of amusement, and also of common schools and public institutions of learning and benevolence supported in whole or in part by general taxation, and of cemeteries so supported, subject only to the conditions and limitations established by law and applicable alike to citizens of any race and color, regardless of any previous condition of servitude." Mr. Frelinghuysen accompanied its introduction with an explanation, and a defence of its provisions. "The whole struggle," he said, alluding to the war and the long and heated discussions of Congress," in field and forum," has been "between freedom and slavery, between national sovereignty and State sovereignty, a struggle between United States citizenship and State citizenship, and the superiority of allegiance due to each." "The one purpose," he continued, "of this bill is to assert, or reassert, freedom from all discrimination before the law on account of race,' as one of the fundamental rights of citizenship." The discussion which ensued, although traversing ground already gone over, revealed very clearly the effect that time was exerting upon the popular mind and heart, already effacing too many of the lessons of the war, increasing the Democratic representation in both houses, provoking the taunt that the Republican was "a perishing party," and inspiring the hope of the reactionists that it was too late for further legislation to conserve the fruits of the war and to make more effective the amendments of the Constitution. The bill was, however, brought to a vote on the 22d of May, 1874, and carried, yeas twenty-nine, nays sixteen. It was referred to the appropriate committee in the House, but was not reported or taken up for action during the session. It was, however, reported by Mr. Butler from the Committee on the Judiciary during the second session, passed both houses, received the approval of the President, and became the law of the land. Without tracing its history at all in either house, a reference to two speeches in the Senate on the 27th of February, 1875, the closing day of the debate in that body, may not be without instruction. Premising that the staple of Democratic argument and appeal, threats and predictions, remained the same, there had sprung up an opposition in the Republican party. Among the Republicans who opposed it was Mr. Carpenter, the eloquent Senator from Wisconsin. In his speech upon the occasion, he made the points, that it was unconstitutional, that it was an infringement on State rights, and an attempt to effect by legislation what can be effected by moral forces alone. Professing himself the same "sentiments which inspired the bill," and a willingness to go as far as the farthest" to protect the colored people of the South, or to restore order to that distracted section"; admitting that, if anything "upon the statute-book" could "accomplish a complete eradi cation of the deep and long-existing prejudice of the white race against social contact with the race in whose favor it is proposed, it would be a signal triumph of humanity," and speaking, too, in the highest terms of the colored people, especially of their bearing during and subsequent to the war, he added: "But haste is not always speed; and especially is this true of attempts to coerce sentiment or suppress prejudice. This can only be accomplished by time, kindly entreaty, reason, and argument. And all experience demonstrates that every unavailing attempt to force men into compliance with social, religious, or political dogmas has the effect to postpone the end desired." It may be added that the debates were very long and exciting; and that many of the friends of the measure, fixed in their purpose that it should be made the practical correlate of the measures of amnesty before Congress, determined there should not be this generosity shown to the ex-Rebels until justice was shown to the ex-slaves. Mr. Edmunds of Vermont, in the closing speech of the debate, thus arraigned the Democratic party. After saying that there had been no measure either for suppressing the Rebellion, carrying on the war, or securing the fruits of the war that has found any favor with that party," he added: "Why, look at it, Mr. President. Take the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution abolishing slavery. Whose votes passed it after the war?. . . . Every Democrat in this body, I believe, on the 11th of April, 1864, voted against submitting it to the people of the various States for their approval. . . . . And when it was .... submitted to the States for their approval, I find that every Democratic State, if I am not mistaken, which then had a Democratic legislature rejected that amendment. . . . . And then again, when we came to the Fourteenth Amendment, I find that, true to that instinct and that impulse, every member of the Democratic party here recorded his vote against it; . and when that amendment was submitted to the States, again true to the same solid and perpetual policy, every Democratic State that I know of voted against it, and some States which when it was submitted to them voted in its favor, the moment they became Democratic undertook to withdraw that ratification..... Then, when we came to the Fifteenth Amendment, true again to the un-American and anti-liberal policy, every Democratic member in this