THE GREAT CONSPIRACY

 Its Origin and History

 Part 6

 BY

 JOHN LOGAN

 CHAPTER XXII. 

 FREEDOM'S SUN STILL RISING. 

After President Lincoln had issued his Proclamation of Emancipation, thefriends of Freedom clearly perceived--and none of them more clearly thanhimself that until the incorporation of that great Act into theConstitution of the United States itself, there could be no realassurance of safety to the liberties of the emancipated; that unlessthis were done there would be left, even after the suppression of theRebellion, a living spark of dissension which might at any time again befanned into the flames of Civil War. 

Hence, at all proper times, Mr. Lincoln favored and evenurged Congressional action upon the subject. It was not, however, untilthe following year that definite action may be said to have commenced inCongress toward that end; and, as Congress was slow, he found itnecessary to say in his third Annual Message: "while I remain in mypresent position I shall not attempt to retract or modify theEmancipation Proclamation; nor shall I return to Slavery any person whois Free by the terms of that Proclamation, or by any of the Acts ofCongress, "

Meantime, however, occurred the series of gloriousUnion victories in the West, ending with the surrender to Grant'striumphant Forces on the 4th of July, 1863, of Vicksburg--"the Gibraltarof the West"--with its Garrison, Army, and enormous quantities of armsand munitions of war; thus closing a brilliant and successful Campaignwith a blow which literally "broke the back" of the Rebellion; while, almost simultaneously, July 1-3, the Union Forces of the East, underMeade, gained the great victory of Gettysburg, and, driving the hosts ofLee from Pennsylvania, put a second and final end to Rebel invasion ofNorthern soil; gaining it, on ground dedicated by President Lincoln, before that year had closed--as a place of sepulture for thePatriot-soldiers who there had fallen in a brief, touching and immortalAddress, which every American child should learn by heart, and everyAmerican adult ponder deeply, as embodying the very essence of trueRepublicanism. 

 [President Lincoln's Address, when the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, Pa. , was dedicated Nov. 19, 1863, was in these memorable words:

 "Fourscore and seven years ago, our Fathers brought forth upon this continent a new Nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. 

 "Now we are engaged in a great Civil War, testing whether that Nation, or any Nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. 

 "We are met on a great battlefield of that War. We have come here to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that Nation might live. 

 "It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. 

 "But in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow, this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. 

 "The World will little note, nor long remember, what we say here; but it can never forget what they did here. 

 "It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have, thus far, so nobly advanced. 

 "It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us; that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that Cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this Nation, under God, shall have a new birth of Freedom; and that Government of the People, by the People, and for the People, shall not perish front the Earth. "]

That season of victory for the Union arms, coming, as it did, upon aseason of depression and doubtfulness, was doubly grateful to the loyalheart of the Nation. Daylight seemed to be breaking at last. Gettysburg had hurled back the Southern invader from our soil; andVicksburg, with the immediately resulting surrender of Port Hudson, hadopened the Mississippi river from Cairo to the Gulf, and split theConfederacy in twain. 

But it happened just about this time that, the enrollment of the wholeMilitia of the United States (under the Act of March, 1863), having beencompleted, and a Draft for 300, 000 men ordered to be made and executed, if by a subsequent time the quotas of the various States should not befilled by volunteering, certain malcontents and Copperheads, inspired byagents and other friends of the Southern Conspirators, started andfomented, in the city of New York, a spirit of unreasoning oppositionboth to voluntary enlistment, and conscription under the Draft, thatfinally culminated, July 13th, in a terrible Riot, lasting several days, during which that great metropolis was in the hands, and completely atthe mercy, of a brutal mob of Secession sympathizers, who made day andnight hideous with their drunken bellowings, terrorized everybody evensuspected of love for the Union, plundered and burned dwellings, including a Colored Orphan Asylum, and added to the crime of arson, thatof murdering the mob-chased, terror-stricken Negroes, by hanging them tothe lamp-posts. 

These Riots constituted a part of that "Fire in the Rear" with which theRebels and their Northern Democratic sympathizers had so frequentlymenaced the Armies of the Union. 

