And therefore it must be either a legal revolution, which makes them
independent, and makes of the United States a foreign country, or it is
a usurpation against the authority of the United States, the erection
of governments which do not recognize the Constitution of the United
States, which the Constitution does not recognize, and, therefore, not
republican governments of the States in rebellion. The latter is
the view which all parties take of it. I do not understand that any
gentleman on the other side of the House says that any rebel government
which does not recognize the Constitution of the United States, and
which is not recognized by Congress, is a State government within the
meaning of the Constitution. Still less can it be said that there is a
State government, republican or unrepublican, in the State of Tennessee,
where there is no government of any kind, no civil authority, no
organized form of administration except that represented by the flag of
the United States, obeying the will and under the orders of the military
officer in command. * * *

Those that are here represented are the only governments existing within
the limits of the United States. Those that are not here represented are
not governments of the States, republican under the Constitution. And
if they be not, then they are military usurpations, inaugurated as the
permanent governments of the States, contrary to the supreme law of the
land, arrayed in arms against the Government of the United States;
and it is the duty, the first and highest duty, of the government to
suppress and expel them. Congress must either expel or recognize and
support them. If it do not guarantee them, it is bound to expel them;
and they who are not ready to suppress are bound to recognize them.

We are now engaged in suppressing a military usurpation of the authority
of the State governments. When that shall have been accomplished, there