any living man. His birth and rearing as a Pennsylvanian leave no
other presumption possible. In the original Union, Pennsylvania
was appropriated denominated the Keystone of the arch, supported
by, and in turn supporting, the strength of all. Of the "old
thirteen" there were six free States north of her, and six slave
States south of her. She was allied as warmly by ties of friendship
and of blood with her Maryland and Virginia neighbors on the one
side as with those of New Jersey and New York on the other. Her
political and social connection on both sides were not more intimate
than those of a business and commercial character. As the Union
grew in power and increased in membership, Pennsylvania lost nothing
of her prestige. She held to the new States as intimate relations
as she held to the old. The configuration of the country and the
natural channels of communication have bound her closely to all
sections. Her northern border touching the great lakes, connected
her by sail and steam, before the era of the railway, with the
magnificent domain which lies upon the shores of those inland seas.
Her western rivers, whose junction marks the site of a great city,
form part of the most extensive system of interior water-communications
on the globe, affording a commercial highway twenty thousand miles
in length through seventeen States not included in the original
Union. Patriotic tradition increased Pennsylvania's attachment to
the National Government. It was on her soil that the Declaration
of Independence was proclaimed. It was in her Legislative halls
that the Constitution was formed and the "more perfect Union" of
the States ordained. From geographical position therefore, from
material interest, from inherited pride, from every association
and sympathy, from every aspiration, and from every hope, Pennsylvania
was for the Union, inviolable and indissoluble. No threat of its
destruction ever came from her councils, and no stress of circumstances
could ever seduce her into a calculation of its value, or drive
her to the contemplation of its end.

With all his attachment to the Union, Mr. Buchanan had been brought
under influences which were hostile to it. In originally constituting
his Cabinet, sinister agencies had controlled him, and far-seeing
men anticipated trouble when the names were announced. From the
South he had selected Howell Cobb of Georgia for the Treasury, John
B. Floyd of Virginia for Sec