Alluding to them, the N. Y. Tribune on July 15th, while its office wasinvested and threatened with attack and demolition, bravely said: "Theyare, in purpose and in essence, a Diversion in favor of Jefferson Davisand Lee. Listen to the yells of the mob and the harangues of itsfavorite orators, and you will find them surcharged with 'Nigger, ''Abolition, ' 'Black Republican, ' denunciation of prominent Republicans, The Tribune, etc. Etc. --all very wide of the Draft and the exemption. Had the Abolitionists, instead of the Slaveholders, revolted, andundertaken to upset the Government and dissolve the Union, nine-tenthsof these rioters would have eagerly volunteered to put them down. It isthe fear, stimulated by the recent and glorious triumphs of the UnionArms, that Slavery and the Rebellion must suffer, which is at the bottomof all this arson, devastation, robbery, and murder. "

The Democratic Governor, Seymour, by promising to "have this Draftsuspended and stopped, " did something toward quieting the Riots, but itwas not until the Army of the Potomac, now following Lee's retreat, wasweakened by the sending of several regiments to New York that theDraft-rioting spirit, in that city, and to a less extent in othercities, was thoroughly cowed. 

 [In reply to Gov. Seymour's appeal for delay in the execution of the Draft Law, in order to test its Constitutionality, Mr. Lincoln, on the 7th of August, said he could not consent to lose the time that would be involved in obtaining a decision from the U. S. Supreme Court on that point, and proceeded: "We are contending with an Enemy who, as I understand, drives every able-bodied man he can reach into his ranks, very much as a butcher drives bullocks into a slaughter-pen. No time is wasted, no argument is used. 

 "This system produces an Army which will soon turn upon our now victorious soldiers already in the field, if they shall not be sustained by recruits as they should be. 

 It produces an Army with a rapidity not to be matched on our side, if we first waste time to re-experiment with the Volunteer system, already deemed by Congress, and palpably, in fact, so far exhausted as to be inadequate; and then more time to obtain a Court decision as to whether a law is Constitutional which requires a part of those not now in the Service to go to those who are already in it, and still more time to determine with absolute certainty that we get those who are to go, in the precisely legal proportion to those who are not to go. 

 "My purpose is to be in my action Just and Constitutional, and yet Practical, in performing the important duty with which I am charged, of maintaining the Unity and the Free principles of our common Country. "]

Worried and weakened by this Democratic opposition to the Draft, and thethreatened consequent delays and dangers to the success of the UnionCause, and depressed moreover by the defeat of the National forces underRosecrans at Chickamauga; yet, the favorable determination of the Fallelections on the side of Union and Freedom, and the immense majoritiesupholding those issues, together with Grant's great victory (November, 1863) of Chattanooga--where the three days of fighting in theChattanooga Valley and up among the clouds of Lookout Mountain andMission Ridge, not only effaced the memory of Rosecrans's previousdisaster, but brought fresh and imperishable laurels to the Union Arms--stiffened the President's backbone, and that of Union men everywhere. 

Not that Mr. Lincoln had shown any signs of weakness or wavering, or anyloss of hope in the ultimate result of this War for the preservation ofthe Union--which now also involved Freedom to all beneath its banner. On the contrary, a letter of his written late in August showsconclusively enough that he even then began to see clearly the comingfinal triumph--not perhaps as "speedy, " as he would like, in its coming, but none the less sure to come in God's "own good time, " and furthermorenot appearing "to be so distant as it did" before Gettysburg, andespecially Vicksburg, was won; for, said he: "The signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the Sea". 

 [This admirable letter, reviewing "the situation" and his policy, was in these words

 EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, August 26. 1863. 

 HON. JAMES C. CONKLING

 MY DEAR SIR; Your letter inviting me to attend a Mass Meeting of unconditional Union men to be held at the Capital of Illinois, on the 3rd day of September, has been received. It would be very agreeable for me thus to meet my old friends at my own home; but I cannot just now be absent from here so long a time as a visit there would require. 

 The meeting is to be of all those who maintain unconditional devotion to the Union; and I am sure that my old political friends will thank me for tendering, as I do, the Nation's gratitude to those other noble men whom no partisan malice or partisan hope can make false to the Nation's life. 

 There are those who are dissatisfied with me. To such I would say: you desire Peace, and you blame me that we do not have it. But how can we attain it? There are but three conceivable ways: First, to suppress the Rebellion by force of Arms. This I am trying to do. Are you for it? If you are, so far we are agreed. If you are not for it, a second way is to give up the Union. I am against this. Are you for it? If you are, you should say so plainly. If you are not for Force, nor yet for Dissolution, there only remains some imaginable Compromise. 

