With the disposition manifested in both Houses of Congress it was
feared that the conflict between the Legislative and Executive
Departments of the Government would assume a virulent and vindictive
spirit. It was known that President Johnson was deeply offended by the
indirect refusal of the House to pass any resolution in the remotest
degree approving his course. He had doubtless been led to believe that
the influence of such eminent Republicans as Mr. Seward in his Cabinet,
Mr. Cowan and Mr. Doolittle in the Senate and Mr. Raymond in the House,
would bring about so considerable a division in the Republican ranks
as to give the Administration, by uniting with the Democratic party,
the control of Congress, or at least of one branch. The test vote of
January 9th was an unwelcome demonstration of the degree to which the
President had almost wilfully deceived himself and had been innocently
deceived by others. He foresaw the struggle and with his combative
nature prepared for it.
On the last day of the preceding Congress, March 3, 1865, an Act had
been passed to establish a bureau for the relief of freedmen and
refugees. It was among the very last Acts approved by Mr. Lincoln,
and was primarily designed as a protection to the freedmen of the
South and to the class of white men known as "refugees,"--driven from
their homes by the rebels on account of their loyalty to the Union.
Protection was needed by both classes during the disorganization
necessarily incident to so great and sudden a change in their condition
and in their relations to society. The total destruction of the
long-established labor system of the South--based as it had been on
chattel-slavery--led inevitably to great confusion, indeed almost to
social anarchy. The result was that many of the freedmen, removed from
the protection of their old masters, were exposed to destitution and to
many forms of suffering. But for the interposition of the National
Government there was serious danger that thousands of them might be
reduced to starvation. Having taken the responsibility of freeing
them, first by Proclamation of the President and then by Amendment of
the Constitution, it would have been a lasting reproach to the
Government not to extend protection and assistance to such of them as
were thrown into dire extremity of want. They could not be left to
the chance relief of the alms-giver, for their number was too large.
The white population of the South were themselves reduced almost to
poverty by the long struggle; and even if they had been able they were
in no mood to extend relief to negroes who, as they believed, had been
wrongfully released from slavery.
The Act provided that the Bureau should have supervision and management
of all abandoned lands and control of all subjects relating to freedmen
and refugees from the Rebel States, under such regulations as might be
prescribed by the Commissioner at the head of the Bureau and by the
President. The Secretary of War was authorized "to direct such issues
of provisions, clothing and fuel as he may deem needful for the
immediate and temporary shelter and supply of destitute and suffering
refugees and freedmen and their wives and children, under such rules
and regulations as he may approve." The Commissioner was authorized
to lease, for a term of three years, to every male citizen, whether
refugee or freedman, not more than forty acres of the lands which had
been abandoned by their owners or confiscated to the United States,
at a rental of six per cent on the last appraised value. At the end
of three years the occupant was entitled to purchase and receive the
land, with such title as the United States could convey, at a price
proportioned to the rental value. Very little permanent advantage came
to the negro from this provision; for the abandoned lands were legally
reclaimed by their owners and the confiscations, few in number, would,
by the Constitution, be only for the life of the owner. Temporary
relief however was afforded; but much harm was done by creating in the
minds of ignorant freedmen, just redeemed from slavery, the belief that
the Government would give to each of them "forty acres of land and a
mule."
The Commissioner selected was Major-General Oliver O. Howard, who had
gone through the war with marked honor. He was a lieutenant of
ordnance when Sumter was fired upon and a brigadier-general in the
regular army three years later. He had discharged his military duties
with steadiness, intelligence, earnestness and courage. He was a man
of pure character, of deep religious faith, and was somewhat an
exception to West-Point graduates in being from the outset thoroughly
anti-slavery in his intellectual and moral convictions. It was the
possession of these characteristics which led Secretary Stanton to
select General Howard for the important trust. For his ease and his
peace of mind he should have declined the place, as he might well
have done, since it was not a military duty to accept. During his
administration of the office he was subjected to unreasonable
fault-finding, often to censure and obloquy; but throughout the whole
he bore himself with the honor of a soldier and the purity of a
Christian,--triumphantly sustaining himself throughout a Congressional
investigation set on foot by political malice, and confronting with
equal credit a military inquiry which had its origin in the jealousy
that is often the bane of army service.
On the first attempt to enforce the provisions of the original Act, its
advocates and sympathizers found that it did not go far enough, nor
give power enough to its agents to effect the desired object. On the
12th of January, therefore, Mr. Trumbull introduced from the Judiciary
Committee a supplementary Act to enlarge the powers of the Freedmen's
Bureau. By the new bill the President was authorized to "divide the
section of country containing the refugees into districts, not
exceeding twelve in number, each containing one or more States, and
with the advice and consent of the Senate to appoint an Assistant
Commissioner for each district." The Bureau, at the discretion of the
President, might be placed under a Commissioner and Assistant
Commissioners to be detailed from the Army. Sub-districts, not to
exceed the number of counties or parishes in each State, were provided
for; and to each sub-district an agent, either a citizen or officer of
the Army, might be detailed for service. Each Assistant Commissioner
might employ not more than six clerks. The President of the United
States, through the War Department and through the Commissioner, was
authorized to extend military jurisdiction and protection over all
employees, agents and officers of the Bureau; and the Secretary of War
was authorized to issue such provisions, clothing, fuel and other
supplies, including medical stores, and to afford such aid, as he might
deem needful for the immediate and temporary shelter and supply of
destitute refugees and freedmen, their wives and children, under such
rules and regulations as he might direct. The President was also
authorized to reserve from sale or settlement under the Homestead and
Pre-emption Laws, public lands in Florida, Mississippi and Arkansas,
not to exceed three millions of acres of good land in all, for the use
of the freedmen, at a certain rental to be named in such manner as the
Commissioner should be regulation prescribe; or the Commissioner could
purchase or rent such tracts of land in the several districts as might
be necessary to provide for the indigent refugees and freedmen
depending upon the Government for support.
