S:

In compliance with a custom as old as the government itself, I appear
before you to address you briefly, and to take in your presence the oath
prescribed by the Constitution of the United States to be taken by the
President "before he enters on the execution of his office."

I do not consider it necessary at present for me to discuss those
matters of administration about which there is no special anxiety or
excitement.

Apprehension seems to exist, among the people of the Southern States,
that by the accession of a Republican administration their property and
their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There never has
been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample
evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to
their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of
him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches
when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to
interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where
it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no
inclination to do so." Those who nominated and elected me did so with
full knowledge that I had made this and many similar declarations, and
had never recanted them. And more than this, they placed in the platform
for my acceptance, and as a law to themselves and to me, the clear and
emphatic resolution which I now read:

"Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States,
and especially the right of each State to order and control its
own domestic institutions according to its judgment exclusively, is
essential to the balance of power on which the perfection and endurance
of our political fabric depend, and we denounce the lawless invasion by
armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what
pretext, as among the gravest of crimes."

I now reiterate these sentiments; and, in doing so, I only press upon
the public attention the most conclusive evidence of which the case is
susceptible, that the property, peace, and security of no section are
to be in any wise endangered by the now incoming administration. I add,
too, that all the protection which, consistently with the Constitution
and the laws, can be given, will be cheerfully given to all the States,
when lawfully demanded, for whatever cause, as cheerfully to one section
as to another.

There is much controversy about the d