itutional rights can
be maintained. Is it true, then, that any right, plainly written in the
Constitution has been denied? I think not. Happily the human mind is so
constituted, that no party can reach to the audacity of doing this.

Think, if you can, of a single instance in which a plainly-written
provision of the Constitution has ever been denied. If, by the mere
force of numbers, a majority should deprive a minority of any
clearly-written constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of
view, justify revolution; it certainly would, if such right were a
vital one. But such is not our case.

All the vital rights of minorities and of individuals are so plainly
assured to them by affirmations and negations, guaranties and
prohibitions in the Constitution, that controversies never arise
concerning them. But no organic law can ever be framed with a provision
specifically applicable to every question which may occur in practical
administration. No foresight can anticipate, nor any document of
reasonable length contain, express provisions for all possible
questions. Shall fugitives from labor be surrendered by national or by
State authorities? The Constitution does not expressly say. Must
Congress protect slavery in the Territories? The Constitution does not
expressly say. From questions of this class, spring all our
constitutional controversies, and we divide upon them into majorities
and minorities.

If the minority will not acquiesce, the majority must, or the government
must cease. There is no alternative for continuing the government but
acquiescence on the one side or the other. If a minority in such a case,
will secede rather than acquiesce, they make a precedent which in turn
will ruin and divide them, for a minority of their own will secede from
them whenever a majority refuses to be controlled by such a minority.
For instance, why not any portion of a new confederacy, a year or two
hence, arbitrarily secede again, precisely as portions of the present
Union now claim to secede from it? All who cherish disunion sentiments
are now being educated to the exact temper of doing this. Is there such
perfect identity of interests among the States to compose a new Union as
to produce harmony only, and prevent renewed secession? Plainly, the
central idea of secession is the essence of anarchy.

A majority held in restraint by constitutional check and limitation, and
always changing easily with deliberate changes of pop