Transcription (excerpt p1):
Mr. Lincoln’s Views of the Crisis.
The Union – It Must Be Preserved.
From the Springfield (Ill.) Journal of Dec. 20 (Mr. Lincoln’s Organ)
There are not a few who seem to think that the Union will be dissolved whenever the South Carolina Secession Convention passes a resolution to that effect. The Union cannot be dissolved by the passage of resolutions. South Carolina may resolve that she is no longer a part of this Union. She may hold Secession meetings, mount Disunion cockades, plant palmetto trees, make palmetto flags. Trample under foot the glorious flag of our country and proclaim from the housetops her treason and her shame, but all this will not dissolves the Union. She may compel her citizens to resign official place held under the federal government, she may close her courts and post offices, and put her own people to a great deal of inconvenience and trouble, but she will still be in the Union, unmolested. She cannot get out of the Union until she conquers this Government.
Citation: New York Weekly Tribune. New York, 29 December 1860. Gift of Steven and Susan Raab.