and disorders which might
involve in ruin the entire Government. A security against this is found
not only in the fact before alluded to, but in the additional fact that
we live under a Confederacy embracing already twenty-six States, no one
of which has power to control the election. The popular vote in each
State is taken at the time appointed by the laws, and such vote is
announced by the electoral college without reference to the decision of
other States. The right of suffrage and the mode of conducting the
election are regulated by the laws of each State, and the election is
distinctly federative in all its prominent features. Thus it is that,
unlike what might be the results under a consolidated system, riotous
proceedings, should they prevail, could only affect the elections
in single States without disturbing to any dangerous extent the
tranquillity of others. The great experiment of a political
confederation each member of which is supreme as to all matters
appertaining to its local interests and its internal peace and
happiness, while by a voluntary compact with others it confides to
the united power of all the protection of its citizens in matters not
domestic has been so far crowned with complete success. The world has
witnessed its rapid growth in wealth and population, and under the guide
and direction of a superintending Providence the developments of the
past may be regarded but as the shadowing forth of the mighty future.
In the bright prospects of that future we shall find, as patriots and
philanthropists, the highest inducements to cultivate and cherish a love
of union and to frown down every measure or effort which may be made to
alienate the States or the people of the States in sentiment and feeling
from each other. A rigid and close adherence to the terms of our
political compact and, above all, a sacred observance of the guaranties
of the Constitution will preserve union on a foundation which can not
be shaken, while personal liberty is placed beyond hazard or jeopardy.
The guaranty of religious freedom, of the freedom of the press, of the
liberty of speech, of the trial by jury, of the habeas corpus, and of
the domestic institutions of each of the States, leaving the private
citizen in the full exercise of the high and ennobling attributes of his
nature and to each State the privilege (which can only be judiciously
exerted by itself) of consulting the means best calculated to advance
its own happ