I never justify, sustain, or in any way or to any extent uphold this cruel, heartless, aimless unnecessary war.

The dangers of a concentration of all power in the general government of a confederacy so vast as ours are too obvious to be disregarded.

It must be felt that there is no national security but in the nation's humble, acknowledged dependence upon God and His overruling providence.

While men inhabiting different parts of this vast continent cannot be expected to hold the same opinions, they can unite in a common objective and sustain common principles.

READILY and, I trust, feelingly acknowledge the duty incumbent on us all . . . to provide for those who, in the mysterious order of Providence, are subject to want and to disease of body or mind; but I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for making the Federal Government the great almoner of public charity throughout the United States . . . .

There's nothing left . . . but to get drunk.

The constitutionality and propriety of the Federal Government assuming to enter into a novel and vast field of legislation, namely, that of providing for the care and support of all those ... who by any form of calamity become fit objects of public philanthropy. ... I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for making the Federal Government the great almoner of public charity throughout the United States. To do so would, in my judgment, be contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution and subversive of the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded.