THE FEDERAL ELECTIONS BILL
In December, 1889, the Republican Party succeeded to the legislative
power in the country for the first time in sixteen years.
Since 1873 there had been a Democratic President for four
years, and a Democratic House or Senate or both for the rest
of the time. There was a general belief on the part of the
Republicans, that the House of Representatives, as constituted
for fourteen years of that time, and that the Presidency itself
when occupied by Mr. Cleveland, represented nothing but usurpation,
by which, in large districts of the country, the will of the
people had been defeated. There were some faint denials at
the time when these claims were made in either House of Congress
as to elections in the Southern States. But nobody seems
to deny now, that the charges were true. Mr. Senator Tillman
of South Carolina stated in my hearing in the Senate:
"We took the Government away. We stuffed ballot boxes. We
shot them. We are not ashamed of it. The Senator from Wisconsin
would have done the same thing. I see it in his eye right
now. He would have done it. With that system--force, tissue
ballots, etc.--we got tired ourselves. So we called a Constitutional
Convention, and we eliminated, as I said, all of the colored
people whom we could under the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments.
"I want to call your attention to the remarkable change that
has come over the spirit of the dream of the Republicans;
to remind you, gentlemen of the North, that your slogans of
the past--brotherhood of man and fatherhood of God--have gone
glimmering down the ages. The brotherhood of man exists no
longer, because you shoot negroes in Illinois, when they come
in competition with your labor, and we shoot them in South
Carolina, when they come in competition with us in the matter
of elections. You do not love them any better than we do.
You used to pretend that you did; but you no longer pretend
it, except to get their votes.
"You deal with the Filipinos just as you deal with the negroes,
only you treat them a heap worse."
No Democrat rose to deny his statement, and, so far as I know,
no Democratic paper contradicted it. The Republicans, who
had elected President Harrison and a Republican House in 1888,
were agreed, with very few exceptions, as to the duty of providing
a remedy for this great wrong. Their Presidential Convention,
held at Chicago in 1888, passed a resolution demanding, "effective
legislation to secure integrity and purity of elections, which
are the fountains of all public authority," and charged that
the "present Administration and the Democratic majority in
Congress owe their existence to the suppression of the ballot
by a criminal nullification of the Constitution and the laws
of the United States."
In the Senate at the winter session of 1888 and at the beginning
of the December session of 1889, a good many Bills were introduced
for the security of National elections. Similar Bills were
introduced in the House. A special Committee was appointed
there to deal with that subject. I had, myself, no doubt
of the Constitutional authority of Congress, and of its duty,
if it were able, to pass an effective law for that purpose.
I was the Chairman of the Committee on Privileges and Elections,
and it was my duty to give special attention to that subject.
I had carefully prepared a Bill in the vacation, based on
one introduced by Mr. Sherman, providing for holding, under
National authority, separate registrations and elections for
Members of Congress. But when I got to Washington, I found,
on consultation with every Republican Senator except one,
that a large majority were averse to an arrangement which
would double the cost of elections throughout the country,
and which, in States where personal registration every year
is required, would demand from every citizen his presence
at the place of polling or registration four times every alternate
year. That is, in the years when there were Congressmen to
be elected he must go twice to be registered--once for the
State election, and once for the Congressional--and twice
to vote. So I drew another Bill. I say I drew it. But I
had the great advantage of consultation with Senator Spooner
of Wisconsin, a very able lawyer who had lately come to the
Senate, and I can hardly say that the Bill, as it was finally
drafted, was more mine or his. This Bill provided, in substance,
that there should be National officers of both parties who
should be present at the registration and election of Members
of Congress, and at the count of the vote, and who should
know and report everything which should happen, so that all
facts affecting the honesty of the election and the return
might be before the House of Representatives. To this were
added some section providing for the punishment of bribery,
fraud and misconduct of election officers.
In the meantime the House of Representatives had appointed
a special Committee charged with a similar duty. Members
of that Committee saw me, and insisted, with a good deal of
reason, that a measure which concerned the election of members
of the House of Representatives, should originate in that
body. Accordingly the Senate Committee held back its Bill,
and awaited the action of the House, which sent a Bill to
the Senate, July 15, 1890. The House Bill dealt not only
with the matter of elections, but also with the selection
of juries, and some other important kindred subjects. Our
Committee struck out from it everything that did not bear
directly on elections; mitigated the severity of the penalties,
and reduced the bulk of the Bill very considerably. The measure
was reported in a new draft by way of substitute. It remained
before the Senate until the beginning of the next Session,
when it was taken up for action. It was a very simple measure.
It only extended the law which, with the approbation of both
parties, had been in force in cities of more than twenty
thousand inhabitants, to Congressional districts, when there
should be an application to the Court, setting forth the
necessity for its protection. That law had received the
commendation of many leading Democrats, including S. S. Cox,
Secretary Whitney, the four Democratic Congressmen who represented
Brooklyn, and General Slocum, then Representative at large
from the State of New York. It had been put in force on the
application of Democrats quite as often as on that of Republicans.
We added to our Bill a provision that in case of a dispute
concerning an election certificate, the Circuit Court of the
United States in which the district was situated should hear
the case and should award a certificate entitling the member
to be placed on the Clerk's roll, and to hold his seat until
the House itself should act on the case. That provision was
copied from the English law of 1868 which has given absolute
public satisfaction there. This was the famous Force Bill,
and the whole of it--a provision that, if a sufficient petition
were made to the court for that purpose, officers, appointed
by the court, belonging to both parties should be present
and watch the election; that the Judge of the Circuit Court
should determine, in case of dispute, what name should be
put on the roll of the House of Representatives, in the beginning,
subject to the Constitutional power of the House to correct
it, and that a moderate punishment for bribery, intimidation
and fraud, on indictment and conviction by a jury of the vicinage,
should be imposed. That was the whole of it.
But the Southern Democratic leaders, with great adroitness,
proceeded to repeat the process known as "firing the Southern
heart." They persuaded their people that there was an attempt
to control elections by National authority. They realized
that the waning power of their party at the South, many of
whose business men saw that the path of prosperity for the
South as well as for the North lay in the adoption of Republican
policies, might be reestablished by exciting the fear of negro
domination. The Northern Democrats, either very ignorantly
or wilfuly, united in the outcry. Governor William E. Russell
of Massachusetts, a gentleman of large influence and popularity
with both parties, telegraphed to President Cleveland a pious
thanksgiving for the defeat of this "wicked Bill."
Some worthy Republican Senators became alarmed. They thought,
with a good deal of reason, that it was better to allow existing
evils and conditions to be cured by time, and the returning
conscience and good sense of the people, rather than have
the strife, the result of which must be quite doubtful, which
the enactment and enforcement of this law, however moderate
and just, would inevitably create.
On reflection, I came myself to the conclusion that, while
the Bill was reasonable and there was no reasonable doubt
of the power of Congress to enact it, yet the attempt to pass
it, if it were to fail, would do the cause infinite mischief. It
would be an exhibition of impotence, always injurious to
a political party. It would drive back into the Democratic
Party many men who were afraid of negro domination; who looked
with great dislike on the assertion of National power over
elections, and whom other considerations would induce to act
with the Republicans. So I thought it was best to ascertain
carefully the prevailing opinion and see if we were likely
to get the Bill through, and, if we found that unlikely, not
to proceed far enough to have a debate in either House.
Accordingly I visited the House of Representatives, saw several
of my Massachusetts colleagues and some other leaders. They
agreed that, if I found that the Bill could not, in all probability,
pass the Senate, it should be arranged to lay it aside in
the House without making any serious movement for it there.
After that arrangement was made there was a Senate caucus.
I brought up the matter and moved the appointment of a Committee
to consider the whole question of legislation with reference
to the security of elections. A gentleman who had recently
become a Member of the Senate rose and quite angrily objected
to taking up the matter for consideration. He declared that
he would not consent to have the subject introduced in a
Republican caucus. The proceedings of such caucuses are
supposed to be kept from the public. But they are pretty
sure to leak out. I could not very well get up and say that
my reason for asking for a committee was to see whether the
law should be suppressed or not. So I did not urge my motion.
But I did the best I could.
Before reporting the Bill I saw every Republican Senator
and obtained his opinion upon it. I have in my possession
the original memoranda of the various answers. Not only a
majority of the Republican Senators, but a majority of the
whole Senate declared emphatically for an Election Bill. I
further consulted them whether the authority, in case of a
disputed election, to order, upon hearing, the name of the
person found to be elected to be placed on the roll should
be lodged in the United States Courts, or in some special
tribunal. Two or three preferred that the court should not
be invoked. But a majority of the whole Senate favored vesting
the power in the courts, and those who preferred another way
stated that they were willing to abide by the judgment of
the Committee.
