In a legal and constitutional sense, it must die at once.

The moment that the States fell, Slavery fell also; so that, even without any proclamation of the President, Slavery ceased to have legal and constitutional existence in every Rebel State.

Holding every acre of soil and every inhabitant within its jurisdiction, Congress can easily do whatever is needful within Rebel limits to assure freedom and save society.

Those citizens in the Rebel States who throughout the darkness of the Rebellion have kept their faith will be protected, and the freedmen rescued from hands that threaten to cast them back into Slavery.

Had it been early recognized that Slavery depends exclusively upon the local government, and falls with that government, who can doubt that every Rebel movement would have been checked?

Let it be established in advance, as an inseparable incident to every Act of Secession, that it is not only impotent against the National Constitution, but that, on its occurrence, both soil and inhabitants lapse beneath the jurisdiction…

Let this principle be adopted, and it will contribute essentially to that consolidation of the Union which was so near the heart of Washington.

The fires which seem to be extinguished will only be covered by treacherous ashes, out of which another conflagration will spring to wrap the country in war.

Union men in Virginia already tremble at the thought of being delivered over to a State government wielded by original Rebels pretending to be patriots; but the freedmen, who have only recently gained their birthright, are justified in…

In the name of Heaven, let us spare no effort to save the country from such shame, and an oppressed people from the additional outrage.

You cannot enact the slave into a freeman by bill in Congress.

Once free, always free.” This is a rule of law and an instinct of humanity.

It is a self-evident axiom, which only tyrants and slave-traders have denied.

The brutal pretension thus flamingly advanced already puts us all on our guard.

There must be no chance or loophole for such intolerable, Heaven-defying iniquity.

Alas! there have been crimes in human history, but I know of none blacker than this.

There have been acts of baseness, but I know of none more utterly vile.

Behold the Rebel States in arms against that paternal government to which, as the supreme condition of constitutional existence, they owe duty and love; and behold all legitimate powers, executive, legislative, and judicial, in these…

It is because Slavery is not yet understood, that any are willing to tolerate it.

When I describe the slave-master, it is simply as he describes himself in the code he sanctions.

If we are not ready to exclaim with Burke, speaking of revolutionary France, “It is but an empty space on the political map,” we may at least adopt the response hurled back by Mirabeau, that this empty space is a volcano red with flames…

All crime is in Slavery, and so every criminal is reproduced in the slave-master.

But whether we deal with it as “empty space” or as “volcano,” the jurisdiction, civil and military, centres in Congress, to be employed for the happiness, welfare, and renown of the American people,--changing Slavery into Freedom, and…

His presence gave character to the cause he represented, and was a standing recommendation of our country.

Let us at all hazards prevent the extension of Slavery and the increase of the Slave Power.