6 quotes
Even though much provoked, let us do nothing through passion and ill temper.
Cooper Union speech (1860)
You say you are conservative — eminently conservative — while we are revolutionary, destructive, or something of the sort. What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?
Cooper Union speech (1860)
An inspection of the Constitution will show that the right of property in a slave is not "distinctly and expressly affirmed" in it.
Cooper Union speech (1860)
If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away.
Cooper Union speech (1860)
But you will not abide the election of a Republican president! In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us!
Cooper Union speech (1860)
You can scarcely scatter and disperse an army which has been formed into order in the face of your heaviest fire; but if you could, how much would you gain by forcing the sentiment which created it out of the peaceful channel of the ballot-box, into some other channel?
Cooper Union speech (1860)