 I do not believe that any Compromise embracing the maintenance of the Union is now possible. All that I learn leads to a directly opposite belief. The strength of the Rebellion is its Military, its Army. That Army dominates all the Country, and all the people, within its range. Any offer of terms made by any man or men within that range, in opposition to that Army, is simply nothing for the present: because such man or men have no power whatever to enforce their side of a Compromise, if one were made with them. 

 To illustrate: Suppose refugees from the South, and Peace men of the North, get together in Convention, and frame and proclaim a Compromise embracing a restoration of the Union. In what way can that Compromise be used to keep Lee's Army out of Pennsylvania? Meade's Army can keep Lee's Army out of Pennsylvania, and, I think, can ultimately drive it out of existence. But no paper Compromise to which the controllers of Lee's Army are not agreed, can at all affect that Army. In an effort at such Compromise we would waste time, which the Enemy would improve to our disadvantage; and that would be all. 

 A Compromise, to be effective, must be made either with those who control the Rebel Army, or with the people, first liberated from the domination of that Army, by the success of our own Army. Now, allow me to assure you that no word or intimation from that Rebel Army, or from any of the men controlling it, in relation to any Peace Compromise, has ever come to my knowledge or belief. All charges and insinuations to the contrary are deceptive and groundless. And I promise you that if any such proposition shall hereafter come, it shall not be rejected and kept a secret from you. I freely acknowledge myself to be the servant of the People, according to the bond of service, the United States Constitution; and that, as such, I am responsible to them. 

 But, to be plain. You are dissatisfied with me about the Negro. Quite likely there is a difference of opinion between you and myself upon that subject. I certainly wish that all men could be Free, while you, I suppose, do not. Yet I have neither adopted nor proposed any measure which is not consistent with even your view, provided that you are for the Union. I suggested compensated Emancipation; to which you replied you wished not to be taxed to buy Negroes. But I had not asked you to be taxed to buy Negroes, except in such a way as to save you from greater taxation to save the Union, exclusively by other means. 

 You dislike the Emancipation Proclamation, and perhaps would have it retracted. You say it is Unconstitutional. I think differently. I think the Constitution invests the Commander-in-Chief with the Law of War in Time of War. The most that can be said, if so much, is, that Slaves are property. Is there, has there ever been, any question that, by the Law of War, property, both of enemies and friends, may be taken when needed? And is it not needed whenever it helps us and hurts the Enemy? Armies, the World over, destroy enemies' property when they cannot use it; and even destroy their own to keep it from the Enemy. Civilized belligerents do all in their power to help themselves or hurt the Enemy, except a few things regarded as barbarous or cruel. Among the exceptions are the massacre of vanquished foes and non-combatants, male and female. 

 But the Proclamation, as law, either is valid or is not valid. If it is not valid, it needs no retraction. If it is valid it cannot be retracted, any more than the dead can be brought to life. Some of you profess to think its retraction would operate favorably for the Union. Why better after the retraction than before the issue? There was more than a year and a half of trial to suppress the Rebellion before the Proclamation was issued, the last one hundred days of which passed under an explicit notice that it was coming, unless averted by those in revolt returning to their allegiance. The War has certainly progressed as favorably for us since the issue of the Proclamation as before. 

 I know as fully as one can know the opinions of others that some of the Commanders of our Armies in the field, who have given us our most important victories, believe the Emancipation policy and the use of Colored troops constitute the heaviest blows yet dealt to the Rebellion, and that at least one of those important successes could not have been achieved when it was, but for the aid of Black soldiers. 

 Among the Commanders who hold these views are some who have never had an affinity with what is called "Abolitionism, " or with "Republican party politics, " but who hold them purely as Military opinions. I submit their opinions as entitled to some weight against the objections often urged that Emancipation and arming the Blacks are unwise as Military measures, and were not adopted as such, in good faith. 

