It was not unfair to say, as was said by many during the crisis, that it was brought to every man's conscience to decide whether he would continue to imperil the fate of the Union by refusing the enfranchise the slave.
Blaine highlights the moral dilemma faced by individuals regarding the enfranchisement of slaves during a national crisis.
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But what if the feeling in any State against the United States should become so universal that the Federal officers themselves (including judges, district attorneys, and marshals) would be reached by the same influences, and resign their…
If it be true that war cannot be declared, nor a system of general hostilities carried on by the Central Government against a State, then it seems to follow that an attempt to do so would be ipso facto an expulsion of such State from the…
The States are colleagues of one another, and if some of them shall conquer the rest, and hold them as subjugated provinces, it would totally destroy the whole theory upon which they are now connected.
Under such circumstances, to send a military force into any State, with orders to act against the people, would be simply making war upon them.
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