September 24

"The law is the only sure protection of the weak and the only efficient restraint upon the strong."

Millard Fillmore, 13th President, 1850-1853. From his First Annual Message (December 2, 1850) Fillmore, as Zachary Taylor's Vice-President, ascended to the Presidency after Taylor's sudden sickness and death in the summer of 1850, most probably from food poisoning. Fillmore, from New York, generally opposed slavery but supported its extension into new territories as provided for in the Missouri Compromise. The law was unpopular and divisive and he was not re-elected in 1853. "...But it must be borne in mind that the country is extensive; that there may be local interests or prejudices rendering a law odious in one part which is not so in another, and that the thoughtless and inconsiderate, misled by their passions or their imaginations, may be induced madly to resist such laws as they disapprove. Such persons should recollect that without law there can be no real practical liberty; that when law is trampled under foot tyranny rules, whether it appears in the form of a military despotism or of popular violence. The law is the only sure protection of the weak and the only efficient restraint upon the strong. When impartially and faithfully administered, none is beneath its protection and none above its control."