When the House Bill came up, it was, on the 7th of August,
1890, reported favorably with my Bill as a substitute. Meantime
the McKinley Tariff Bill, which Mr. Cleveland had made, so
far as he could, the sole issue in the late election, had
been matured and reported. It affected all the business interests
of the country. They were in a state of uncertainty and alarm.
Mr. Quay of Pennsylvania proposed a resolution to the effect
that certain enumerated measures, not including the Election
Bill, should be considered at that session, and that all others
should be postponed. That, I suppose, would have had the
entire Democratic support and Republicans enough to give it
a majority. It would have postponed the Election Bill without
giving any assurance of its consideration at the short session.
So a conference of Republicans was held at which an agreement
was made, which I drew up, and signed by a majority of the
entire Senate. It entitled the friends of the Election Bill to
be assured that it would be brought to a vote and passed at
the short session, if there were then a majority in its favor.
This is the agreement, of which I have the original, with
the original signatures annexed, in my possession.
"We will vote: 1. To take up for consideration on the first
day of the next session the Federal Election Bill, and to
keep it before the Senate to the exclusion of other legislative
business, until it shall be disposed of by a vote. 2. To
make such provision as to the time and manner of taking the
vote as shall be decided, by a majority of the Republican
Senators, to be necessary in order to secure such vote, either
by a general rule like that proposed by Mr. Hoar, and now
pending before the committee on rules, or by special rule of
the same purport, applicable only to the Election Bill."
At the next December session the Bill was taken up for consideration
and, after a few days' debate, there was a motion to lay it
aside. Since the measure had been first introduced, the sentiment
in certain parts of the country in favor of the free coinage
of silver had been strengthened. Several of the Republican
Senators were among its most zealous advocates. There was
a motion to lay aside the Election Bill which was adopted
by a bare majority--the Democrats voting for it and several
of the Silver Republican Senators, so-called. All but one
of these had signed their names to the promise I have printed.
I never have known by what process of reasoning they reconciled
their action with their word. But I know that in heated political
strife men of honor, even men of ability, sometimes deceive
themselves by a casuistic reasoning which would not convince
them at other times.
The Election Bill deeply excited the whole country. Its
supporters were denounced by the Democratic papers everywhere,
North and South, with a bitterness which I hardly knew before
that the English language was capable of expressing. My mail
was crowded with letters, many of them anonymous, the rest
generally quite as anonymous, even if the writer's name were
signed, denouncing me with all the vigor and all the scurrility
of which the writers were capable. I think this is the last
great outbreak of anger which has spread through the American
people.
I got, however, a good deal of consolation from the stanch
friendship and support of the Republicans of Massachusetts,
which never failed me during the very height of this storm.
Whittier sent me a volume of poetry which he had just published,
with the inscription written on the blank leaf in his own
hand, "To George F. Hoar, with the love of his old friend,
John G. Whittier." I think I would have gone through ten
times as much objurgation as I had to encounter for those
few words.
There has never since been an attempt to protect National
elections by National authority. The last vestige of the
National statute for securing purity of elections was repealed
in President Cleveland's second Administration, under the
lead of Senator Hill of New York. I have reflected very carefully
as to my duty in that matter. I am clearly of the opinion
that Congress has the power to regulate the matter of elections
of Members of the House of Representatives and to make suitable
provisions for honest elections and an honest ascertainment
of the result, and that such legislation ought to be enacted
and kept on the statute book and enforced. But such legislation,
to be of any value whatever, must be permanent. If it only
be maintained in force while one political party is in power,
and repealed when its antagonist comes in, and is to be constant
matter of political strife and sectional discussion, it is
better, in my judgment, to abandon it than to keep up an incessant,
fruitless struggle. It is like legislation to prohibit by law
the selling of liquor. I believe that it would be wise to
prohibit the sale of liquor, with the exceptions usually made
in prohibitory laws. But if we are to have in any State,
as we have had in so many States, a prohibitory law one year,
another with different provisions the next, a license law
the next, and the difficulty all the time in enforcing any
of them, it is better to give the attempt at prohibition
up and to adopt a local option, or high license, or some
other policy. In other words, it is better to have the second
best law kept permanently on the statute book than to have
the best law there half the time.
So, after Senator Hill's repealing act got through the Senate,
I announced that, so far as I was concerned, and so far as
I had the right to express the opinion of Northern Republicans,
I thought the attempt to secure the rights of the colored
people by National legislation would be abandoned until there
were a considerable change of opinion in the country, and
especially in the South, and until it had ceased to be a matter
of party strife. To that announcement, Senator Chandler of
New Hampshire, who had been one of the most zealous advocates
of the National laws, expressed his assent. That statement
has been repeated once or twice on the floor of the Senate.
