With the Union my best and dearest earthly hopes are entwined.

I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity.

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 . . . .

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.

The founders of the Republic dealt with things as they were presented to them, in a spirit of self sacrificing Patriotism and as time has proved, with a comprehensive wisdom which it will always be safe for us to consult

In expressing briefly my views upon an important subject which has recently agitated the nation..., I fervently hope that the question is at rest and that no sectional or ambitious or fanatical excitement may again threaten the durability of our institutions.