fort was attacked
and bombarded to its fall, without even awaiting the arrival of the
provisioning expedition.

It is thus seen that the assault upon and reduction of Fort Sumter was
in no sense a matter of self-defense on the part of the assailants. They
well knew that the garrison in the fort could by no possibility commit
aggression upon them. They knew--they were expressly notified--that the
giving of bread to the few brave and hungry men of the garrison was
all which would on that occasion be attempted, unless themselves, by
resisting so much, should provoke more. They knew that this Government
desired to keep the garrison in the fort, not to assail them, but merely
to maintain visible possession, and thus to preserve the Union from
actual and immediate dissolution, trusting, as hereinbefore stated, to
time, discussion, and the ballot box for final adjustment; and they
assailed and reduced the fort for precisely the reverse object--to drive
out the visible authority of the Federal Union, and thus force it to
immediate dissolution. That this was their object the Executive well
understood; and having said to them in the inaugural address, "You can
have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors," he took pains
not only to keep this declaration good, but also to keep the case so
free from the power of ingenious sophistry as that the world should not
be able to misunderstand it. By the affair at Fort Sumter, with its
surrounding circumstances, that point was reached. Then and thereby the
assailants of the Government began the conflict of arms, without a gun
in sight or in expectancy to return their fire, save only the few in the
fort, sent to that harbor years before for their own protection, and
still ready to give that protection in whatever was lawful. In this act,
discarding all else, they have forced upon the country the distinct
issue, "Immediate dissolution or blood."

And this issue embraces more than the fate of these United States.
It presents to the whole family of man the question whether a
constitutional republic, or democracy--a government of the people by the
same people--can or can not maintain its territorial integrity against
its own domestic foes. It presents the question whether discontented
individuals, too few in numbers to control administration according to
organic law in any case, can always, upon the pretenses made in this
case, or on any other pretenses, or arbitrarily without any