It was further provided that wherever in consequence of any State or
local law any of the civil rights or immunities belonging to white
persons, such as the right to enforce contracts, to sue, to give
evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold or convey real and
personal property, were refused or denied to freedmen on account of
race or color or any previous condition of slavery or involuntary
servitude, or whenever they were subjected to punishment for crime
different from that provided for white persons, it was made the duty of
the President, through the Commissioner, to extend military
jurisdiction and protection over all cases affecting persons against
whom such unjust discriminations were made. It was made the duty of
the officers and agents of the Bureau to take jurisdiction of and to
hear and determine all cases, in which by local law discrimination was
made against the freedmen. This was to be done under such rules and
regulations as the President, through the Commissioner, might
prescribe. But the jurisdiction was to cease "whenever the
discrimination on account of which it is conferred shall cease," and
was in no event to be exercised in any State "in which the ordinary
course of judicial proceeding has not been interrupted by the
Rebellion, nor in those States after they shall have been fully
restored to their constitutional relations to the United States, and
when the courts of the State and of the United States, within their
limits, are not disturbed or stopped in the peaceable course of justice."
In the time of peace, these provisions seemed extraordinary, but the
condition of affairs, in the judgment of leading Republican statesmen,
justified their enactment. The Thirteenth Amendment, about to be
formally promulgated by the Executive Department of the Government,
as incorporated in the Constitution, had made every negro a free man.
The Southern States had responded to this Act of National authority by
enacting a series of laws which really introduced, as has already been
shown, a new, offensive and most oppressive form of servitude. Thus
not only was rank injustice contemplated by the States lately in
rebellion, but they conveyed also an insulting challenge to the
authority of the Nation. It was as if they had said to the National
Government: "In order to destroy the Confederacy and restore the Union
you have manumitted these black men; but we will demonstrate to you, by
our local legislation, that you are powerless to give them any further
freedom than we are willing to concede, and we defy you to show by
what means you can achieve it!"
The first answer of the National Government to this defiance was Mr.
Trumbull's bill conferring upon the Freedmen's Bureau a degree of
power which combated and restrained the Southern authorities at every
point where wrong was committed or menaced. It was designed for the
purpose of extending to the freeman protection against all the wrongs
of local legislation, and to make him feel that the Government which
had freed him would not desert him and allow his release from slavery
to be made null and void. Mr. Johnson's policy of declaring all the
States at once restored to the Union and in full possession of their
powers of local legislation, would carry with it necessarily the
confirmation of the odious laws already enacted in those States, and
also the power to make them as stringent and binding upon the freedmen
as the discretion of Southern legislators might dictate. The war would
thus have practically injured the negro, for after taking from him that
form of protection which slavery afforded, it would have left him an
object of still harsher oppression than slavery itself--an oppression
that would be inspired and quickened by a spirit of vengeance.
The bill was debated at full length, nearly every prominent man in the
Senate taking part. Mr. Hendricks of Indiana and Mr. Garrett Davis of
Kentucky opposed it in speeches of excessive bitterness, and Mr.
Guthrie of Kentucky with equal earnestness but less passion. It was
sustained with great ability by all the leading Republican senators;
and on the final passage, in an unusually full Senate, the vote in its
favor was 37; those opposed were 10. There were only three absentees.
Even those Republican senators who had given strong evidence of
sympathy with the Administration did not unite with the Democrats on
this issue. Mr. Cowan declined to vote, while Messrs. Dixon,
Doolittle and Norton voted in the affirmative. The public opinion of
the country unmistakably sustained this legislation--the purpose to
extend protection to the freedmen being deep-set and all-pervading
among the men of the North who had triumphed in the war. When the
bill reached the House it was referred to the Select Committee on
Freedmen's Affairs, of which Mr. Thomas D. Eliot of Massachusetts was
chairman. It was promptly reported and came to a final vote on the 6th
of February, when it was passed on a call of yeas and nays by 136 to
33. It was a clear division upon the line of party, the nays being
composed entirely of Democrats, with the possible exception of Mr.
Rousseau of Kentucky, who had been elected with the aid of Republican
votes.
One of the most striking speeches made in the House upon the subject
was by Mr. Ignatius Donnelly of Minnesota. He had carefully prepared
for the debate and dwelt with great force upon the educational feature.
"Education," said he, "means the intelligent exercise of liberty; and
surely without this liberty is a calamity, since it means simply the
unlimited right to err. Who can doubt that if a man is to govern
himself he should have the means to know what is best for himself, and
what is injurious to himself, what agencies work against him and what
for him? The avenue to all this is simply education. Suffrage without
education is an edged tool in the hands of a child,--dangerous to
others and destructive to himself. Now what is the condition of the
South in reference to all this? I assert that it is such as would
bring disgrace upon any despotism in Christendom. The great bulk of
the people are rude, illiterate, semi-civilized: hence the Rebellion;
hence all the atrocious barbarities that accompanied it. . . . I
repeat, the condition of the South in this respect would be shameful
to any semi-civilized people, and is such as to render a republican
government, resting upon the intelligent judgment of the people, an
impossibility."
It is worthy of remark that the question so cogently presented and
enforced by Mr. Donnelly--that of the connection between education and
suffrage--disclosed the general fact that even among Republicans there
was no disposition at this period to confer upon the negro the right
to vote. Even so radical a Republican as Mr. Fessenden, during the
debate in the Senate on this question, said, "I take it that no one
contends--I think the Honorable Senator from Massachusetts himself (Mr.
Sumner), who is the great champion of universal suffrage, would
hardly contend--that now, at this time, the whole of the population of
the recent slave States is fit to be admitted to the exercise of the
right of suffrage. I presume no man who looks at the question
dispassionately and calmly could contend that the great mass of those
who were recently slaves (undoubtedly there may be exceptions), and
who have been kept in ignorance all their lives, oppressed and more or
less forbidden to acquire information, are fitted at this stage to
exercise the right of suffrage, or could be trusted to do it unless
under such good advice as those better informed might be prepared to
give them."
