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destroy the Government; while I shall have the most solemn one to " preserve, protect and defend" it.

I am loth to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.

The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

ABOLISHING SLAVERY IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

I HAVE never doubted the constitutional authority of Congress to abolish slavery in this District, and I have ever desired to see the national capital freed from the institution in some satisfactory way. Hence there has never been, in my mind, any question upon the subject except the one of expediency, arising in view of all the circumstances. If there be matters within and about this act which might have taken a course or shape more satisfactory to my judgment, I do not attempt to specify them. I am gratified that the two principles of compensation and colonization are both recognized and practically applied in the act.

APRIL 16, 1862.

A. H. GARLAND.

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I

NEVER had personally an opportunity to know

or study Mr. Lincoln, and my ideas of him are made up altogether from reading, and from conversations with prominent gentlemen who knew him well. From these sources, I have the impression firmly fixed, that Mr. Lincoln possessed great native good sense and a wellbalanced head, what is generally called "common sense." He had an intuitive judgment of men, and he studied men closely; with these he combined a liberal and charitable judgment, and viewed the shortcomings of his fellows with leniency, mercy and goodness of heart. His intentions were good, and, as I think, on the side of his country at large, and I am of the opinion but few, very few, men would have passed through the ordeal of war, and such a war, as successfully as he did. The blow that struck him down inflicted a wound upon the whole country. His loss to the country was severe indeed, for I believe, had he lived, the work of pacification, or quieting the Southern States to practical relations with the Union -to use his own language-would have progressed more smoothly, and been consummated in less time, and with less expense, less bitterness and less loss to all parties.

In Mr. Lincoln's history there is as much profound stimulus to the young men of the country who desire to secure it, as in that of any man who has figured in our annals.

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE

TO CONGRESS, DECEMBER 3, 1861.

THE war continues. In considering the policy to be adopted for suppressing the insurrection, I have been anxious and careful that the inevitable conflict for this purpose shall not degenerate into a violent and remorseless revolutionary struggle. I have, therefore, in every case thought it proper to keep the integrity of the Union prominent as the primary object of the contest on our part, leaving all questions which are not of vital military importance to the more deliberate action of the legis lature.

In my present position, I could scarcely be justified were I to omit raising a warning voice against this approach of returning despotism.

It is not needed nor fitting here, that a general argumcnt should be made in favor of popular institutions; but there is one point, with its connections, not so hackneyed as most others, to which I ask a brief attention. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above labor, in the structure of government. It is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital; that nobody labors unless somebody else, owning capital, somehow, by the use of it, induces him to labor. This assumed, it is next considered whether it is best that capital shall hire laborers, and thus induce them to work by their own consent, or buy them, and drive them

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to it without their consent. Having proceeded so far, it is naturally concluded that all laborers are either hired laborers or what we call slaves. And further, it is assumed that whoever is once a hired laborer is fixed in that condition for life.

Now, there is no such relation between capital and labor as assumed; nor is there any such thing as a free man being fixed for life in the condition of a hired laborer. Both these assumptions are false, and all inferences from them are groundless.

Labor is prior to, and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labor and capital, producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labor of a community exists within that relation. A few men own capital, and that few avoid labor themselves, and, with their capital, hire or buy another few to labor for them. A large majority belong to neither class-neither work for others, nor have others working for them. In most of the Southern States a majority of the whole people, of all colors, are neither slaves nor masters; while in the Northern a large majority are neither hirers nor hired. Men with their families -wives, sons, and daughters-work for themselves on their farms, in their houses, and in their shops, taking the whole product to themselves, and asking no favors of capital on the one hand, nor of hired