The fact is that our Union rests upon public opinion, and can never be cemented by the blood of its citizens shed in civil war.  If it can not live in the affections of the people, it must one day perish.  Congress possesses many means of preserving it by conciliation, but the sword was not placed in their hand to preserve it by force.

But may I be permitted solemnly to invoke my countrymen to pause and deliberate before they determine to destroy this the grandest temple which has ever been dedicated to human freedom since the world began?  It has been consecrated by the blood of our fathers, by the glories of the past, and by the hopes of the future.  The Union has already made us the most prosperous, and ere long will, if preserved, render us the most powerful, nation on the face of the earth.  In every foreign region of the globe the title of American citizen is held in the highest respect, and when pronounced in a foreign land it causes the hearts of our countrymen to swell with honest pride.  Surely when we reach the brink of the yawning abyss we shall recoil with horror from the last fatal plunge.

By such a dread catastrophe the hopes of the friends of freedom throughout the world would be destroyed, and a long night of leaden despotism would enshroud the nations.  Our example for more than eighty years would not only be lost, but it would be quoted as a conclusive proof that man is unfit for self-government.

It is not every wrong—­nay, it is not every grievous wrong—­which can justify a resort to such a fearful alternative.  This ought to be the last desperate remedy of a despairing people, after every other constitutional means of conciliation had been exhausted.  We should reflect that under this free Government there is an incessant ebb and flow in public opinion.  The slavery question, like everything human, will have its day.  I firmly believe that it has reached and passed the culminating point.  But if in the midst of the existing excitement the Union shall perish, the evil may then become irreparable.

Congress can contribute much to avert it by proposing and recommending to the legislatures of the several States the remedy for existing evils which the Constitution has itself provided for its own preservation.  This has been tried at different critical periods of our history, and always with eminent success.  It is to be found in the fifth article, providing for its own amendment.  Under this article amendments have been proposed by two-thirds of both Houses of Congress, and have been “ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States,” and have consequently become parts of the Constitution.  To this process the country is indebted for the clause prohibiting Congress from passing any law respecting an establishment of religion or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of petition.  To this we are also indebted for the bill of rights which secures the people against any abuse of power by the Federal Government.  Such were the apprehensions justly entertained by the friends of State rights at that period as to have rendered it extremely doubtful whether the Constitution could have long survived without those amendments.