The bill, as finally passed by both Houses, reached the President on
the 10th of February. On the 19th he sent a message to Congress
informing each House that, having with much regret come to the
conclusion that it would not be consistent with the public welfare to
give his approval to the measure, he returned the bill to the Senate,
stating his objections to its becoming a law. The main argument of the
President was based upon the principle that legislation such as that
contained in the bill was not proper for States that were deprived of
their right of representation in both branches of Congress. "The
Constitution," he said, "imperatively declares, in connection with
taxation, that each State shall have at least one representative,
and fixed the rule for the number to which in future times each State
shall be entitled. It also provides that the Senate of the United
States shall be composed of two senators from each State, and adds with
peculiar force that no State, without its consent, shall be deprived
of its equal suffrage in the Senate. . . . Burdens have now to be borne
by all the country, and we may best deem that they shall be borne
without murmur when they are voted by a majority of the representatives
of all the people. . . . At present all the representatives of eleven
States are excluded, those who were the most faithful during the war
not less than others. The State of Tennessee, for instance, whose
authorities were engaged in rebellion, was restored to all her
Constitutional relations to the Union by the patriotism and energy of
her patriot people. I know no reason why the State of Tennessee should
not fully enjoy all her Constitutional relations. . . . The bill under
consideration refers to certain of the States as thought they had not
been fully restored in all their Constitutional relations to the United
States. If they have not let us at once act together to secure that
desirable end at the earliest possible moment. In my judgment most of
these States, so far at least as depends upon their own acts, have
already been fully restored and should be deemed as entitled to enjoy
their Constitutional rights as members of the Union."
He reviewed at some length the minor provisions of the bill, objected
to them as unwarrantably interfering with the local administration of
justice, and declared that a system for the support of indigent persons
in the United States was never contemplated by the authors of the
Constitution. "Nor can any good reason be advanced," said the
President, "why as a permanent establishment it should be founded for
one class or color of our people more than another." He objected to it
on the ground of its expense. "The appropriations asked for by the
Freedmen's Bureau, as already established, for the current year,
amount," he said, "to $11,745,000; and it may be safely estimated
that the cost to be incurred under the pending bill will require double
that amount,--more than any sum expended in any one year of the
Administration of John Quincy Adams."
The argument of the message based on expense and extravagance was much
applauded by the opponents of the Republican party, and there was a
great expectation that it would create a strong re-action in favor of
the President; but those who thus reckoned utterly failed to appreciate
the temper of the public mind. The disbursement of vast sums in the
war had accustomed the people to large appropriations of money, and
the pecuniary aspect of the case, upon which the President had much
relied, made far less impression than he anticipated. The philanthropists
did not deem the question at issue to be one of dollars and cents;
and those less disposed to sympathize with the humanitarian
aspects of the subject had not yet learned the lesson of economy which
the adversity of after years taught them. The great expansion of our
currency, the ease with which money had been obtained, and the
extravagance with which it had been expended in all the walks of life,
produced in the minds of the people an indifference to the question of
economy. The President, in his own long career, had exercised a rigid
watchfulness over the disbursements of public money, and he did not
fully realize the great change which had been wrought in the people--a
change sure to follow the condition of war if historic precedents may
be trusted--a change in which economy gives way to lavishness and
careful circumspection is followed by loose disregard of established
rules. It is a condition not implying dishonesty or even recklessness,
but one which follows from a positive inability in the public mind to
estimate the expenditure of money by the standards which are applied
in the era of peaceful industry, careful supervision and prudent
restraint.
The Senate voted upon the veto the day after it was received. Greatly
to the surprise of the public the dominant party was unable to pass the
bill against the objections of the President. Messrs. Dixon,
Doolittle, Morgan, Norton and Van Winkle had voted for it, but now
changed their votes and thereby reversed the action of the Senate.
These senators, with the addition of Nesmith and Willey, who did not
vote on the passage of the bill, gave the final count of 30 in favor
of the passage to 18 against--lacking the two-thirds and therefore
failing to pass the bill. The result was wholly unlooked for and the
vote of Governor Morgan of New York gave great uneasiness to his
political associates. It was for a time believed that under the
persuasive influence of Mr. Seward, with whom he had long been on terms
of close intimacy, Mr. Morgan might be intending to join the
Administration party. The same was thought possible with regard to Mr.
Van Winkle of West Virginia, his location suggesting the possibility
of such a change. The excitement among Republicans was great for a
time, because if they should so far lose control of either branch of
Congress as to be unable to override the vetoes of the President, all
attempts to enforce a more radical policy of Reconstruction than Mr.
Johnson could be induced to approve would necessarily be futile. It
was soon ascertained however, that the apprehension of danger was
unfounded and that Messrs. Morgan and Van Winkle did not design any
change of political relations, but were only more cautious and perhaps
wiser than the other Republican senators.
A few weeks later, the disaster of the veto--for such it was esteemed
by Republicans--was repaired by the passage of another bill,
originating in the House. This was simply a bill to continue in
force the original Freedmen's Bureau Act, with some enlarging
provisions to make it more effective. The Act was so framed as to
escape the objections which had controlled some of the Republican
votes that sustained the President's veto. Among the most important
of the changes were the limitation of the statute to the term of two
years and a serious modification of the judicial powers accorded to
the officers of the Bureau in the preceding bill. It was not so
elaborately debated in either branch as was the original act, but its
passage was retarded by the interposition of other measures and it did
not reach the President until the first week in July.
The President promptly returned the bill to the House with his veto.
He found it to fall within the objections which he had assigned in his
message vetoing the Senate bill on the same subject. He believed that
the only ground upon which this kind of legislation could be justified
was that of the war-making power. He admitted therefore that the
original Act organizing a Freedmen's Bureau, passed during the
existence of the war, was proper and Constitutional. By its own terms
it would end within one year from the cessation of hostilities and
the declaration of peace. It would probably continue in force, he
thought, as long as the freedmen might require the benefit of its
provisions. "It will certainly," said he, "remain in operation as a
law until some months subsequent to the meeting of the next session of
Congress, when, if experience shall make evident the necessity of
additional legislation, the two Houses will have ample time to mature
and pass the requisite measures." The President renewed in varied
forms the expression of his belief that all the States should be
admitted to the privilege of legislation, especially in matters
affecting their own welfare. The House proceeded at once to vote upon
the reconsideration of the bill, and by 104 in the affirmative and 33
in the negative passed it over the veto of the President. The Senate
voted on the same day with the House, and passed it against the
President's objections by 33 in the affirmative and 12 in the negative.
A measure of very great importance to the colored race was thus
completed, after serious agitation in both Houses and against two
vetoes by the President. It required potent persuasion, re-enforced
by the severest exercise of party discipline to prevent a serious break
in both Houses against the bill. The measure had lost, under
discussion, much of the popularity which attended its first
introduction in Congress.
