ces such as groping for some middle ground between
the right and wrong, vain as the search for a man who should be
neither a living man nor a dead man; such as a policy of 'don't care'
on a question about which all true men do care; such as Union appeals
beseeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the
divine rule, and calling, not the sinners, but the righteous to
repentance; such as invocations to Washington imploring men to unsay
what Washington said, and undo what Washington did.

Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us,
to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.

FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS, MARCH 4, 1861

Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States,
that by the occasion of a Republican administration, their property
and their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There has
never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the
most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed, and
been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published
speeches of him who now addresses you.

I do but quote from one of those speeches, when I declared that "I
have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the
institution of slavery, in the States where it exists."

I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination
to do so. Those who nominated and elected me did so with the full
knowledge that I had made this and many similar declarations, and had
never recanted them. I now reiterate these sentiments, and in doing
so, I only press upon the public attention the most conclusive
evidence of which the case is susceptible, that the property, peace,
and security of no section are to be in any wise endangered by the now
incoming administration.

I take the official oath to-day with no mental reservations, and with
no purpose to construe the Constitution or laws by any hypercritical
rules; and, while I do not choose now to specify particular acts of
Congress as proper to be enforced, I do suggest that it will be much
safer for all, both in official and private stations, to conform to
and abide by all those acts which stand unrepealed, than to violate
any of them, trusting to find impunity in having them held to be
unconstitutional.

It is seventy-two years since the first inauguration of a president
under our national constitution. During that period, fifteen different
and v