us, as it was not to our fathers, to
remove the curse from our borders. We shall be false to every
inspiration of patriotism if we now fail to remove it. The time has come
to complete the unity of the Constitution, and make the ideal purpose of
it, as stated in the preamble, a living fact. Shall we let the
opportunity slip? Now, at last, we may ordain a Constitution by which 'a
more perfect Union' shall 'secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves
and our posterity.'

3. A third reason for the proposed amendment, not less cogent though
more familiar to our political discussions than the two already named,
is found in article fourth, section second, of the Constitution:
'Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and
immunities of citizens of the several States.' Everybody knows that this
section of the Constitution has been heretofore practically a dead
letter, albeit as fully a part of the supreme law as that other
provision in the same section for the rendition of 'persons held to
service.' So everybody knows equally well the reason of it. It was a
concession to the fierce passions of slaveholding politics. From the
very nature of the case there could not be the same toleration of speech
and press in a Slave State which the men from a Slave State enjoyed in a
Free State. It was incendiary. So for half a century there has been this
virtual nullification of one of the justest compromises of the
Constitution; and citizens of the United States have, within the limits
of the United States, been tarred and feathered, and burnt, and hung,
and subjected to indignities without number and without name. Nobody
will probably be willing to say that such a state of things is worthy to
be continued. The hope of peaceable relief has for long restrained the
hands of a people educated to an abhorrence of war. We have submitted to
a despotism less tolerant than the autocracy of Russia, or the
absolutism of France--hoping, vainly hoping, for some change; willing to
forego all things rather than dissever the Union, which we have held,
and hold, to be foremost, because bearing the promise of all other
political blessings; pardoning much to a legacy left the South for which
it was not primarily responsible, and ready to second the humane care of
a feeble race, and clinging to the hope of that better time to which all
the signs pointed, when, by force of freedom, there could be no more
slavery. The time has come, though