or are now, in
any sense a separate power. If they were, sir, how and when did they
become so? They were once States of this Union--that every one
concedes; bound to the Union and made members of the Union by the
Constitution of the United States. If they ever went out of the Union,
it was at some specific time and by some specific act. Was it by the
ordinance of secession? I think we all agree that an ordinance of
secession passed by any State of this Union is simply a nullity,
because it encounters in its practical operation the Constitution of
the United States, which is the supreme law of the land. It could have
no legal, actual force or validity. It could not operate to effect any
actual change in the relations of the States adopting it to the
National Government, still less to accomplish the removal of that
State from the sovereign jurisdiction of the Constitution of the
United States.

"Well, sir, did the resolutions of these States, the declarations of
their officials, the speeches of members of their Legislatures, or the
utterances of their press accomplish the result? Certainly not. They
could not possibly work any change whatever in the relations of these
States to the General Government. All their ordinances and all their
resolutions were simply declarations of a purpose to secede. Their
secession, if it ever took place, certainly could not date from the
time when their intention to secede was first announced. After
declaring that intention, they proceeded to carry it into effect. How?
By war. By sustaining their purpose by arms against the force which
the United States brought to bear against it. Did they sustain it?
Were their arms victorious? If they were, then their secession was an
accomplished fact; if not, it was nothing more than an abortive
attempt, a purpose unfulfilled. This, then, is simply a question of
fact, and we all know what the fact is. They did not succeed. They
failed to maintain their ground by force of arms; in other words, they
failed to secede.

"But the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Stevens] insists that they
did secede, and that this fact is not in the least affected by the
other fact that the Constitution forbids secession. He says that the
law forbids murder, but that murders are, nevertheless, committed. But
there is no analogy between the two cases. If secession had been
accomplished; if these States had gone out, and overcome the armies
that tried to prevent their going