Speaking of the doctrine that secession was lawful under the Constitution, and that it was not rebellion, he made plain the genuine significance of the issue thus raised: "It presents ... the question whether a Constitutional Republic or Democracy, a government of the people by the same people, can or cannot maintain its territorial integrity against its own domestic foes. It presents the question whether discontented individuals, too few in numbers to control the administration according to the organic law in any case, can always, upon the pretenses made in this case, or any other pretenses, or arbitrarily without any pretense, break up their government, and thus practically put an end to free government upon the earth. It forces us to ask: Is there in all Republics this inherent fatal weakness? Must a government of necessity be too strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak to maintain its own existence?" The Constitution of the Confederacy was a paraphrase with convenient adaptations of the Constitution of the United States. A significant one of these adaptations was the striking out of the first three words, "We, the people," and the substitution of the words, "We, the deputies of the sovereign and independent States." "Why," said Mr. Lincoln, "why this deliberate pressing out of view the rights of men and the authority of the people? This is essentially a people's contest. On the side of the Union it is a struggle for maintaining in the world that form and substance of government whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men ... to afford to all an unfettered start and a fair chance in the race of life.... This is the leading object of the government for whose existence we contend. I am most happy to believe that the plain people understand and appreciate this." Many persons, not gifted with the power of thinking clearly, were disturbed at what seemed to them a purpose to "invade" and to "subjugate" sovereign States,--as though a government could invade its own country or subjugate its own subjects! These phrases, he said, were producing "uneasiness in the minds of candid men" as to what would be the course of the government toward the Southern States after the suppression of the rebellion. The President assured them that he had no expectation of changing the views set forth in his inaugural address; that he desired "to preserve the government, that it may be administered for all as it was administered by the men who made it. Loyal citizens everywhere have a right to expect this,... and the government has no right to withhold or neglect it. It is not perceived that in giving it there is any coercion, any conquest, or any subjugation."