"
This caution was abundantly manifested in his annual message to Congress
of December 3, 1861:
"In considering the policy to be adopted for suppressing the
insurrection," he wrote, "I have been anxious and careful that the
inevitable conflict for this purpose shall not degenerate into a violent
and remorseless revolutionary struggle. I have, therefore, in every
case, thought it proper to keep the integrity of the Union prominent as
the primary object of the contest on our part, leaving all questions
which are not of vital military importance to the more deliberate action
of the legislature.... The Union must be preserved; and hence all
indispensable means must be employed. We should not be in haste to
determine that radical and extreme measures, which may reach the loyal
as well as the disloyal, are indispensable."
The most conservative opinion could not take alarm at phraseology so
guarded and at the same time so decided; and yet it proved broad enough
to include every great exigency which the conflict still had in store.
Mr. Lincoln had indeed already maturely considered and in his own mind
adopted a plan of dealing with the slavery question: the simple plan
which, while a member of Congress, he had proposed for adoption in the
District of Columbia--the plan of voluntary compensated abolishment.
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