US Presidency
1856

It is the duty of the people of Kansas to discountenance every act or purpose of resistance to its laws. Above all, the emergency appeals to the citizens of the States, and especially of those contiguous to the Territory, neither by intervention of nonresidents in elections nor by unauthorized military force to attempt to encroach upon or usurp the authority of the inhabitants of the Territory. No citizen of our country should permit himself to forget that he is a part of its Government and entitled to be heard in the determination of its policy and its measures, and that therefore the highest considerations of personal honor and patriotism require him to maintain by whatever of power or influence he may possess the integrity of the laws of the Republic.