So far as I know, no Republican has dissented from it. Certainly
there has been no Bill for that purpose introduced in either
House of Congress, or proposed, so far as I know, in the Republican
press, or in any Republican platform since.
The question upon which the policy of all National election
laws depends is, At whose will do you hold your right to be
an American citizen? What power can you invoke if that right
be withheld from you? If you hold the right at will of your
State, then you can invoke no power but the State for its
vindication. If you hold it at the will of the Nation, as
expressed by the people of the whole Nation under the Constitution
of the United States, then you are entitled to invoke the
power of the United States for its enforcement whenever necessary.
If you hold it at the will of the white Democracy of any State
or neighborhood then, as unfortunately seems to be the case
in a good many States, you will be permitted to exercise it
only if you are a white man, and then only so long as you
are a Democrat.
I have had during my whole life to deal with that most difficult
of all political problems, the relation to each other, in
a Republic, of men of different races. It is a question
which has vexed the American people from the beginning of
their history. It is, if I am not much mistaken, to vex
them still more hereafter. First the Indian, then the Negro,
then the Chinese, now the Filipino, disturb our peace. In
the near future will come the Italian and the Pole and the
great population of Asia, with whom we are soon to be brought
into most intimate and close relation.
In my opinion, in all these race difficulties and troubles,
the fault has been with the Anglo-Saxons. Undoubtedly the
Indian has been a savage; the Negro has been a savage; the
lower order of Chinamen have been gross and sometimes bestial.
The inhabitants of the Philippine Islands, in their natural
rights, which, as we had solemnly declared to be a self-evident
truth, were theirs beyond question, have committed acts of
barbarism. But in every case, these inferior and alien races,
if they had been dealt with justly, in my opinion, would have
been elevated by quiet, peaceful and Christian conduct on
our part to a higher plane, and brought out of their barbarism.
The white man has been the offender.
I have no desire to recall the story of the methods by which
the political majorities, consisting in many communities
largely of negroes and led by immigrants from the North, were
subdued.
This is not a sectional question.
It is not a race question. The suffrage was conferred on
the negro by the Southern States themselves. They can always
make their own rules. If the negro be ignorant, you may define
ignorance and disfranchise that. If the negro be vicious,
you may define vice and disfranchise that. If the negro be
poor, you may define poverty and disfranchise that. If the
negro be idle, you may define idleness and disfranchise that.
If the negro be lazy, you may define laziness and disfranchise
that. If you will only disfranchise him for the qualities
which you say unfit him to vote and not for his race or the
color of his skin there is no Constitutional obstacle in your
way.
So it was not wholly a race or color problem. It was largely
a question of party supremacy. In three states, Alabama,
South Carolina and Florida, white Democrats charged each other
with stifling the voice of the majority by fraudulent election
processes, and in Alabama they claimed that a majority of
white men were disfranchised by a false count of negro votes
in the black belt.
It was not wholly unnatural that the men who, in dealing
with each other, were men of scrupulous honor and of undoubted
courage should have brought themselves to do such things,
or at any rate to screen and sympathize with the more hot-
headed men who did them. The proof in the public records
of those public crimes is abundant. With the exception of
Reverdy Johnson of Maryland there is no record of a single
manly remonstrance, or expression of disapproval from the
lips of any prominent Southern man. But they had persuaded
themselves to believe that a contest for political power with
a party largely composed of negroes was a contest for their
civilization itself. They thought it like a fight for life
with a pack of wolves. In some parts of the South there were
men as ready to murder a negro who tried to get an office
as to kill a fox they found prowling about a hen roost. These
brave and haughty men who had governed the country for half
a century, who had held the power of the United States at
bay for four years, who had never doffed their hats to any
prince or noble on earth, even in whose faults or vices there
was nothing mean or petty, never having been suspected of
corruption, who as Macaulay said of the younger Pitt, "If
in an hour of ambition they might have been tempted to ruin
their country, never would have stooped to pilfer from her,"
could not brook the sight of a Legislature made up of ignorant
negroes who had been their own slaves, and of venal carpet-
baggers. They could not endure that men, some of whom had
been bought and sold like chattels in the time of slavery,
and others ready to sell themselves, although they were freemen,
should sit to legislate for their States with their noble
and brave history. I myself, although I have always maintained,
and do now, the equal right of all men of whatever color or
race to a share in the government of the country, felt a thrill
of sadness when I saw the Legislature of Louisiana in session
in the winter of 1873.
There was a good deal to provoke them also in the character
of some of the Northern men who had gone to the South to take
an active part in political affairs. Some of them were men
of the highest character and honor, actuated by pure and unselfish
motives. If they had been met cordially by the communities
where they took up their abode they would have brought to
them a most valuable quality of citizenship. If Northern
immigration and Northern capital had been welcomed at the
South it would have had as helpful and influence as it had
in California and Oregon. But the Southern men treated them
all alike. I incline to think that a large number of the
men who got political office in the South, when the men who
had taken part in the Rebellion were still disfranchised,
and the Republicans were still in power, were of a character
that would not have been tolerated in public office in the
North. General Willard Warner of Alabama, a brave Union soldier,
a Republican Senator from that State, was one of the best
and bravest men who ever sat in that body. Governor Packard
of Louisiana was I believe a wise and honest man. But in
general it was impossible not to feel a certain sympathy with
a people, who whatever else had been their faults never were
guilty of corruption or meanness, or the desire to make money
out of public office, in the intolerable loathing which they
felt for these strangers who had taken possession of the high
places in their States.
President Grant gave the influence and authority of his Administration
toward maintaining in power the lawfully chosen Republican
State Governments. But in spite of all he could do they had
all been overthrown but two when the Presidential election
was held in 1876. Those two were South Carolina and Louisiana.
The people of those two States had chosen Republican Governors
at the State election held on the same day with the election
of the President. But these Governors could not hold their
power twenty-four hours without the support of the National
administration. When that was withdrawn the negro and carpet-
bag majority was powerless as a flock of sheep before a pack
of wolves to resist their brave and unscrupulous Democratic
enemy, however inferior the latter in numbers.
In attempting to give a dispassionate account of the history
of this great question which has entered so deeply into the
political and social life of the American people almost from
the beginning, it is hard to measure the influence of race
prejudice, of sectional feeling, and of that other powerful
motive, eagerness for party supremacy.
Suffrage was conferred upon the negro by the Southern States
themselves. Under the Constitution every State can prescribe
its own qualifications for suffrage, with the single exception
that no State can deny or abridge the right of a citizen of
the United States to vote on account of race, color or previous
condition of servitude.
But I am bound to say, indeed it is but to repeat what I have
said many times, that my long conflict with their leaders
has impressed me with an ever-increasing admiration of the
great and high qualities of our Southern people. I said at
Chicago in February, 1903, what I said, in substance, twenty
years before in Faneuil Hall, and at about the same time in
the Senate:
"Having said what I thought to say on this question, perhaps
I may be indulged in adding that although my life, politically
and personally, has been a life of almost constant strife
with the leaders of the Southern people, yet as I grow older
I have learned, not only to respect and esteem, but to love
the great qualities which belong to my fellow citizens of
the Southern States. They are a noble race. We may well
take pattern from them in some of the great virtues which
make up the strength, as they make the glory, of Free States.
Their love of home; their chivalrous respect for women; their
courage; their delicate sense of honor; their constancy, which
can abide by an opinion or a purpose or an interest of their
States through adversity and through prosperity, through the
years and through the generations, are things by which the
people of the more mercurial North may take a lesson. And
there is another thing--covetousness, corruption, the low
temptation of money has not yet found any place in our Southern
politics.
"Now, my friends, we cannot afford to live, we don't wish
to live, and we will not live, in a state of estrangement from
a people who possess these qualities. They are our kindred;
bone of our bone; flesh of our flesh; blood of our blood,
and whatever may be the temporary error of any Southern State
I, for one, if I have a right to speak for Massachusetts,
say to her, 'Entreat me not to leave thee, nor to return from
following after thee. For where thou goest I will go, and
where thou stayest, I will stay also. And they people shall
be my people, and thy God my God.'"
In July, 1898, I was invited to deliver an address before
the Virginia Bar Association. I was received by that company
of distinguished gentlemen with a hospitality like that I
had found in Charleston the year before. Certainly the old
estrangements are gone. I took occasion in my address to
appeal to the Virginia bar to give the weight of their great
influence in sustaining the dignity and authority of the Supreme
Court, in spite of their disappointment at some of its decisions
of Constitutional questions. They received what I had to
say, although they knew I differed from them on some of the
gravest matters which concerned the State, and had been an
anti-slavery man from my youth, with a respect and courtesy
which left nothing to be desired. At the banquet which followed
the address, this toast was given by William Wirt Henry, a
grandson of Patrick Henry, himself one of the foremost lawyers
and historians of the South. I prize very highly the original
which I have in his handwriting.
"Massachusetts and Virginia.
"Foremost in planting the English Colonies in America;
"Foremost in resisting British tyranny;
"Foremost in the Revolution which won our Independence
and established our free institutions;
"May the memories of the past be the bond of the future."
My own endeavor, during my long public life, has been to
maintain the doctrine of the Declaration of Independence,
which declares the right of every man to political equality
by virtue of his manhood, and of every people to self-government
by virtue of its character as a people. This our fathers
meant to lay down as the fundamental law of States and of
the United States, having its steadfast and immovable foundation
in the law of God. It was never their purpose to declare
that ignorance or vice or want of experience of the institutions
of a country should not disqualify men from a share in the
Government. Those things they meant to leave to the discretion
of the power, whether State or National, which was to prescribe
the qualifications of suffrage. But they did not mean that
the accident of birthplace, or the accident of race, or the
accident of color, should enter into the question at all.
To this doctrine I have, in my humble way, endeavored to adhere.
In dealing with the Chinese, or any class of immigrants, I
would prescribe as strict a rule as the strictest for ascertaining
whether the immigrant meant in good faith to be an American
citizen, whether he meant to end his life here, to bring his
wife and children with him, whether he loved American institutions,
whether he was fit to understand the political problems with
which the people had to deal, whether he had individual worth,
or health of body or mind. I would make, if need be, ten
years or twenty years, as the necessary period of residence
for naturalization.
I would deal with the Negro or the German or the Frenchman
or the Italian on the same principle. But the one thing
I have never consented to is that a man shall be kept out of
this country, or kept in a position of inferiority, while he is
in it, because of his color, because of his birthplace, or
because of his race.
One matter in connection with the management of the Elections
Bill I have never been able to think of since without a shudder.
The Democrats in the Senate, led by Mr. Gorman, the most
skilful of their leaders, endeavored to defeat the bill by
the tactics of delay. If the debate could be prolonged so
that it was impossible to get a vote without the loss of the
great Appropriations Bills, or some of them, the bill, of
course, must be laid aside. So the Republicans, on the other
hand, as is usual in such cases, refrained from debate, leaving
their antagonists to take up the time. Every afternoon at
about five o'clock some Democrat would come to me saying that
he was to take the floor, but that he did not feel well, or
was not quite ready with some material, and ask me as a personal
favor to let the matter go over until the next morning. This
happened so often that I became satisfied it was a concerted
scheme, and made up my mind that I would not yield to such
a request again.
But one afternoon Senator Wilson of Maryland, a quiet and
most estimable gentleman, whom I had known very well, and
for whom I had a high regard, came to me and said he felt
quite unwell; he could go on that afternoon, if I insisted
upon it; but he would like much better to put off speaking
till the next day. I was just beginning my answer to the
effect that I had heard that so often that I had determined I
would not yield again to the request. But I said to myself,
It cannot be possible that this man would undertake to deceive
me. He is a gentleman of high character, absolutely honorable
and incapable of falsehood. So I answered, Of course, Mr.
Wilson, if you are ill, I will consent to your desire. Mr.
Wilson made his speech the next day. This was December 15.
A few weeks after, on the 24th of February, Mr. Wilson died
suddenly of heart disease. It was an affection of which he
had been conscious for some years, and which he had for some
time expected would cause sudden death. I dare say if he
had been compelled to proceed with his speech that day it
would have been fatal. In that case my life would have been
embittered by the memory.
We had a meeting of the Republican members of the Committee,
for consultation, before we reported the Bill. Mr. Evarts,
while he approved the principle of the measure, shared very
strongly my own hesitation, caused by the fear of the political
effect of the defeat of a measure likely to excite so much
angry strife throughout the country. After hearing the opinion
of those who favored going on with the Bill, Mr. Evarts said:
"I spent a Sunday with Judge Kent on the Hudson a good many
years ago, with several New York lawyers. We all went to
the Episcopal church in the forenoon, and dined with the Judge
after church. During the service one of the company kept
far behind in the responses, which annoyed the Judge a good
deal. At dinner he broke out, 'Davis, why can't you descend
into hell with the rest of the congregation?' I will descend
into hell with the rest of the congregation."
Mr. Evarts made the descent and stood loyally by the measure
in the debate to the best of his great ability.