The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1856-12-03
ppEsTnENrs MESSAGE.
rsifos.c;fisens Of Ds Senate

PRESIDENTS MESSAGE.
and Of 1Ae House Of Representatives
RS. r,,,.,i,ution requires that the President
.h.u Ann time 10 time, not only recommend TO
,ha confederation OF Congress such measures ~ oe
NAV Judge necessary and sxpedens gu. a:o .na,
us San live information to them OF the state oi
,ns Union To do this fully involves exposition oil
al matters In the actual condition OF the conntry,
domestic or foreign, which essentially concern tue
-snsral welfare While performing bis constitu'
nn.l dntv in this respect, the President does not
snaak merely TO express personal convictions, nut
a. the executive minister OF the government, ena,
hIed nv his position, and called upon by MS oficiai
obligations to scan with an impartial eye the IN
terests of the whole, and of every part of the
United States
Ifnion its agriculture, mines, manufactures, nav
isation and commerce, II is necessary only to say
,ba, the internal prosperity of the country It's con-
tinrous and steady advancement in wealth and
pepuiation, and In private as well a. public we'll
being attest the wisdom of our institutions, and
the predominant spirit of intelligence and patriot
ism. which, notwithstanding occasional Irregular
ties of opinion or action resulting from popular
freedom has distinguished and characterized the
people Of America
the last and the commencement of the present SEES.
sion Of Congress, the public mind has been occu.
pied with the care of selecting, for another consi
tutiona term, the President and Vice President of
the United States.
The determination of the persons, who are of
right, or contingentiy, to preside over the admin
istratiou OF the government, is, under our system
committed to the States and the people. We ap
peal to them, by their voice pronounced in the
forms Of law, to call whomsoever they will to the
high post of Chief Magistrate
And thus it Is that as the senators represent the
respective States of the Union, and the members
of The House of Representatives the several con
atituencies of each State, so the President repre-
SCENTS the aggregate population of the United
States. Their election of him is the explicit and
solemn &C: of the sole sovereign authority of the
Union.
1t is impossible to msapprehend the great prin
cipies which, by their recent political action the
people of the United States have sanctioned and
announced.
They have asserted the constitutional equality
of eacn and all of the States of the Union "a
States they have affirmed the constitutional
equality OF each and all of the citizens of the
United States as citizens, whatever their religion
wherever their birth, or their residence; they
have maintained the invioIability of the constitn
tonai rights of the different sections of the Union:
and they have proclaimed their devoted and un.
alterabe attachment to the Union and to the con.
sttution objects of interest superior to all sub.
jecs of local sectional controversy as the safe
guard OF the right of all the spirit and essence
OF the.lberty, peace, and greatness of the Re.
public
In doing this, they have, at the same time. en-.
phatlcaily condemned the idea of organizing in
marshalling in'hoste array towards each other the
different parts of the country, North or South
East or West
Schemes of this nature, fraught with incalcula
Ole mischief, and which the considerable sense of
Inc people has rejected could have had counts-
nance III no part Of the country had they not been
disguised by suggestions plausible in appearance
acting upon an excited state of the public mind
lnuueeo by causes temporary in their character
ana II Is to be hoped transient in their influence
nh
Jects, and the widest scope of discussion are the
received and ordinary conditions of government in
our country: Our institutions, framed in the
spirit OF confidence in the intelligence and integr
~ OF the people, do not forbid citizens either ind
vlduahy or associated together, to attack by vri
ing speech, or any other methods short of phys
cal force the Constitution and the very existence
of the Union. Under the shelter of this great ber
iy, and protected by the laws and usages of the 90
vernment taey assal, associations have been form
cd, Ia some of the States, of individuals
VINO, pretending to seek only to prevent the
spread OF the institution of slavery into the
present future inchoate States of the Union Ara
really lHf AIMED with derire TO change the domestic
institutions OF existing States. Toaccompsh their
OBJECT they dedicate themselves to the odious task
OF depreciating the government organization
"hicn STANDS IN their way, and of eliminating
with lndiscrlminate invective, and not only the
citizens OF particular States with whose laws thew
ma fault, but all others of their fellow. citizens
throughout the country, who do not partcipate
with them IN their assaults upon the Constitution
framed and adopted by our fathers and claiming
tor the privileges it has secured and the blessings
IL mas conferred the steady support and grateful
reverence OF their children. They seek object
which they well know to be q revolutionary one
lhey are perfectly aware that the change In the
relative condition of the white and black races in
the slaveholding States, which they would pro.
mote beyond their lawful authority; that to
them 1t Is foreign object that it cannot be effect
ed by any peaceful fundamentally of theirs that
LOT tnein and the States for which they are cti
Zens' the only path to its accomplishment is
through burning cities, and ravaged fields, and
slaughtered populations and all there is most ter
Tlbie In foreign, complicated in civil and seryile
war and that the first step in the attempt is the
iorcioie disruption OF country embracing in its
broad BOSOM degree of liberty, and an amount of
Individual aud public prosperity, to which there is
no parallel in history and substituting in its Mace
hostile governments, driven at once and ineyita.
bly, into mutual devastation and fratrici ial car.
mage, transforming the now peaceful and felicitous
protnerhood into vast permanent camp of armed
men IKE the rival nonarchies of Europe and Asia
wen knowing that such, and such only are the
means and the consequences of their plans and
purposes, they endeavor to prepare the people of
tue United States for civil war by doing eyery-
thing In their power to deprive the Constitution
and Tie laws of moral authority, and to undermine
the fabric OF the Union by appeals to passion and
seetionai PREJUDICE, by matchmaking its people
Win reciprocal hatred, and by educating them to
stand face to face as enemies rather than shoulder
to shoulder as friends.
1t is by the agency of such unwarrantable inter-
ference, foreign and domestic, that the minds
OF many, otherwise good citizens have been
30 Unnamed into the passionate condemnation of
the domestic institutions of the Southern States
as at length to pass insensibly to almost equal
~ passionate hostilities towards their fellow
citizens OF those States, and thus finally n
fall into temporary fellowship with the ayoweS
and active enemies of the Constitution. Ar
IDENTIFY attached to liberty in the abstract thew
do not stop to consider practically how the Oh
Jects they would attain be ACCOMPLISHED nor tn
reflect that, even il the evil were great as they
deem it, they have no remedy to apply, and thai i
can be only agt waited by their violence an uncon
stitutionai action question, which IA one NJ
the most difficult OF all the problems of social in
siitution, political economy and statesmansbin
they treat with unreasoninR intemperance ri
Thought and language. Extremes beget extremes
Violent attack from the North finds its in.vi,.his
consequence IN the growth of spirit of angry det
ance at the South Thus in the progress OF events
we had reached that contamination which tho
voice OF the people has now 90 pointedly rebnk cd
OF The attempt OF portion of the States by sec
'ionai organizat on and movement to us,rp the
controi Oh the government of the United States
confidently believe that the great bodv of
those who inconsderately took this fatal step are
sincerely attached TO the Constitution and The