body voted against it still, and I believe every Democratic legislature voted against it also. . . . . There is not one of the reconstruction acts that had the advantage of a Democratic word in its favor or a Democratic vote for it. There is not a civil rights bill securing the simplest and confessedly fundamental rights, such as the one proposed in 1866, that received a Democratic vote." The veteran Senator had and gave his philosophy for the facts stated, but his language is quoted here simply for the testimony it bears to the attitude of the Democratic party as late as the winter of 1875. Simultaneously with this there was action upon another class of bills, germane in spirit and purpose, entitled Enforcement Acts, or popularly termed Force Bills. On the 16th of May, 1870, Mr. Bingham, from the House Committee on the Judiciary, reported a bill, which had been referred, and which he thus explained: "The object of this bill is to enforce the legal rights of citizens of the United States to vote in the several States of this Union, a right which is defiantly denied in my own State and others, in direct contravention of the express letter of the Constitution of the United States." It contained ten sections, and was most carefully and elaborately drawn. Its first section, indicating its general character, provided if any officer should, by neglect or refusal to perform any official act, under color of any State constitution or law, deprive any one, on account of color, race, or previous condition, from voting, he should be deemed guilty of misdemeanor, to be punished by fine and imprisonment. It was several months before Congress, was very ably and acrimoniously discussed, and was passed and approved May 31, 1870. On the 14th of May, 1872, an amendatory act was passed authorizing district judges to appoint, in congressional elections, two men of opposite politics, to be present at the registration and voting, and to remain with the boxes until the votes were counted. On the 28th, another amendatory act was passed providing for "a written or printed ballot." Thus earnestly and sedulously did the Republican leaders watch the practical workings of the reconstruction acts, mark any defects revealed, and seek by carefully and conscientiously drawn amendments to perfect and render effective the legisla tion by which they sought to protect the freedmen in their new-found rights. If the subsequent history of the latter has been marked by wrongs and outrages at which humanity weeps and the patriot trembles when he "remembers that God is just"; if freedom has proved to them of less value than they and their friends had fondly hoped; if the negro's enfranchisement has too often fulfilled the prophecy and verified the threats of his enemies, that it would only be "multiplying his chances for having his head broken at the polls in a contest with a stronger race," and that to give him office would be to "crown, with flowers the victim for the sacrifice," and "inscribe upon the cross an empty title, when upon that cross the victim is crucified," it has resulted from causes that lie too deep to be reached by law, - from a disease for which as yet no adequate remedy has been prescribed, or, if prescribed, has not been provided. CHAPTER XLIX. INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN CHURCHES AND ASSOCIATIONS. - South not united for secession. - Appeals to churches.-R. L. Stanton. - Arraignment of Southern clergy. - Proofs. Thornwell, Palmer. - Address. Defection and its causes. Damaging testimony. Amazing record. - Leaders. Synod of Mississippi. - Southern argument. Clergy led the way. Thornwell, Ross, Smythe, Hopkins, Seabury, Adams. South Side view. Fisk, Stuart, Tyler, Bacon, Beecher. - Indorsement of Webster's 7th of March speech. - Presbyterian Church. Benevolent associations. A. B. C. F. M. - Ecclesiastical odium and social ostracism. Lewis Tappan, Leonard Woods, Jr. - Humiliating attitude. Cincinnati Christian Convention. - Albert Barnes, John Jay. - Northern fellowship. Its cost and protests. Causes of defection. - Grave difficulties of the situation. - Christian antislavery effort. — Painful struggles. — Small success. -Appeals to missionary associations. — Formation of new societies on an antislavery basis. -American Missionary Association. Church Antislavery Society. - Republican party. - Ministers and members of churches largely Republican. Conclusion. THE South, at the opening of the Rebellion, was far from being a unit on the subject of secession. It is indeed claimed that the majority was opposed to that extreme measure, and were only dragooned into it by the violence and skilful management of their leaders. Of the means employed, strangely as it may sound, were earnest appeals to the Christian churches, and an adroit use of the pulpit and religious press. We have the testimony of Dr. R. L. Stanton, a Southern clergyman and late professor in the Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church in Danville, Kentucky, in an elaborate work, entitled "The Church and the Rebellion," that these were among the most active and potential forces which precipitated and made inevitable that fearful revolt. Alluding to the great speech of Alexander H. Stephens dissuading his fellow-citizens from going into the Rebellion, he said: "While |