I do not stop to consider whether it is subjugation or not.  It is compulsory obedience, not to my will; not to yours, sir; not to the will of any one man; not to the will of any one State; but compulsory obedience to the Constitution of the whole country.  The Senator chose the other day again and again to animadvert on a single expression in a little speech which I delivered before the Senate, in which I took occasion to say that if the people of the rebellious States would not govern themselves as States, they ought to be governed as Territories.  The Senator knew full well then, for I explained it twice—­he knows full well now—­that on this side of the Chamber; nay, in this whole Chamber; nay, in this whole North and West; nay, in all the loyal States in all their breadth, there is not a man among us all who dreams of causing any man in the South to submit to any rule, either as to life, liberty, or property, that we ourselves do not willingly agree to yield to.  Did he ever think of that?  Subjugation for what?  When we subjugate South Carolina, what shall we do?  We shall compel its obedience to the Constitution of the United States; that is all.  Why play upon words?  We do not mean, we have never said, any more.  If it be slavery that men should obey the Constitution their fathers fought for, let it be so.  If it be freedom, it is freedom equally for them and for us.  We propose to subjugate rebellion into loyalty; we propose to subjugate insurrection into peace; we propose to subjugate confederate anarchy into constitutional Union liberty.  The Senator well knows that we propose no more.  I ask him, I appeal to his better judgment now, what does he imagine we intend to do, if fortunately we conquer Tennessee or South Carolina—­call it “conquer,” if you will, sir—­what do we propose to do?  They will have their courts still; they will have their ballot-boxes still; they will have their elections still; they will have their representatives upon this floor still; they will have taxation and representation still; they will have the writ of habeas corpus still; they will have every privilege they ever had and all we desire.  When the confederate armies are scattered; when their leaders are banished from power; when the people return to a late repentant sense of the wrong they have done to a Government they never felt but in benignancy and blessing, then the Constitution made for all will be felt by all, like the descending rains from heaven which bless all alike.  Is that subjugation?  To restore what was, as it was, for the benefit of the whole country and of the whole human race, is all we desire and all we can have.

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