Official Report of the Great Union Meeting, Held at the Academy of Music, in the City of New York, December 19th, 1859
(Virginia Historical Society, Call no. E451 .N53 1859)

The Great Union Meeting in New York City was the largest ever held there: 6,000 filled the Academy of Music, 15,000 more gathered outside, and a document of support was signed by 20,000 citizens—one third of the registered voters. The meeting was a blatant celebration of the commercial ties between the city's cotton merchants and the slave-based economy of the South. Resolutions were passed. "[W]e regard the recent outrage at Harper's Ferry as a crime . . . and we approve of the firmness by which the treason has been duly punished"; "[T]he Constitution . . . recognize[s] the institution of slavery" and "it is our duty . . . to stand by that Constitution."