Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your communication, and say that, under the circumstances, I have deemed it proper to refer the whole matter to my Government, and intend deferring the course I indicated in my note this morning until the arrival from Washington of such instructions as I may receive.
I have the honor also to express the hope that no obstructions will be placed in the way, and that you will do me the favor of giving every facility for the departure and return of the bearer, Lieut. T. Talbot, who is directed to make the journey.
ROBERT ANDERSON.
IV.
EXTRACTS FROM PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S INAUGURAL, MARCH 4, 1861. (Page 110.)
The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the Government, and collect the duties on imports; but, beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force against or among the people anywhere. Where hostility to the United States shall be so great and so universal as to prevent competent resident citizens from holding the federal offices, there will be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers among the people with that object. While the strict legal right may exist of the Government to enforce the exercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so irritating, and so nearly impracticable withal, that I deem it better to forego for the time the use of such offices. * * * * *
I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court, nor do I deny that such decision must be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other departments of the Government; and while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chances that it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that, if the policy of the Government upon the vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by the decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigations between parties in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own masters,—having, to that extent, practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor is there, in this view, any assault upon the Court or the Judges. It is a duty from which they may not shrink, to decide cases properly brought before them; and it is no fault of theirs if others seek to turn their decisions to political purposes.
V.
THE PRESIDENT'S SPEECH TO THE VIRGINIA COMMISSIONERS. (Page 110.)
To Honorable Messrs. Preston, Stuart, and Randolph: