SPEECH

OF THE

HON. JAMES A. GARFIELD,

OF OHIO,

Delivered in the House of Representatives, February 12th, 1878.

WASHINGTON, D. C.:

DARBY & DUVALL, PRINTERS, 432 NINTH STREET.

1878.

On the 16th of January, 1878, Mr. GARFIELD introduced into the House of Representatives the following Joint Resolution, which was adopted without a division. It was subsequently adopted by the Senate, and was approved by the President February 1st, 1878:

Whereas Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson, of New York City, has tendered to Congress Carpenter's Painting of President Lincoln and his Cabinet, at the time of his first reading of the Prociamation of Emancipation: Therefore,

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That said painting is hereby accepted in the name of the people of the United States; and the thanks of Congress are tendered to the donor for her generous and patriotic gift.

And be it further resolved, That the Joint Committee on the Library are hereby instructed to make arrangements for the formal presentation of said painting to Congress, on Tuesday, the twelfth of February next; and said committee shall cause said painting to be placed in an appropriate and conspicuous place in the Capitol, and shall carefully provide for its preservation.

And be it further resolved, That the President is requested to cause a copy of these Resolutions to be forwarded to Mrs. Thompson.

In pursuauce of its provisions, the hour of two o'clock p. m., Tuesday, February 12th, was fixed for the formal presentation and acceptance of the painting.

At two o'clock the Assistant Doorkeeper announced the Senate of the United States. Preceded by the Vice President of the United States and accompanied by their Secretary and Sergeant-at-Arms, the Senators entered and took the seats assigned them. The donor of the picture, Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson, with her escort, and the artist, Mr. F. B. Carpenter, also occupied seats on the floor.

The VICE PRESIDENT (who occupied a chair on the right of the Senate) said: The Senate and House of Representatives have convened in joint session for the purpose of receiving, through the munificence of Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson, of New York, Carpenter's painting, The Signing of the Proclamation of Emancipation.

Mr. GARFIELD said:

Mr. PRESIDENT: By the order of the Senate and the House, and on behalf of the donor, Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson, it is made my pleasant duty to deliver to Congress the painting which is now unveiled. It is the patriotic gift of an American woman whose years have been devoted to gentle and generous charities and to the instruction and elevation of the laboring poor.

Believing that the perpetuity and glory of her country depend upon the dignity of labor and the equal freedom of all its people, she has come to the Capitol, to place in the perpetual custody of the nation, as the symbol of her faith, the representation of that great act which proclaimed "liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."

Inspired by the same sentiment, the Representatives of the nation have opened the doors of this Chamber to receive at her hands the sacred trust. In coming hither, these living Representatives have passed under the dome and through that beautiful and venerable Hall which, on another occasion, I have ventured to call the third House of American Representatives, that silent assembly whose members have received their high credentials at the impartial hand of History. Year by year, we see the circle of its immortal membership enlarging; year by year, we see the elect of their country, in eloquent silence, taking

their places in this American Pantheon, bringing within its sacred precincts the wealth of those immortal memories which made their lives illustrious; and year by year, that august assembly is teaching deeper and grander lessons to those who serve in these more ephemeral Houses of Congress.

Among the paintings hitherto assigned to places within the Capitol, are two which mark events forever memorable in the history of mankind; thrice memorable in the history of America.

The first is the painting by Vanderlyn, which represents, though with inadequate force, the great discovery which gave to the civilized world a new hemisphere.

The second, by Trumbull, represents that great Declaration which banished forever from our shores the crown and scepter of Imperial Power, and proposed to found a new nation upon the broad and enduring basis of liberty.

To-day, we place upon our walls, this votive tablet, which commemorates the third great act in the history of America-the fulfillment of the promises of the Declaration.

Concerning the causes which led to that act, the motives which inspired it, the necessities which compelled it, and the consequences which followed and are yet to follow it, there have been, there are, and still will be great and honest differences of opinion. Perhaps we are yet too near the great events of which this act formed so conspicuous a part, to understand its deep significance and to foresee its faroff consequences.

The lesson of history is rarely learned by the actors themselves, especially when they read it by the fierce and dusky light of war, or amid the deeper shadows of those sorrows which war brings to both. But the unanimous voice of this House in favor of accepting the gift, and the impressive scene we here witness, bear eloquent testimony to the transcendant importance of the event portrayed on yonder canvas. Let us pause to consider the actors in that scene. In force of character, in thoroughness and breadth of culture, in experience of public affairs and in national reputation, the Cabinet that sat around that council-board has had no superior, perhaps no equal in our history. Seward, the finished scholar, the consummate orator, the great leader of the Senate, had come to crown his career with those achievements which placed him in the first rank of modern diplomatists. Chase, with a culture and a fame of massive grandeur, stood as the rock and pillar of the public credit, the noble embodiment of the public faith. Stanton was there, a very Titan of strength, the great organizer of victory. Eminent lawyers, men of business, leaders of States and leaders of men completed the group.

But the man who presided over that council, who inspired and guided its deliberations, was a character so unique that he stood alone, without a model in history or a parallel among men. Born on this day,

sixty-nine years ago, to an inheritance of extremest poverty; surrounded by the rude forces of the wilderness; wholly unaided by parents; only one year in any school; never, for a day, master of his own time until he reached his majority; making his way to the profession of the law by the hardest and roughest road; yet by force of unconquerable will and persistent, patient work, he attained a foremost place in his profession,

And, moving up from high to higher,
Became, on fortune's crowning slope,
The pillar of a people's hope,

The center of a world's desire.

At first, it was the prevailing belief that he would be only the nominal head of his administration; that its policy would be directed by the eminent statesmen he had called to his council. How erroneous this opinion was, may be seen from a single incident:

Among the earliest, most difficult, and most delicate duties of his administration, was the adjustment of our relations with Great Britain. Serious complications, even hostilities were apprehended. On the 21st of May, 1861, the Secretary of State presented to the President his draught of a letter of instructions to Minister Adams, in which the position of the United States and the attitude of Great Britain were set forth with the clearness and force which long experience and great ability had placed at the command of the Secretary.

Upon almost every page of that original draught are erasures, additions, and marginal notes in the handwriting of Abraham Lincoln, which exhibit a sagacity, a breadth of wisdom, and a comprehension of the whole subject, impossible to be found except in a man of the very first order. And these modifications of a great state paper were made by a man who, but three months before, had entered, for the first time, the wide theater of Executive action.

Gifted with an insight and a foresight which the ancients would have called divination, he saw, in the midst of darkness and obscurity, the logic of events, and forecasted the result. From the first, in his own quaint, original way, without ostentation or offense to his associates, he was pilot and commander of his administration. He was one of the few great rulers whose wisdom increased with his power, and whose spirit grew gentler and tenderer as his triumphs were multiplied.

This was the man, and these his associates, who look down upon us from the canvas.

The present is not a fitting occasion to examine, with any completeness, the causes that led to the proclamation of emancipation; but the peculiar relation of that act to the character of Abraham Lincoln cannot be understood, without considering one remarkable fact in his history.

His earlier years were passed in a region remote from the centers of political thought, and without access to the great world of books. But the few books that came within his reach he devoured