r even withhold
the mails from places where they were habitually violated, would any or
all of these things be invasion or coercion? Do our professed lovers
of the Union, who spitefully resolve that they will resist coercion and
invasion, understand that such things as these, on the part of the United
States, would be coercion or invasion of a State? If so, their idea of
means to preserve the object of their great affection would seem to be
exceedingly thin and airy. If sick, the little pills of the homoeopathist
would be much too large for it to swallow. In their view, the Union, as a
family relation, would seem to be no regular marriage, but rather a sort
of "free-love" arrangement, to be maintained on passional attraction.

By the way, in what consists the special sacredness of a State? I speak
not of the position assigned to a State in the Union by the Constitution,
for that is a bond we all recognize. That position, however, a State
cannot carry out of the Union with it. I speak of that assumed primary
right of a State to rule all which is less than itself, and to ruin all
which is larger than itself. If a State and a county, in a given case,
should be equal in number of inhabitants, in what, as a matter of
principle, is the State better than the county? Would an exchange of
name be an exchange of rights? Upon what principle, upon what rightful
principle, may a State, being no more than one fiftieth part of the
nation in soil and population, break up the nation, and then coerce a
proportionably large subdivision of itself in the most arbitrary way? What
mysterious right to play tyrant is conferred on a district of country,
with its people, by merely calling it a State? Fellow-citizens, I am not
asserting anything. I am merely asking questions for you to consider. And
now allow me to bid you farewell.

INTENTIONS TOWARD THE SOUTH

ADDRESS TO THE MAYOR AND CITIZENS OF

CINCINNATI, OHIO, FEBRUARY 12, 1861

Mr. MAYOR, AND GENTLEMEN:--Twenty-four hours ago, at the capital of
Indiana, I said to myself, "I have never seen so many people assembled
together in winter weather." I am no longer able to say that. But it
is what might reasonably have been expected--that this great city of
Cincinnati would thus acquit herself on such an occasion. My friends, I am
entirely overwhelmed by the magnificence of the reception which has been
given, I will not say to me, but to the President-elect of the United
States of Ameri