Party faction, seeking the continuance of its misrule, may momentarily
delay it, but the principles of political liberty for which our
fathers successfully contended, and to secure which they adopted the
Constitution, are so glaringly inconsistent with the condition in
which the country has been placed by such misrule that it will not
be permitted a much longer duration.
We wish, Mr. President, you could have witnessed the spirit of concord
and brotherly affection which animated every member of the convention.
Great as your confidence has ever been in the intelligence and
patriotism of your fellow-citizens, in their deep devotion to the Union
and their present determination to reinstate and maintain it, that
confidence would have become a positive conviction could you have seen
and heard all that was done and said upon the occasion. Every heart
was evidently full of joy; every eye beamed with patriotic animation;
despondency gave place to the assurance that, our late dreadful civil
strife ended, the blissful reign of peace, under the protection, not of
arms, but of the Constitution and laws, would have sway, and be in every
part of our land cheerfully acknowledged and in perfect good faith
obeyed.
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