might sell itself again the next day to the highest bidder.  That no foreign dominion shall interpose between the Northwest and the Atlantic, or between the Valley of the Mississippi and the Gulf, is a geographical necessity.  But that, the American Union is indissoluble is essential to our national existence.  If that be not so, we have neither a flag nor a country,—­we can neither contract a debt nor make a treaty,—­we have neither honor abroad nor strength at home,—­our experiment of free government is a blunder and a failure, and for us, “Chaos has come again.”

But the further question remains, In what way is it possible that harmony shall be restored between the parts of the country through which the rebellion has spread and those which have remained faithful to the Constitution and the Union?  When we have dispersed the armies of the rebels, and demolished their batteries, and retaken our forts and arsenals, our navy-yards and armories, our mints and custom-houses,—­when we have visited their leaders with retributive justice, and made Richmond and Charleston and New Orleans as submissive to lawful authority as Baltimore or Washington or Boston,—­what then?  Will a people we have subjugated ever live with us again on terms of equality and friendship?  Can the wounded pride of the Ancient Dominion be so far soothed that she can allow us again to bask in the sunshine of her favor?  Will she ever consent to resume her old superiority, and furnish our audacious army and navy with officers, our committees with chairmen, and our departments with clerks?  Or must we, for a generation, hold the States we have subdued by military occupation?  Must we make Territories of them, and blot out those malignant stars from our glorious and triumphant banner?

In all seriousness, there seems but one solution to the problem; and it must be found, if at all, in the proposition already stated, that treason is an individual act.  A State cannot rebel, as it cannot secede.  A governor of a State may rebel, and a majority of a legislature may join an insurrection, as a governor or legislators may commit larceny or join a piratical expedition.  But whoever arrays himself in armed opposition to the Government of the United States, or gives aid and comfort to its enemies, becomes thereby merely a private rebel and traitor.  Whatever office he may fill, with whatever functions of local government he may be intrusted, by whatever name he may be called, governor or judge, senator or representative, it is the treason of the citizen, and not of the officer.  And as a State has no legal existence except as a member of the Union, and has no constitutional powers or functions or capacities but those which it exercises in harmony with and subordination to the rightful authority of the Federal Government, so the loyal and faithful inhabitants of a State, and they only, constitute the State.  Mr. Mason tells the people of Virginia, that those of them who, in their consciences,