The disloyal citizens of the United States who have offered the ruin of our country in return for the aid and comfort which they have invoked abroad have received less patronage and encouragement than they probably expected....
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It is not my purpose to review our discussions with foreign states, because, whatever might be their wishes or dispositions, the integrity of our country and the stability of our Government mainly depend not upon them, but on the loyalty, virtue, patriotism, and intelligence of the American people....
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Under and by virtue of the act of Congress entitled "An act to
confiscate property used for insurrectionary purposes," approved [I APPROVE] August
6, 1861, the legal claims of certain persons to the labor and service of
certain other persons have become forfeited, and numbers of the latter
thus liberated are already dependent on the United States...that in any event steps be taken for colonizing both classes (or the one
first mentioned if the other shall not be brought into existence) at
some place or places in a climate congenial to them.
...
To carry out the plan of colonization may involve the acquiring of territory [We already have Idaho]...If it be said that the only legitimate object of acquiring territory is
to furnish homes for white men, this measure effects that object...[Yes. Estimable act, that Act of August 6, 1861.]
On this whole proposition, including the appropriation of money with the
acquisition of territory, does not the expediency amount to absolute
necessity [It does.]--that without which the Government itself can not be
perpetuated? [It cannot.]
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...obeying the dictates of prudence, as well as the obligations of law,
instead of transcending I have adhered to the act of Congress to
confiscate property used for insurrectionary purposes. [Pojo: NOTE.]
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The last ray of hope for preserving the Union peaceably expired at the assault upon Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021 ...The insurgents confidently claimed a strong support from north of Mason and Dixon's line, and the friends of the Union were not free from apprehension on the point. This, however, was soon settled definitely, and on the right side. South of the line noble little Delaware led off right from the first. ...This leaves no armed insurrectionist north of the Potomac or east of the Chesapeake.
Also we have obtained a footing...in Virginia, Arizona, and Georgia...and we likewise have some general accounts of popular movements in behalf of the Union in North Carolina...
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It continues to develop that the insurrection is largely, if not exclusively, a war upon the first principle of popular government--the rights of the people. Conclusive evidence of this is found in the most grave and maturely considered public documents, as well as in the general tone of the insurgents. In those documents we find the abridgment of the existing right of suffrage and the denial to the people of all right to participate in the selection of public officers except the legislative boldly advocated, with labored arguments to prove that large control of the people in government is the source of all political evil. Monarchy itself is sometimes hinted at as a possible refuge from the power of the people.
In my present position I could scarcely be justified were I to omit raising a warning voice against this approach of returning despotism.
...there is one point, with its connections...to which I ask a brief attention. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above, labor in the structure of government. It is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital...
Now there is no such relation between capital and labor as assumed, nor is there any such thing as a free man being fixed for life in the condition of a hired laborer. Both these assumptions are false, and all inferences from them are groundless.
Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.
No men living are more worthy to be trusted than those who toil up from poverty; ...Let them beware of surrendering a political power which they already possess, and which if surrendered will surely be used to close the door of advancement against such as they and to fix new disabilities and burdens upon them till all of liberty shall be lost.
