Whitelaw Reid: “I don’t believe there ever was a majority for secession in South Carolina.”

Our national experience has demonstrated that public order reposes most securely on the broad base of universal suffrage.

May it not prove, moreover, in that work of reorganization, which now engages the thoughts of all patriotic men, that universal suffrage is the best reconciler of the most comprehensive lenity with the most perfect public security and the…

Ordinarily the simple performance of duty is so blessed of God, that men who live in the doing of it, are the best off, in all respects, even in this world.

And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.