "each State enjoys Sovereign power." Roger Sherman declared that "the Government was Oliver Ellsworth, made by a number of sovereign States." called the thirteen States, "thirteen sovereign bodies." Webster declared "the States are Nations."

Daniel

Who are these witnesses? They were all except Webster no less than the ablest and most illustrious members of the Philadelphia Convention that framed, in 1787, the immortal docuA majority ment known as the great American Constitution. of them, in that Convention, advocated a consolidated Government. They failed in their purpose. But loyal to the work of that Convention, they declared, in honest terms, the true nature

of the compact, and of the States that made it. Are not such witnesses most impartial, and hence most competent?

The reader will recall that in the chapter just preceding this, we have called to the stand another array of most competent witnesses-all contemporary with Lincoln. They were in turn disappointed when Lincoln declared his policy, which, however "disguised," they knew to be the policy of coercion. The testimony of all these was that of the framers of the Constitution: viz: The States were sovereignties and "the right of secession did exist."

In still another chapter we have shown that the Federal Government itself actually taught the right of a State to secede for at least a decade and a half at West Point.

Notwithstanding this great array of most competent witnesses, reaching from the '60's back to the very Convention that framed the Constitution, we find Lincoln, in this first inaugural address, arrayed against them all-all this galaxy of superb statesmen. What competent authority has ever proclaimed Lincoln a great and profound constitutional expounder? The Nation had scores of Statesmen in his day who excelled him as expounders of the Constitution. Had a Webster or a Douglas been president in 1861, there would have been no secession-no

war.

With this introduction we will hear Lincoln in his first inaugural: "I hold that in contemplation of universal law and of the Constitution the Union of these States is perpetual." The term "universal law" is very indefinite. It may mean all law. Perhaps he meant to include a higher law" as if "a higher law" existed then that did not exist when the Constitution was framed. Perhaps he meant to include also "a common law" as if a common law existed then which did not exist at the time of the framing of the Constitution. Perhaps he meant to include also an "unwritten Constitution," as if unwritten constitutions might not be numbered by the billions and sextillions. Yet he couples this mysterious "universal law" with our Constitution. For what? To confound? Perhaps, to give strength and clearness to this truism, viz: "Continue to execute all the express provisions of our National Govern