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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from First Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: equal unanimity frame and pass a law by means of which to keep good
that unanimous oath?
There is some difference of opinion whether this clause should
be enforced by national or by State authority; but surely that
difference is not a very material one. If the slave is to be
surrendered, it can be of but little consequence to him or to others
by which authority it is done. And should any one in any case be
content that his oath shall go unkept on a merely unsubstantial
controversy as to HOW it shall be kept?
Again, in any law upon this subject, ought not all the safeguards of
liberty known in civilized and humane jurisprudence to be introduced,
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