"Again, I say, what is the use of concession, conciliation, or compromise, when, if we yield everything you demand, you cannot say to us 'It will save us from disunion or war?' Are we not in danger of quarreling about terms of conciliation, when traitors are overthrowing the government we wish to preserve? Are we not dividing ourselves for their benefit? What will satisfy South Carolina and Florida and Mississippi and Alabama? They want disunion, and not compromise or conciliation. The Democratic party would not agree to their terms, and they seceded from the Charleston and Baltimore conventions. Is it likely that we will yield what our northern Democratic friends could not yield? Can you expect this 'black Republican party,' as you please to call it, will yield to you what your northern Democratic associates dare not? It is utterly idle to talk about any such terms of concession. I do not believe any terms which our people could yield, and preserve their own self-respect, would satisfy South Carolina, Florida, or some of the other southern states, because they are bent upon disunion. "We know that gentlemen who represented South Carolina on this floor, if the newspapers correctly report them, declared in the Charleston convention, held recently, that they had brooded over this matter for long years, and that they only sought an opportunity, an occasion, or, if I may use the word, a pretext, for the secession of the State of South Carolina and the disruption of the Union. Some stated that they had brooded over disunion and prayed for its consummation since boyhood. We know, sir, that the seeds of this revolution were sowed in the time of Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun. We know that in 1832 the doctrines upon which this revolution is going forward were initiated, and from that time the young men of South Carolina have been educated in the school of disunion. They have cherished these doctrines in their innermost hearts. All the concessions we might make, all the compromises we could agree to, all the offerings of peace we could make for the salvation of the Union, would not be able to secure the desired end, if South Carolina could prevent it. "Again, we might, on this side, properly say we have done nothing to impair any constitutional right. We propose to do nothing to infringe yours. We have succeeded in a constitutional way in electing a President of the United States. All we ask is that he may be inaugurated in peace, and may develop his policy in the usual manner. We can add that this is the demand of all our people, not only of those who voted for Mr. Lincoln, but of every loyal citizen. You tell us your people are excited and alarmed, that they apprehend that an overwhelming anti-slavery element is about to be inaugurated in power that will, directly or indirectly, affect the constitutional rights of your states.