Transcription
This is essentially a people’s contest— On the side of the Union, it is a struggle for maintaining in the world, that form, and substance of government, whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men — to lift artificial weights from all shoulders — to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all — to afford all an even unfettered start, and a fair chance, in the race of life— Yielding to partial, and temporary departures, from necessity, this I hold to be is the leading object of the government for whose existence we contend—