On the same day that Mr. Trumbull introduced his original bill to
enlarge the powers of the Freedmen's Bureau, he introduced another
bill, more important in its scope and more enduring in its character,
--a bill "to protect all persons of the United States in their civil
rights and furnish the means of their vindication." It was referred
to the Judiciary Committee on the 5th day of January and was reported
back on the 11th. The bill was one which exemplified in a most
striking manner the revolution produced by the war. It declared that
"there shall be no discrimination in civil rights or immunities among
the inhabitants of any State or Territory of the United States on
account of race, color or previous condition of servitude; but the
inhabitants of every race and color shall have the same right to make
and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, to inherit,
purchase, lease, sell, hold and convey real and personal property, and
to full and equal benefits of all laws and provisions for the security
of personal property; and shall be subject to like punishments, fines
and penalties, and none other,--any law, statute, ordinance, regulation
or custom to the contrary notwithstanding."
Any person who under any law, statute or regulation of any kind should
attempt to violate the provisions of the Act, would be punished by a
fine not exceeding one thousand dollars or by imprisonment not
exceeding one year. Very stringent provisions were made, and a whole
framework of administration devised, by which the rights conferred
under this enactment could be enforced through "the judicial power of
the United States." The district attorneys, marshals, deputy marshals
of the United States, the commissioners appointed by the Circuit and
Territorial Courts of the United States, the officers and agents of the
Freedmen's Bureau, and every other officer who was sufficiently
empowered by the President of the United States, were, by the Act,
specially authorized and required, at the expense of the United States,
to institute proceedings against every person who should violate its
provisions, and "cause him or them to be arrested and imprisoned for
trial at such court of the United States or Territorial court as, by
this Act, has cognizance of the case." Any person who should obstruct
or hinder an officer in the performance of his duty or any person
lawfully assisting him in the arrest of an offender, or who should
attempt to rescue any person from the custody of an officer, was in
turn subjected to severe penalties.
The bill was designed, in short, to confer upon the manumitted negro
of the South the same civil rights enjoyed by the white man, with the
exception of the right of suffrage; to give him perfect equality in
all things before the law, and to nullify every State law wherever
existing, that should be in conflict with the enlarged provisions of
the Federal statute. It left no loophole for escape on the question
of the citizenship of the negro. As the decisions of the Supreme
Court of the United States then stood he was not a citizen of the
United States; and to prevent this question being raised the word
_inhabitant_ was used,--thus making the conferment of civil rights so
broad that it was impossible to defeat the full intent of the law by
any technical evasion. It was undoubtedly a very sweeping enactment,
the operation of which was not confined to the States which had been
slave-holding, but bore directly upon some of the free States where
the negro had always been deprived of certain rights fully guaranteed
to the white man.
Lest "inhabitant" might be held to mean "citizen" in the connection
in which it was used Mr. Trumbull proposed, at the initial point of
the discussion, to amend by inserting the declaration that "all persons
born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power are
hereby declared to be citizens of the United States without distinction
of color." Mr. Guthrie of Kentucky and Mr. Howard of Michigan both
asked whether that would naturalize all the Indians in the United
States. Mr. Trumbull thought not, because "we deal with the Indians
as foreigners--as separate nations;" but he was willing to change it
so as specifically to exclude Indians. Mr. Cowan asked "whether the
amendment would not have the effect of naturalizing children of Chinese
and gypsies born in this country." Mr. Trumbull replied that it
undoubtedly would. Mr. Cowan then thought it would be proper to hear
the senators from California on that question, because "at the present
rate of emigration the day may not be very distant when California,
instead of belonging to the Indo-European race, may belong to the
Mongolians, may belong to the Chinese." Mr. Trumbull inquired if the
children of Chinese born in this country were not citizens? Mr. Cowan
thought they were not.
Mr. Reverdy Johnson of Maryland pointed out a difficulty not
anticipated by Mr. Trumbull. By using the word _inhabitant_ in the
bill he made it impossible for any State in the Union to "draw any
distinction between citizens who have been there from birth, or have
been residents for a long time, and him who comes into the State for
the first time as a foreigner. He becomes at once an inhabitant.
If he comes from England or from any of the countries of the world he
becomes that moment an inhabitant; and if this bill is to pass in the
shape it stands he can buy, he can sell, he can hold, he can inherit
and be inherited from and possess all the rights of a native-born
citizen," without being naturalized. Mr. Johnson pointed out another
difficulty which perhaps the senator from Illinois did not foresee.
Many of the States in the North as well as in the South forbade the
marriage of a black man with a white woman or a white man with a black
woman. This law would destroy all State power over the subject; and
the man who offended in the matter of marriage between the races, so
far from being punished himself, could bring the judge who attempted
to enforce the law against him into punishment. The bill, after much
elaboration of debate and many amendments offered and defeated, came
to a vote on the 2d of February and was passed by 33 _yeas_ to 12
_nays_. Mr. Dixon of Connecticut, one of the Administration
Republicans, voted for the bill; Mr. Cowan and Mr. Norton against it;
Mr. Doolittle did not vote.
The bill immediately went to the House, and on the 1st of March that
body proceeded to consider it without its reference to the Judiciary
Committee. Mr. Wilson of Iowa, chairman of that committee, said they
had considered it informally, and in order to save time it was brought
up for action at once. The first amendment offered was to strike out
"inhabitants" and insert "citizens of the United States," and thus
avoid the embarrassments that might result from giving it so broad an
extension. The amendment was promptly agreed to. Mr. Wilson, by
another amendment, removed the difficulties suggested in the Senate by
Reverdy Johnson, touching the question of marriage between the races.
He supported the bill in a speech of great strength and legal research.
He admitted at the outset that "some of the questions presented by the
measure are not entirely free from defects. Precedents, both judicial
and legislative, are found in sharp conflict concerning them. The
line which divides these precedents is generally found to be the same
which separates the early from the later days of the Republic. The
farther the Republic drifted from the old moorings of the equality of
human rights, the more numerous became the judicial and legislative
utterances in conflict with some of the leading features sought to be
re-established by this bill."
The debate was continued by Mr. Rogers of New Jersey, in the
opposition, by Mr. Russell Thayer of Pennsylvania, who made an
uncommonly able speech in its favor, and by Mr. Eldridge of Wisconsin,
who tersely presented the objections entertained by the Democratic
party to such legislation. There were some apprehensions in the
minds of the members on both sides of the House that the broad
character of the bill might include the right of suffrage, but to
prevent that result Mr. Wilson moved to add a new section declaring
that "nothing in this Act shall be so construed as to affect the laws
of any State concerning the right of suffrage." Mr. Wilson said that
the amendment he proposed did not change his own construction of the
bill; he did not believe the term "civil rights" included the right of
suffrage; he offered it simply from excessive caution, because certain
gentlemen feared trouble might arise from the language of the bill.
The amendment was unanimously agreed to, not one voice on either side
of the House being raised against it. Mr. Bingham, Mr. Raymond and
other prominent members of the House, to the number of forty in all,
debated the bill exhaustively. It was passed by 111 _yeas_ to 38 _nays_.
The bill reached the President on the 18th of March (1866), and on the
27th he sent to the Senate a message regretting that it contained
provisions which he could not approve. "I am therefore constrained,"
he said, "to return it to the Senate, in which it originated, with my
objections to its becoming a law." The President stated that by the
first section the Chinese of the Pacific States, Indians subject to
taxation, the people called gypsies, as well as the entire race
designated as black,--people of color, negroes, mulattoes, and persons
of African blood,--"are made citizens of the United States." The
President did not believe that this class possessed "the requisite
qualifications to entitle them to all the privileges and immunities of
citizens of the United States." He sought to raise prejudice against
the bill because it proposed "to discriminate against large number of
intelligent, worthy and patriotic foreigners, in favor of the negro,
to whom, after long years of bondage, the avenues to freedom and
intelligence have now suddenly been opened." "It is proposed," he
said, "by a single legislative enactment to confer the rights of
citizens upon all persons of African descent born within the extended
limits of the United States, while persons of foreign birth who make
our land their home must undergo a probation of five years, and can
then only become citizens of the United States upon the proof that they
are of good moral character, attached to the principles of the
Constitution of the United States, and well disposed towards the good
order and happiness of the same."
The President sought to impress upon Congress, in strong language, the
injustice of advancing four millions of colored persons to citizenship
"while the States in which most of them reside are debarred from any
participancy in the legislation." He found many provisions of the bill
in conflict with the Constitution of the United States as it had been
hitherto construed, and argued elaborately against its expediency or
necessity in any form. "The white man and the black race," said the
President, "have hitherto lived in the South in the relation of master
and slave,--capital owning labor. Now suddenly the relation is changed
and as to the ownership, capital and labor are divorced. In this new
relation, one being necessary to the other, there will be a new
adjustment, which both are deeply interested in making harmonious. . . .
This bill frustrates this adjustment. It intervenes between capital
and labor and attempts to settle questions of political economy through
the agency of numerous officials, whose interest it will be to foment
discord between the two races, for as the breach widens their
employment will continue and when the breach is closed their occupation
will terminate."
"The details of this bill," continued the President, "establish for the
security of the colored race safeguards which go infinitely beyond any
that the General Government has ever provided for the white race; in
fact, the distinction between white and colored is by the provisions
of this bill made to operate in favor of the colored and against the
white race." "The provisions of the bill," he maintained, "are an
absorption and assumption of power by the General Government, which,
being acquiesced in, must eventually destroy our federative system of
limited power and break down the barriers which preserve the rights of
States. It is another step, or rather stride, towards centralization
and the concentration of all legislative power in the General
Government. The tendency of the bill must be to resuscitate rebellion
and to arrest the progress of those influences which are more closely
thrown around the States--the bond of union and peace."
The debate upon the President's veto was not very prolonged but was
marked by excitement approaching to anger. Mr. Trumbull, who had
charge of the bill, analyzed the President's argument with consummate
ability and readily answered him on every point of Constitutional law
which he had adduced. He did more than this. He pointed out with
unflinching severity what he considered the demagogical features of
the message. "The best answer," said Mr. Trumbull, "to the President's
objection that the bill proposes to make citizens of Chinese and
gypsies and his reference to the discrimination against foreigners, is
to be found in a speech delivered in this body by the President
himself, on the occasion of a message being sent to the Senate by
Mr. Buchanan, then President of the United States, returning with his
objections what was known as the Homestead Bill. On that occasion
Senator Johnson of Tennessee said, 'This idea about poor foreigners
somehow or other bewilders and haunts the imagination of a great many.
I am constrained to say that I look upon this objection to the bill as
a mere quibble on the part of the President, as being hard pressed for
some excuse in withholding his approval of the measure. His allusion
to foreigners in this connection looks to me more like the _ad
captandum_ of the mere politician or demagogue, than a grave and sound
reason to be offered by the President of the United States in a veto
message on so important a measure as the Homestead Bill.'"
In exposing the inconsistency between Andrew Johnson, President of the
United States, and Andrew Johnson, Senator from Tennessee, Mr. Trumbull
said that he would not use as harsh language as Mr. Johnson had used
towards President Buchanan when he accused him of "quibbling and
demagogery." Mr. Trumbull argued with great force that the citizen
has a counter-claim upon the Government for the comprehensive claim
which the Government has upon the citizen. "It cannot be that we have
constituted a government," said Mr. Trumbull, "which is all-powerful to
command the obedience of the citizen but has no power to afford him
protection." "Tell it not, sir," said he, "to the father whose son was
starved at Andersonville, or the widow whose husband was slain at
Mission Ridge, or the little boy who leads his sightless father
through the streets of your city, of the thousand other mangled heroes
to be seen on every side of us to-day, that this Government, in defense
of which the son and the husband fell, the father lost his sight and
the others were maimed and crippled, had the right to call those
persons to its defense, but now has no power to protect the survivors
or their friends in any rights whatever in the States. Such, sir, is
not the meaning of our Constitution: such is not the meaning of
American citizenship. Allegiance and protection are reciprocal rights."
During the progress of the debate a curious incident showed the temper
engendered in the Senate. Mr. Trumbull, on the 5th of April, intimated
his readiness to have the vote taken if the Senate was ready. It was
late in the evening. Mr. Cowan interposed the suggestion that two
senators detained at home by illness, Mr. Dixon of Connecticut and Mr.
Wright of New Jersey, could not with safety come out at night. The
point of courtesy was strongly insisted upon by Mr. Guthrie, Mr.
Hendricks and other members. Mr. Wade spoke very excitedly in reply
to it. "If the President of the United States," said he, "can impose
his authority upon a question like this and can by a veto compel
Congress to submit to his dictation, he is an emperor and a despot.
