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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: It is seventy-two years since the first inauguration of a President
under our national Constitution. During that period fifteen different
and greatly distinguished citizens have, in succession, administered
the executive branch of the government. They have conducted it through
many perils, and generally with great success. Yet, with all this scope
of precedent, I now enter upon the same task for the brief Constitutional
term of four years under great and peculiar difficulty. A disruption of
the Federal Union, heretofore only menaced, is now formidably attempted.
I hold that, in contemplation of universal law and of the Constitution,
the Union of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied,
if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments.
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