ted to the labors
of the present Congress.

Our forefathers of the thirteen united colonies, in acquiring their
independence and in founding this Republic of the United States of
America, have devolved upon us, their descendants, the greatest and the
most noble trust ever committed to the hands of man, imposing upon all,
and especially such as the public will may have invested for the time
being with political functions, the most sacred obligations. We have to
maintain inviolate the great doctrine of the inherent right of popular
self-government; to reconcile the largest liberty of the individual
citizen with complete security of the public order; to render cheerful
obedience to the laws of the land, to unite in enforcing their
execution, and to frown indignantly on all combinations to resist
them; to harmonize a sincere and ardent devotion to the institutions
of religious faith with the most universal religious toleration; to
preserve the rights of all by causing each to respect those of the
other; to carry forward every social improvement to the uttermost limit
of human perfectibility, by the free action of mind upon mind, not by
the obtrusive intervention of misapplied force; to uphold the integrity
and guard the limitations of our organic law; to preserve sacred
from all touch of usurpation, as the very palladium of our political
salvation, the reserved rights and powers of the several States and of
the people; to cherish with loyal fealty and devoted affection this
Union, as the only sure foundation on which the hopes of civil liberty
rest; to administer government with vigilant integrity and rigid
economy; to cultivate peace and friendship with foreign nations, and to
demand and exact equal justice from all, but to do wrong to none; to
eschew intermeddling with the national policy and the domestic repose of
other governments, and to repel it from our own; never to shrink from
war when the rights and the honor of the country call us to arms, but
to cultivate in preference the arts of peace, seek enlargement of the
rights of neutrality, and elevate and liberalize the intercourse of
nations; and by such just and honorable means, and such only, whilst
exalting the condition of the Republic, to assure to it the legitimate
influence and the benign authority of a great example amongst all the
powers of Christendom.

Under the solemnity of these convictions the blessing of Almighty God is
earnestly invoked to attend upo