Because I believe the great question of Congressional power and
authority is at stake here, I yield to no importunities on the other
side. I feel myself justified in taking every advantage which the
Almighty has put in my hands to defend the power and authority of this
body. I will not yield to these appeals of comity on a question like
this, but I will tell the President and everybody else that if God
Almighty has stricken a member of this body so that he cannot be here
to uphold the dictation of a despot, I thank him for it and I will take
every advantage of it I can."
Mr. Wade was answered with great severity by Mr. McDougal of
California. Mr. Guthrie spoke with much spirit, but not with the
temper of Mr. McDougal. "I should not like it to go out from this
body," said the senator from Kentucky, "that Mr. Stockton was removed
to get rid of his vote. I do not want it to go out from this body
that we would not extend a courtesy to sick senators because we could
pass a bill without their votes when we might not pass it if they were
here. The time will come when the people, being convinced of these
things, will say that there is more to be feared from a combined
Congress than from a President, in relation to the liberties of the
people." The angry position of Mr. Wade was not sustained by the
Senate and the motion to adjourn was carried by 33 to 12. The debate
continued throughout the next day and disclosed during its progress
that Senator Lane of Kansas had joined the small band of Administration
Republicans. He attempted to take part in the debate but was
unmercifully dealt with by Mr. Wade, Mr. Trumbull and others, and paid
dearly for his personal defection. When the vote was taken upon
passing the bill over the President's veto the _ayes_ were 33 and the
_noes_ 15. Every senator was present except Mr. Dixon of Connecticut,
still detained from the Senate from illness. There was one vacancy,
Mr. Stockton's seat not having yet been filled. Among the nays were
Mr. Cowan, Mr. Doolittle, Mr. Lane of Kansas, Mr. Norton and Mr. Van
Winkle.
The bill went to the House and after a very brief debate came to a vote
on the 9th of April--_yeas_ 122, _nays_ 41. Speaker Colfax directed
that his name should be called in order that he might have the honor of
recording himself for the bill. He then announced that having received
the vote of two-thirds of each House the Civil Rights Bill had become a
law, the President's objections to the contrary notwithstanding. The
announcement was received with an outburst of applause, in which the
members of the House as well as the throng of spectators heartily
joined--the speaker being unable to restore order for several minutes.
It recalled the scene of a little more than a year before, when the
rejoicing over the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment was equally
demonstrative.
To many persons of conservative mind the bill seemed too radical--to
many it seemed positively rash. It was an illustration of how rapidly
public opinion is changed, and with what force it may be brought to
bear upon a given question in a period that is filled with the spirit
of revolutionary excitement. If five years before the most pronounced
anti-slavery man in the country had been told that not only would
slavery be abolished, not only would the slave be transformed into a
citizen, but that the National Government would confer upon him all the
civil rights pertaining to the white man and would stretch forth its
arm to protect him in those rights throughout the limits of the
Republic, it would have seemed to him as the wildest fancy of a
distempered brain. But his had actually come to pass through the
ordinary forms of legislation, and by such a preponderating display
of senatorial and representative strength as had scarcely ever before
controlled a public policy since the foundation of the Government.
It was not, of course, without some misgiving, without a certain
timidity and distrust, that many Republicans were brought to the
support of these measures. They did not object to their inherent and
essential justice and rightfulness, but with instinctive caution they
feared that an attempt to wipe away the prejudices of two centuries in
a single day might lead to a dangerous re-action, and to a consequent
change in the political control of the country. Many who were borne
along in the irresistible current of aggressive reform dreaded all the
more the effect of the votes which the moral and political pressure of
their constituents compelled them to give. In the Constitutional
amendment abolishing slavery they went forward without distrust, with
complete approbation of conscience, with undoubting belief in the
expediency of the act. They knew that the great mass of the North was
heartily opposed to slavery: they knew that its abolition was not
merely right but was destined to be popular. It affected moreover only
that great section of country which had engaged in the crime of
rebellion; and if it were viewed only as a punishment of those who had
sought the destruction of the Government, they felt more than justified
in inflicting it.
But the legislation now accomplished was of a different type. In no
State of the North had there ever been social equality between the
negro and the white man. It had been most nearly approached in New
England, but still there were points of prejudice which time had not
effaced nor custom changed. In the Middle and Western States the
feeling was much deeper. In many of their laws a discrimination was
made against the negro, and a direct interference with the habits of
loyal communities on this subject involved many considerations which
did not in any degree attach to legislation affecting only the Southern
States. There was among Democratic leaders a confidence as marked as
the timidity on the part of the Republicans. They were sure of a
re-action in their favor; they believed that the Republicans had taken
the step which would prove fatal to them, and that with the prejudices
of the people supplemented by the patronage of the President a serious
division would ensue, which would prove fatal to Radical ascendency in
a majority of the Northern states. Overcome in both chambers by the
aggressive force of a majority which transcended the limit of two-thirds,
they congratulated themselves that this very power, beyond the
restraint of the Executive and exercised in defiance of his opinions,
would prove the pitfall of Republicanism wherever race prejudice was
kept alive.
The passage of these bills by Congress, their persistent veto by the
President and their re-enactment against his objections, produced, as
had been anticipated, not only an open political hostility, but one
which rapidly advanced to a condition in which violent epithet
and mutual denunciation indicated the deplorable relations of
the two great departments of the Government. The veto of the
Freedmen's-Bureau Bill, on the 19th of February, was followed by a large
popular meeting in Washington, on the 22d, to approve the President's
action. The meeting adjourned to the White House to congratulate the
President, and he in turn made a long speech in which he broke through
all restraint, and spoke his mind with exasperating frankness. "I
have," said the President, "fought traitors and treason in the South.
I opposed Davis, Toombs, Slidell, and a long list of others whose names
I need not repeat, and now, when I turn around at the other end of the
line, I find men--I care not by what name you call them (a voice:
'Call them traitors')--who still stand opposed to the restoration to
the Union of these States. (A voice: 'Give us their names.') A
gentleman calls for their names. Well! suppose I should give them?
