The Constitution and its guarantees are our birthright, and I am ready to enforce that inalienable right to the last extent. We can not recognize secession. Recognize it once, and you have not only dissolved government, but you have destroyed social order—upturned the foundations of society. You have inaugurated anarchy in its worst form, and will shortly experience all the horrors of the French Revolution.
Then we have a solemn duty—to maintain the Government. The greater our unanimity, the speedier the day of peace. We have prejudices to overcome from the few short months since of a fierce party contest. Yet these must be allayed. Let us lay aside all criminations and recriminations as to the origin of these difficulties. When we shall have again a country with the United States flag floating over it, and respected on every inch of American soil, it will then be time enough to ask who and what brought all this upon us.
I have said more than I intended to say. (Cries of "Go on.") It is a sad task to discuss questions so fearful as civil war; but sad as it is, bloody and disastrous as I expect it will be, I express it as my conviction before God, that it is the duty of every American citizen to rally round the flag of his country.
I thank you again for this magnificent demonstration. By it you show you have laid aside party strife. Illinois has a proud position—United, firm, determined never to permit the Government to be destroyed. (Prolonged cheering.)
PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FIRST CALL FOR TROOPS.
APRIL 15th, 1861.
Whereas, the laws of the United States have been for some time past, and now are, opposed, and the execution thereof obstructed, in the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the powers vested in the marshals by law; now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, in virtue of the power in me vested by the Constitution and the laws, have thought fit to call forth the Militia of the several States of the Union to the aggregate number of 75,000, in order to suppress said combinations, and to cause the laws to be duly executed.
The details for this object will be immediately communicated to the State authorities through the War Department. I appeal to all loyal citizens to favor, facilitate, and aid, this effort to maintain the honor, the integrity, and existence, of our national Union, and the perpetuity of popular government, and to redress wrongs already long enough endured. I deem it proper to say that the first service assigned to the forces hereby called forth will probably be to repossess the forts, places, and property which have been seized from the Union; and in every event the utmost care will be observed, consistently with the objects aforesaid, to avoid any devastation, any destruction of, or interference with property, or any disturbance of peaceful citizens of any part of the country; and I hereby command the persons composing the combinations aforesaid, to disperse and retire peaceably to their respective abodes, within twenty days from this date.