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gence, patriotism, and industry" to which the President called the attention of "the lately enfranchised race," and for the attainment of which he bespoke the favoring aid that should be prompted by the humanity and sense of justice of the "race more favored." Without such preparation the right to vote becomes a questionable gift, full of peril to both the freedmen and the nation as well, not only, as roughly expressed by the Pennsylvania Senator, " multiplying the chances for having his head broken at the polls in a contest with a stronger race," but through his ignorance becoming the tool of the designing, to be used for his own detriment and his country's harm. That the latter has been so remiss in this supplemental work no doubt in a measure explains, or accounts for, the little advantage suffrage has been to the former in the past, the unsatisfactory situation of affairs at the present, and the still discouraging outlook for the future.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

Forces involved.

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PERSONAL FREEDOM. CIVIL RIGHTS.

Ex-Rebel purpose to defeat the Amendments. — Counter-parMr. Wilson's bill and speech. - Speech of Mr. Sumner. -Johnson, Sherman, Trumbull, Saulsbury, Cowan, Wilson. — Bill laid aside. — Trunbull's bill. Debate and radical purpose. - Difficulties and diversity of opinion. Trumbull, Howard, Morrill. - Democratic opposition. — Hendricks, Cowan, Davis. House debate. — Bingham, Delano, Raymond, Broomall, Wilson, Shellabarger. - Bill passed. — Vetoed. - Debate. -Johnson, Trumbull, Wade, Henderson. - Final passage.

THE forces which provoked and entered into the irrepressible conflict were both titanic and indestructible. Surviving the abolishment of the legal relation of chattelhood, the malign elements remained to mar the results of the war, diminish the value of its victories, harass and oppress the ex-slaves, fill with anxiety, and test severely the fidelity and wisdom of those responsible for the right treatment of these wards of the nation. Though by skilful strategy, a fortunate concurrence of circumstances, and favoring Providence, the constitutional amendments had been carried through making slavery impossible and enfranchising the freedmen, it was soon seen that they afforded no exception to the rule, that laws, even organic, cannot execute themselves, and, if far in advance of the popular sentiment, they will remain a dead letter and practically inoperative. Nor has anything occurred since, even up to this present writing, to change the apprehensions that were thus early felt. From the first, it was seen that the ex-masters, though they had been defeated in the war they had themselves inaugurated, and had accepted pardon from their magnanimous victors, were not above the meanness of wreaking their vengeance on the unoffending freedmen for

that defeat, nor the purpose to make for them the state of freedom worse if possible than had been their former state of slavery. Accordingly, their friends in Congress, anxious and alert, at once resolved to forestall and guard if possible, by appropriate legislation, against such injustice and inhumanity.

On the very first day of the session, December 4, 1865, Mr. Wilson introduced a bill for the protection of personal freedom in the States lately in rebellion. It provided that "all laws, statutes, acts, ordinances, rules, and regulations heretofore in force in the Rebel States, whereby and wherein existed any inequalities of civil rights among their inhabitants on account of color, race, or previous condition of slavery, were null and void, and it should be unlawful to enforce or attempt to enforce the same." In his remarks upon the introduction of the bill, Mr. Wilson referred to the black codes of the Rebel States, to the pending legislation in some of those States, and to the reported outrages against the freedmen, and said that it was a measure "imperatively demanded at our hands." He contended that the faith of the government was pledged to "maintain the freedom" given by the Proclamation of Emancipation. By neglecting it, he averred, they were "incurring the indignation of men and the judgments of Almighty God." Subsequently in the debate, after saying that he would not impose anything degrading or unmanly on the Rebel States, he added, "while I would not degrade any of them, neither would I allow them to degrade others." He spoke of the barbarities of those who hated the freedmen for their fidelity to the country"; and said that "the evidence conclusively shows that great atrocities and cruelties are perpetrated upon the poor, dumb, toiling millions who look to us for protection." "The condition of the freedmen," he said, "is worse to-day than on the day General Lee surrendered to General Grant. Their spirits are less buoyant; they are less hopeful, less confident of their future; and we ought in Congress to say that these laws shall nevermore be enforced, and that these States shall not have power to pass laws to oppress men whom we have declared free, and to whom we have given the plighted faith of the Republic." Mr. Sumner expressed hearty sympathy with the

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proposed measure of his colleague, indorsed its necessity, spoke of the plighted faith of the nation as a "pledge without any limitation in space or time, as extended and immortal as the Republic itself." Speaking of the "terrible testimony," he said, "The blood curdles at the thought of such enormities, and especially at the thought that the poor freedmen, to whom we owe protection, are left to the unrestrained will of such a people, smarting with defeat and ready to wreak vengeance upon these representatives of a true loyalty. In the name of God let us protect them. Insist upon guaranties. Pass the bill now under consideration; pass any bill; but do not let this crying injustice rage any longer. An avenging God cannot sleep while such things find countenance. If you are not ready to be the Moses of an oppressed people, do not become its Pharaoh."

In the debate which followed there was the utterance of a general desire that the freedmen should be protected, though doubts were expressed as to the necessity or exact legitimacy of the proposed measure. Mr. Johnson of Maryland, while deprecating any injustice to the freedmen, could not see that there was any demand for special legislation, or greater call to protect the blacks from Southern outrages than the whites from Northern. Mr. Sherman was in favor of the purposes of the bill, but expressed the belief that it would be wiser to postpone action till the Thirteenth Amendment had been ac cepted by the States, and had become the supreme law of the land. The hope was avowed by Mr. Trumbull that there would be no need of such action of Congress; but that the South would in good faith adapt its laws to the amendment, which its legislatures had just accepted, abolishing slavery. If, how ever, there was the necessity, he would have the bill referred to its appropriate committee and made the subject of the most careful consideration. Mr. Saulsbury denied the power of Congress, even under the new amendment, thus to interfere with the rights of the States. Mr. Cowan of Pennsylvania and Stewart of Nevada doubted, they said, the alleged atrocities in those States, and both, with almost identical phraseology, expressed the conviction that if such were facts, the war

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had been in vain and unjustifiable. If so, said the former, "the Republic is at an end, the war was folly, and its cost of blood and treasure wasted"; if these are facts, said the latter, "a union of these States is impossible, and hundreds of thousands of the best of our land have fallen to no purpose." "They might as well question," said Mr. Wilson in reply, "the massacre at Fort Pillow, and the cruelties practised at Andersonville, where eighty-three per cent of the men who entered the hospitals died; Andersonville, where more American soldiers lie buried than fell throughout the Mexican war, where more American soldiers now lie than were killed of British soldiers in Wellington's four great battles in Spain, and at Waterloo, at Alma, Inkerman, and Sebastopol."

The bill was laid aside and was not afterward called up. A similar bill was introduced by Mr. Wilson, two days after the proclamation of ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, and referred to Committee on the Judiciary. Mr. Sumner had also introduced a bill "supplying appropriate legislation to enforce the amendment of the Constitution," which was also referred to the same committee. On the last day of December the chairman of this committee reported the two bills; but with a recommendation of their indefinite postponement.

On the 5th of January, 1866, Mr. Trumbull introduced a bill substantially like the preceding bills. It provided that there should be no discrimination in civil rights on account of color, race, or previous condition of slavery; but the inhabitants, of every race and color, should have the same right to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, and should be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding. It was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, reported, and made the order of the day for the 29th.

The debate in both houses on the bill and the amendments offered revealed the radical character of the legislation pro

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