already; for ambition may revive it, and what ambition _may_ do it _will_ do. In other words, and to sum up the argument on this point: Whatever may have been our individual opinions and beliefs before the rebellion (variant enough at all times), the attempted establishment of a confederacy avowedly based on slavery, proves beyond possibility of cavil that chattel slavery, to which we have been lenient without limit, is a temptation too great for the peace of the nation, and therefore the highest interests of the nation require its removal. 2. The simple fact of the Southern Confederacy is also the basis of our second proposition. For it reveals clearly the necessity of the proposed amendment as a thing essential to be added to the organic law, in order to carry out the purpose of it. That purpose is thus expressed in the preamble to the Constitution: 'We, the people of the United States, _in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity_, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.' Every one of the objects therein specified is, in the baleful light of the rebellion, a plea for the amendment. We are aware that this preamble has heretofore served as a basis for the stanchest conservatism, and wisely so. We are of those who have always contended that the 'blessings of liberty' are best secured by whatever tends most to strengthen the Union--the asylum and hope of liberty, without which liberty, disorganized and unprotected, were a vain show. We are of that opinion still, and therefore support the amendment, because we are for strengthening the Union and making it 'more perfect.' We have not changed: circumstances have changed. What was formerly conservatism is now radicalism, and radicalism is now the true conservatism. For the period is one of transition, a crisis period, when these two forces, to be of use, must be interfused, and thus become a combined power of reform.