I look upon them, I repeat it as President or citizen, as being as much
opposed to the fundamental principles of this Government, and believe
they are as much laboring to pervert or destroy them, as were the men
who fought against them in the Rebellion. (A voice: 'Give us the
names.') I say Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania. (Tremendous
applause.) I say Charles Sumner. (Tremendous applause.) I say
Wendell Phillips and others of the same stripe are among them. (A
voice: 'Give it to Forney.') Some gentleman in the crowd says, 'Give
it to Forney.' I have only to say that I do not waste my ammunition
upon dead ducks." (Laughter and applause.) . . . "They may traduce
me," continued the President, "they may slander me, they may
vituperate, but let me say to you that it has no effect upon me; and
let me say in addition that I do not intend to be bullied by my
enemies. . . . There is an earthquake coming, gentlemen: there is a
ground-swell coming of popular judgment and indignation. The American
people will speak for their interests, and they will know who are their
friends and who their enemies. What positions have I held under this
Government?--beginning with an alderman and running through all the
branches of the Legislature. (A voice: 'From a tailor up.') Some
gentleman says I have been a tailor. (Tremendous applause.) Now that
did not discomfit me in the least; for when I used to be a tailor I
had the reputation of being a good one and of making close fits (great
laughter); always punctual with my customers and always did good work.
(A voice: 'No patchwork.') No: I do not want any patchwork. I want
a whole suit. But I will pass by this little facetiousness. . . . I
was saying that I held nearly all positions, from alderman, through
both branches of Congress, to that which I now occupy; and who is there
that will say Andrew Johnson ever made a pledge that he did not redeem
or made a promise that he did not fulfill?"
Some one had spoken in Congress about the Presidential obstacle to be
gotten out of the way. Mr. Johnson interpreted this as meaning
personal violence to himself. "I make use," said he, "of a very strong
expression when I say that I have no doubt the intention was to incite
assassination and so get out of the way the obstacle to place and
power. Whether by assassination or not, there are individuals in this
Government, I doubt not, who want to destroy our institutions and
change the character of the Government. Are they not satisfied with
the blood which has been shed? Does not the murder of Lincoln appease
the vengeance and wrath of the opponents of this Government? Are they
still unslaked? Do they still want more blood? I am not afraid of the
assassin attacking me where a brave and courageous man would attack
another. I only dread him when he would go in disguise, his footsteps
noiseless. If it is blood they want let them have courage enough to
strike like men."
The speech produced a very unfavorable impression upon the country.
Its low tone, its vulgar abuse, recalled Mr. Johnson's unhappy words at
the time of his inauguration as Vice-President, and produced throughout
the country a feeling of humiliation. His effort to make it appear
that his political opponents meditated assassination was regarded as
a thoroughly unscrupulous declaration, as an unworthy attempt to place
himself beside Lincoln in the martyrdom of duty--to suggest that as
Lincoln had fallen, sacrificed to the spirit of hostility in the South,
so he, in pursuing his line of duty, was in danger of being sacrificed
to hostility in the North. The delivery of this speech was the formal
forfeiture of the respect and confidence of the great majority of the
people who had elected him to his place, and he failed to secure
compensation by gaining the respect or confidence of those who had
opposed him. A few Democrats who wished to worry and divide the
Republican party, the place-hunters who craved the favor of the
Executive, a few deserters from the Republican ranks unable to pursue
the path of exacting duty, represented by their combination a specious
support for the President. Natives of the border States, who had been
unwilling to join in treasonable demonstrations against the Government
but who had not been inspired with sufficient loyalty to join actively
in its defense, now naturally rallied around Mr. Johnson. The
residents of Washington, consisting at that time of Southern men and
Southern sympathizers, now applauded the President because they saw an
opportunity to distract and defeat the Republican party. But the
entire mass of those who were now eager to sustain the President
exhibited but a pitiable contrast with the magnificent party which he
had voluntarily abandoned.
The increasing fierceness of the struggle between the President and
Congress gave rise to every form of evil suspicion and evil imputation.
The close vote on the Civil Rights Bill admonished the Republicans
of their danger. If Mr. Dixon had not been confined to his house by
illness, if Mr. Stockton had not been a few days before deprived of his
seat, the Administration would have been able to rally seventeen votes
in the negative, leaving but thirty-three to the Republicans out of a
Senate of fifty members. The exigencies of the situation presented the
strongest possible temptation to take every fair advantage, and this
naturally led to the imputation of unfair advantage. A large number of
honest-minded opponents believed that a careful calculation had been
made by the Republican leaders, and that they had found the margin so
close as to be unsafe in a contest with the President. If the margin
had been broader and the two-thirds vote assured past all reasonable
danger, it was asserted, and no doubt believed, that the Constitution
would not have been strained to exchange Mr. Stockton for a Republican
senator, who was sure to succeed him. It was the first attempt in our
history to establish the policy of the Government without regard to
the President, and indeed against his power. In the case of President
Tyler the reverse had been practically attempted. In his controversy
with the Whigs his friends constituted more than a third in each House
--thus making his veto effective and leading him to attempt the
administration of the Government without regard to the opinions of
Congress. Mr. Tyler had failed; but thus far in the controversy with
Johnson, Congress had succeeded. It was said, however, with great
pertinacity by the friends of the President, that Congress was enabled
to do this only by the exclusion of eleven States of the Union from
representation; and from this fact came the Democratic denunciation of
the Republican party for administering the affairs of the Government in
a revolutionary spirit.
The narrow escape of the measure again created great uneasiness, not
only among the Republicans in Congress but throughout the country.
One or two more defections would imperil Republican control of the
Senate. The loyalty of every member to his party was therefore
scanned with closest observation. Rumors, gossip, inventions of all
kinds were set afloat in the public press,--hinting first at one man
and then at another among the Republican senators as likely to weaken,
as about going over to the Administration, as having just had a
confidential interview with Mr. Seward, as dining the evening before
with the President, or as being concerned in some matter of even less
consequence. When public interest is heightened the imagination of the
people is stimulated, until trifles light as air have fatal
significance in one direction or the other. Throughout the spring and
early summer of 1866 (the tentative period, as it may be called, in
fixing the relations of the President and Congress) this suggestion of
doubt, this latent apprehension, continued, and was not indeed wholly
removed until the political lines were definitely drawn by the
elections for representatives to Congress in the ensuing autumn.
The situation in all its bearings was one of peculiar embarrassment,
beset with extraordinary difficulties to those who directed the
proceedings of Congress. In reviewing the events of that day, whatever
may be thought respecting their wisdom and expediency, candid men of
all parties will concede that the Republican leaders exhibited great
determination of purpose, remarkable steadiness of nerve and unflagging
devotion to principle. They were absolutely without precedent to guide
them in the exigencies and emergencies of the situation. It was well
said at the time that the framers of the Constitution in 1787 were not
confronted with difficulties so grave or surrounded with problems so
complex and unproved, as were the leaders of Congress during the period
of Reconstruction. The framers of the Constitution met for one
purpose, upon which all were agreed. They had only to reconcile
differences of detail and to adjust the jealousies of local interest;
but in 1866 Congress was called upon to exclude the President
practically from all share in the law-making power, and to charge him
on his oath of duty to faithfully execute laws, against which he had
constantly entered his solemn protest, not only as inexpedient but as
unconstitutional. Perhaps a man of more desperate resolution than Mr.
