But as has been already set forth in these pages, public opinion in the United States is hostile to any thing that even in appearance indicates a Government control at elections, and most of all a control by the use of the military arm.
Blaine critiques public sentiment against government control in elections, particularly military involvement.
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All these provisions are made to protect the States, not to authorize an attack by one part of the country upon another; to preserve the peace, and not to plunge them into civil war.
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…
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.
The right of the General Government to preserve itself in its whole constitutional vigor by repelling a direct and positive aggression upon its property or its officers cannot be denied.
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