Colorado Bill, the Nevada Bill, and the Dakota Bill, are identically the
same with the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, and in its precise language"--these
former Bills having been passed at the last Session of the 36th
Congress--the Republicans, on the contrary, held that neither in these
nor other measures had they abandoned any distinctive Republican
principle; while Breckinridge declared that they had passed those
Territorial Bills, without the Wilmot proviso, because they felt
perfectly secure in those Territories, with all the Federal patronage in
Republican hands.

However that may be, we have here, brought out in strong contrast, the
conciliatory feeling which inspired such Union men as Douglas, and the
strong and persistent efforts they made in behalf of Concession and
Peace up to a period only a few weeks before the bombardment of Sumter;
and the almost total revulsion in their sentiments after that event, as
to the only proper means to preserve the Union. For it was only then
that the truth, as it fell from Douglas's lips at Springfield, was fully
recognized, to wit: that there was no half-way ground betwixt Patriotism
and Treason; that War was an existing fact; and that Patriots must arm
to defend and preserve the Union against the armed Traitors assailing
it.

At last, July 4, 1861, the Congress met, and proceeded at once with
commendable alacrity and patriotism, to the consideration and enactment
of measures sufficient to meet the extraordinary exigency, whether as
regards the raising and equipment of the vast bodies of Union volunteers
needed to put down Rebellion, or in the raising of those enormous
amounts of money which the Government was now, or might thereafter be,
called upon to spend like water in preserving the Union.