At the period of my inauguration I was confronted in Kansas by a revolutionary government existing under what is called the “Topeka constitution.”  Its avowed object was to subdue the Territorial government by force and to inaugurate what was called the “Topeka government” in its stead.  To accomplish this object an extensive military organization was formed, and its command intrusted to the most violent revolutionary leaders.  Under these circumstances it became my imperative duty to exert the whole constitutional power of the Executive to prevent the flames of civil war from again raging in Kansas, which in the excited state of the public mind, both North and South, might have extended into the neighboring States.  The hostile parties in Kansas had been inflamed against each other by emissaries both from the North and the South to a degree of malignity without parallel in our history.  To prevent actual collision and to assist the civil magistrates in enforcing the laws, a strong detachment of the Army was stationed in the Territory, ready to aid the marshal and his deputies when lawfully called upon as a posse comilatus in the execution of civil and criminal process.  Still, the troubles in Kansas could not have been permanently settled without an election by the people.

The ballot box is the surest arbiter of disputes among freemen.  Under this conviction every proper effort was employed to induce the hostile parties to vote at the election of delegates to frame a State constitution, and afterwards at the election to decide whether Kansas should be a slave or free State.

The insurgent party refused to vote at either, lest this might be considered a recognition on their part of the Territorial government established by Congress.  A better spirit, however, seemed soon after to prevail, and the two parties met face to face at the third election, held on the first Monday of January, 1858, for members of the legislature and State officers under the Lecompton constitution.  The result was the triumph of the antislavery party at the polls.  This decision of the ballot box proved clearly that this party were in the majority, and removed the danger of civil war.  From that time we have heard little or nothing of the Topeka government, and all serious danger of revolutionary troubles in Kansas was then at an end.

The Lecompton constitution, which had been thus recognized at this State election by the votes of both political parties in Kansas, was transmitted to me with the request that I should present it to Congress.  This I could not have refused to do without violating my clearest and strongest convictions of duty.  The constitution and all the proceedings which preceded and followed its formation were fair and regular on their face.  I then believed, and experience has proved, that the interests of the people of Kansas would have been best consulted by its admission as a State into the Union, especially as the majority