e people of the States. This
Constitution is established by the people of all the States. How, then,
can a State secede? How can a State undo what the whole people have
done? How can she absolve her citizens from their obedience to the laws
of the United States? How can she annul their obligations and oaths? How
can the members of her legislature renounce their own oaths? Sir,
secession, as a revolutionary right, is intelligible; as a right to be
proclaimed in the midst of civil commotions, and asserted at the head of
armies, I can understand it. But as a practical right, existing under
the Constitution, and in conformity with its provisions, it seems to me
to be nothing but a plain absurdity; for it supposes resistance to
government, under the authority of government itself; it supposes
dismemberment, without violating the principles of union; it supposes
opposition to law, without crime; it supposes the violation of oaths,
without responsibility; it supposes the total overthrow of government,
without revolution.

The Constitution, Sir, regards itself as perpetual and immortal. It
seeks to establish a union among the people of the States, which shall
last through all time. Or, if the common fate of things human must be
expected at some period to happen to it, yet that catastrophe is not
anticipated.

The instrument contains ample provisions for its amendment, at all
times; none for its abandonment, at any time. It declares that new
States may come into the Union, but it does not declare that old States
may go out. The Union is not a temporaly partnership of States. It is
the association of the people, under a constitution of government,
uniting their power, joining together their highest interests, cementing
their present enjoyments, and blending, in one indivisible mass, all
their hopes for the future. Whatsoever is steadfast in just political
principles; whatsoever is permanent in the structure of human society;
whatsoever there is which can derive an enduring character from being
founded on deep-laid principles of constitutional liberty and on the
broad foundations of the public will,--all these unite to entitle this
instrument to be regarded as a permanent constitution of government.

In the next place, Mr. President, I contend that there is a supreme law
of the land, consisting of the Constitution, acts of Congress passed in
pursuance of it, and the public treaties. This will not be denied,
because such are the