Johnson might have used his Executive power more effectively against
Congress, but he must have done so at the expense of his fidelity to
sworn obligations. The practical deduction as to the working of our
Governmental machinery, from the whole experience of that troublous
era, is that two-thirds of each House, united and stimulated to one
end, can practically neutralize the Executive power of the Government
and lay down its policy in defiance of the efforts and the opposition
of the President.
The defection of Senator Lane of Kansas from the ranks of the most
radical Republicans caused great surprise to the country. He had been
so closely identified with all the tragic events in the prolonged
struggle to keep slavery out of Kansas, that he was considered to be
an irreconcilable foe to the party that tolerated or in any way
apologized for its existence. The position he had taken in voting
against the Civil Rights Bill worried and fretted him. He keenly felt
his separation from the sympathy of such men as Sumner, Chandler, Wade,
and the whole host who had nobly fought the battle of Kansas in the
halls of Congress. He felt still more keenly the general and somewhat
indignant disapproval of his action, freely expressed by the great mass
of his constituents. One of his intimate friends said that on the very
day of his vote he received a telegram warning him that if he voted
against the bill it would be the mistake of his life. The telegram
reached him after the roll had been called. He said excitedly, "The
mistake has been made. I would give all I possess if it were undone."
He was still further disturbed by imputations upon his integrity in
connection with some transactions of the Indian Bureau--imputations
which were pronounced baseless by the two senators from Indiana (Thomas
A. Hendricks and Henry S. Lane), one a political opponent and the
other a political friend, who had impartially examined all the facts.
But under the mortification caused by parting with old political
associates, and the humiliation to which he was subjected by
groundless imputations upon his character, his mind gave way and on the
11th of July, 1866 he committed suicide.
General Lane was a native of Indiana, son of a reputable lawyer, Amos
Lane, who was a representative in Congress during the Administrations
of Jackson and Van Buren. He thus inherited Democracy of the most
aggressive type. He was a man of violent passions and marked courage.
He commanded a regiment of Indiana volunteers at the battle of Buena
Vista, and in 1852 was elected a member of the House of
Representatives. He was a warm supporter of Douglas and voted for the
repeal of the Missouri Compromise. He immediately afterwards emigrated
to Kansas, as he said, "to see fair play under the doctrine of popular
sovereignty." His career thenceforward formed a large part of the
history of Kansas. He contributed perhaps as largely as any other one
man to the victory of the Free-State policy, and became as violent in
his hostility to the Democratic party as he had formerly been in its
advocacy. When his State was admitted to the Union in 1861 he was
rewarded with the honor of being one of her first senators in Congress.
His course in the Senate, until the time of his defection, had been
specially marked for its aggressiveness in support of the war and the
destruction of the institution of slavery. He was profoundly attached
to Mr. Lincoln and had received many marks of his friendship. The
motive for his strange course under President Johnson was never clearly
disclosed. He was in the full vigor of life when he closed it with his
own hands, being a few weeks beyond his fifty-first birthday.
The Administration of Mr. Johnson had, before the death of Mr. Lane,
been unhappily associated in the popular mind with another suicide.
A few days before the assembling of Congress Mr. Preston King,
collector of the port of New York, had drowned himself in the Hudson
River by leaping from a ferry-boat. He had been for more than twenty
years an intimate friend of Mr. Johnson and held, as already narrated,
a confidential relation to him at the time of his accession to the
Presidency. He had been especially influential in the National
Republican Convention of 1864 in securing for Mr. Johnson the
nomination for the Vice-Presidency. The original disagreement with Mr.
Seward was generally ascribed to the influence of Mr. King upon the
President, but when, with Mr. Seward in the Cabinet, Mr. King was
appointed collector of customs for the port of New York, it was
understood to mean that a perfect reconciliation had taken place
between all the Republican factions in his State. The change in the
President's position was a complete surprise to Mr. King and left him
in a peculiarly embarrassing situation. He was essentially a radical
man in all his political views, and the evident tendency of the
President towards extreme conservatism on the question of
reconstruction was a keen distress to him. He was at a loss to
determine his course of action. If he should resign his position it
would be the proclamation of hostility to one to whom he was deeply
attached. If he should remain in office he feared it might be at the
expense of forfeiting the good will of the tens of thousands of New-York
Republicans who had always reposed the utmost confidence in his
fidelity to principle, and who had rewarded him with the highest honors
in their power to bestow. He had not desired the collectorship, and
consented to accept it only from his sincere friendship for the
President and from his earnest desire to harmonize the Republican party
in New York and bring its full strength to the support of the
Administration. The office had given him no pleasure. It had indeed
brought him nothing but care and anxiety. The applications for place
were numerous and perplexing, the daily routine of duty was onerous and
exacting, and his pecuniary responsibility to the Government, much
exaggerated by his worried mind, constantly alarmed him. Mr. King
found himself therefore so situated that, whichever way he turned, he
faced embarrassment in his career, and as he imagined, disaster to his
reputation. In the conflicting emotions incident to his entangled
position, his brain was fevered, and his intellect became disordered.
From the anguish which his sensitive nature could not endure, he sought
relief in the grave.
Mr. King was born in 1806 at Ogdensburg, St. Lawrence County, New York,
which throughout his life continued to be his home. He became
prominent in political affairs, while still a young man, as a zealous
supporter of President Jackson in whose interest he edited a paper.
He attached himself to that strong school of New-York Democrats of
whom Silas Wright was the acknowledged leader. After conspicuous
service in the New-York Legislature, he entered Congress in 1845 and
remained until 1851. When the South demanded the abrogation of the
Missouri Compromise Mr. King followed his personal convictions, broke
from his Democratic associations and aided in the organization of the
Republican party. He adhered steadily to the fortunes of the new party
and brought with him a strong popular support--the large Republican
majorities in Northern New York being originally due in no small degree
to his personal influence and earnest efforts.