April, 1865 -- The war ended and throughout the Northern States joy and relief reigned. Then, less than a week later, a thunderbolt: the president was dead -- struck down by an assassin's bullet. Could this have been the mad act of a single demented actor? Or was there a wider conspiracy to be rooted out? At this dark moment of national confusion, rage and despair, would the provisions of the Constitution and the procedures of established law be able to deal with the crisis -- or would extralegal methods be needed?
By : David Miller DeWitt (1837 - 1912)
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“Oceans of horse-hair, continents of parchment, and learned-sergeant eloquence, were it continued till the learned tongue wore itself small in the indefatigable learned mouth, cannot make the unjust just. The grand question still remains, Was the judgment just? If unjust, it will not and cannot get harbour for itself, or continue to have footing in this Universe, which was made by other than One Unjust. Enforce it by never such statuting, three readings, royal assents; blow it to the four winds with all manner of quilted trumpeters and pursuivants, in the rear of them never so many gibbets and hangmen, it will not stand, it cannot stand. From all souls of men, from all ends of Nature, from the Throne of God above, there are voices bidding it: Away! Away!”
Past and Present.
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