I suggest that the difference of opinion, reduced to its lowest terms,
is no other than the difference between the men who think slavery a
wrong and those who do not think it wrong. The Republican party think it
wrong--we think it is a moral, a social, and a political wrong. We think
it is a wrong not confining itself merely to the persons or the States
where it exists, but that it is a wrong which in its tendency, to say
the least, affects the existence of the whole nation. Because we think
it wrong, we propose a course of policy that shall deal with it as a
wrong.
We deal with it as with any other wrong, in so far as we can prevent its
growing any larger, and so deal with it that in the run of time there
may be some promise of an end to it We have a due regard to the actual
presence of it amongst us, and the difficulties of getting rid of it in
any satisfactory way, and all the constitutional obligations thrown
about it. I suppose that in reference both to its actual existence in
the nation, and to our constitutional obligations, we have no right at
all to disturb it in the States where it exists, and we profess that we
have no more inclination to disturb it than we have the right to do it.
Pages:
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247