Later, as a senator from New York, Seward repeated his prediction on several occasions, including his famous “higher law” speech of 1850. He posited a stark distinction between gradual abolition in peacetime and immediate emancipation in wartime. Threats of southern secession posed the all-important question of “whether the Union shall stand, and slavery, under the steady, peaceful action of moral, social and political causes, be removed by gradual, voluntary effort, and with compensation, or whether the Union shall be dissolved, and civil wars ensue, bringing on violent but complete and
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