I am the last President of the United States!

There is nothing stable but Heaven and the Constitution.

The course of events is so rapidly hastening forward that the emergency may soon arise when you may be called upon to decide the momentous question whether you possess the power by force of arms to compel a State to remain in the Union

Abstract propositions should never be discussed by a legislative body.

Our union rests upon public opinion, and can never be cemented by the blood of its citizens shed in civil war.

The Government of the United States possesses no power whatever over the question of religion.

All the friends that I loved and wanted to reward are dead, and all the enemies that I hated and I had marked out for punishment are turned to my friends.