It would be unjust to the senators and representatives in Congress to leave the impression that their unavailing efforts at conciliating the South were any thing more or less than a compliance with a popular demand which overspread the free States.
Blaine defends the actions of Congress members as a response to public demand rather than genuine attempts at conciliation with the South.
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Without the exercise of those functions which belong exclusively to the civil service, the laws cannot be executed in any event, no matter what may be the physical strength which the Government has at its command.
You can use force only to repel an assault on the public property and aid the Courts in the performance of their duty.
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 this view of the subject be correct, as I think it is, then the Union must utterly perish at the moment when Congress shall arm one part of the people against another for any purpose beyond that of merely protecting the General…
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