ct
nothing heretofore said as to Slavery. I repeat the declaration made a
year ago, that 'while I remain in my present position I shall not
attempt to retract or modify the Emancipation Proclamation, nor shall I
return to Slavery any Person who is Free by the terms of that
Proclamation, or by any of the Acts of Congress.' If the People should,
by whatever mode or means, make it an Executive duty to Reenslave such
Persons, another, and not I, must be their instrument to perform it. In
stating a single condition of Peace I mean simply to say that the War
will cease on the part of the Government, whenever it shall have ceased
on the part of those who began it."

On the 22d of December, 1864, in accordance with the terms of a
Concurrent Resolution that had passed both Houses, Congress adjourned
until January 5, 1865. During the Congressional Recess, however, Mr.
Lincoln, anxious for the fate of the Thirteenth Amendment, exerted
himself, as it afterward appeared, to some purpose, in its behalf, by
inviting private conferences with him, at the White House, of such of
the Border-State and other War-Democratic Representatives as had before
voted against the measure, but whose general character gave him ground
for hoping that they might not be altogether deaf to the voice of reason
and patriotism.

[Among those for whom he sent was Mr. Rollins, of
Missouri, who afterward gave the following interesting account of
the interview:

"The President had several times in my presence expressed his deep
anxiety in favor of the passage of this great measure. He and
others had repeatedly counted votes in order to ascertain, as far
as they could, the strength of the measure upon a second trial in
the House. He was doubtful about its passage, and some ten days or
two weeks before it came up for consideration in the House, I
received a note from him, written in pencil on a card, while
sitting at my desk in the House, stating that he wished to see me,
and asking that I call on him at the White House. I responded that
I would be there the next morning at nine o'clock.

"I was prompt in calling upon him and found him alone in his
office. He received me in the most cordial manner, and said in his
usual familiar way: 'Rollins, I have been wanting to talk to you
for some time about the Thirteenth Amendment proposed to the
Constitution of the United