[_Brusquely._]

What policies?

RAYMOND

Understand me, Mr. President--I am telling you the conclusion of this
Committee----

LINCOLN

All right, Raymond--fire away--spare me the oratory, please--just give
me the plain reasons, one at a time, why you wish me to get off the
ticket----

RAYMOND

The first policy found indefensible has been your handling of the
border slave states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. You have not
yet declared the slaves free in these states, the only ones in which
you actually have the power to do so--at all.

LINCOLN

The first policy of my Administration has been to save for the Union
the great border states--for the simple reason--with these border slave
states, we have such a balance of power that the Union _may_ be
saved! Without these states, the Union _cannot_ be saved!
Therefore in my Proclamation of Emancipation, I purposely did not raise
the question of the right or wrong of slavery. If slavery is not wrong,
nothing is wrong. But the Constitution of the United States, which I
have sworn to uphold in the border states of Maryland, Kentucky and
Missouri, guarantees to their people the right to hold slaves if they
choose.

RAYMOND

But why pat on the back the slaveholder of Maryland and strike at the
slaveholder of South Carolina?

LINCOLN

Because Maryland is loyal to the Union, and South Carolina is fighting
it. My Proclamation was not a sermon on the rights of man--black or
white. It was an act of war--a blow aimed at the heart of the seceding
South to break its wealth and power, end the war, and save the Union. I
know the spell of _State loyalty_ in the South, gentlemen. I was born
there. Many a mother in Richmond wept the day our flag fell from their
Capitol. But they brushed their tears away and sent their sons to the
front the next day, to fight that flag--_in the name of Virginia_! So
would thousands of mothers in these border slave states, if I put them
to the test. In God's own time slavery will be destroyed. I have saved
these states for our cause by conciliation and compromise. I will not
apologize for this act.

[_He lifts his hand to stop interruption._]

My paramount object is to save the Union, and not, either to save or
destroy slavery. If I could save the Union, wi