 You say that you will not fight to Free Negroes. Some of them seem willing to fight for you; but no matter. Fight you, then, exclusively to save the Union. I issued the Proclamation on purpose to aid you in saving the Union. Whenever you shall have conquered all resistance to the Union, if I shall urge you to continue fighting, it will be an apt time then for you to declare you will not fight to Free Negroes. I thought that in your struggle for the Union, to whatever extent the Negroes should cease helping the Enemy, to that extent it weakened the Enemy in his resistance to you. Do you think differently? I thought whatever Negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves just so much less for White soldiers to do in saving the Union. Does it appear otherwise to you? But Negroes, like other people, act upon motives. Why should they do anything for us if we will do nothing for them? If they stake their lives for us they must be prompted by the strongest motives, even the promise of Freedom. And the promise, being made, must be kept. 

 The signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the Sea. Thanks to the great Northwest for it; nor yet wholly to them. Three hundred miles up, they met New England, Empire, Keystone, and Jersey, hewing their way right and left. The Sunny South, too, in more colors than one, also lent a helping hand. On the spot, their part of the history was jotted down in Black and White. The job was a great National one, and let none be slighted who bore an honorable part in it. And while those who have cleared the Great River may well be proud, even that is not all. It is hard to say that anything has been more bravely and well done than at Antietam, Murfreesboro, Gettysburg, and on many fields of less note. Nor must Uncle Sam's web-feet be forgotten. At all the watery margins they have been present, not only on the deep Sea, the broad Bay, and the rapid River, but also up the narrow, muddy Bayou, and wherever the ground was a little damp they had been, and made their tracks. Thanks to all. For the Great Republic--for the principle it lives by, and keeps alive--for Man's vast future --thanks to all. 

 Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I hope it will come soon, and come to stay; and so come as to be worth the keeping in all future time. It will then have been proved that among Freemen there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet, and that they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case and pay the cost. And there will be some Black men who can remember that, with silent tongue, and clinched teeth, and steady eye, and well poised bayonet, they have helped mankind on to this great consummation, while I fear there will be some White ones unable to forget that with malignant heart and deceitful speech they have striven to hinder it. 

 Still, let us not be over sanguine of a speedy, final triumph. Let us be quite sober. Let us diligently apply the means, never doubting that a just God, in his own good time, will give us the rightful result. 

 Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. ]

But Chattanooga, and the grand majorities in all the FallState-elections, save that of New Jersey, --and especially the mannerin which loyal Ohio sat down upon the chief Copperhead-Democrat andTreason-breeder of the North, Vallandigham--came most auspiciously tostrengthen the President's hands. 

 [The head of the Knights of the Golden Circle, and the Democratic candidate for Governor of Ohio]

And now he saw, more clearly still, the approach of that time when thesolemn promise and declaration of Emancipation might be recorded uponthe sacred roll of the Constitution, and thus be made safe for all time. 

In his Annual Message of December, 1863, therefore, President Lincoln, after adverting to the fact that "a year ago the War had already lastednearly twenty months, " without much ground for hopefulness, proceeded tosay:

"The preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, issued in September, wasrunning its assigned period to the beginning of the New Year. A monthlater the final Proclamation came, including the announcement thatColored men of suitable condition would be received into the Warservice. The policy of Emancipation, and of employing Black soldiers, gave to the future a new aspect, about which hope, and fear, and doubt, contended in uncertain conflict. 

"According to our political system, as a matter of Civil Administration, the General Government had no lawful power to effect Emancipation in anyState, and for a long time it had been hoped that the Rebellion could besuppressed without resorting to it as a Military measure. It was allthe while deemed possible that the necessity for it might come, and thatif it should, the crisis of the contest would then be presented. Itcame, and, as was anticipated, it was followed by dark and doubtfuldays. 

"Eleven months having now passed, we are permitted to take another view* * * Of those who were Slaves at the beginning of the Rebellion, fullone hundred thousand are now in the United States Military service, about one half of which number actually bear arms in the ranks; thusgiving the double advantage of taking so much labor from the Insurgentcause, and supplying the places which otherwise must be filled with somany White men. So far as tested, it is difficult to say they are notas good soldiers as any. 

"No servile insurrection, or tendency to violence or cruelty, has markedthe measures of Emancipation and arming the Blacks. These measures havebeen much discussed in Foreign Countries, and contemporary with suchdiscussion the tone of public sentiment there is much improved. Athome, the same measures have been fully discussed, supported, criticised, and denounced, and the annual elections following are highlyencouraging to those whose official duty it is to bear the Countrythrough this great trial. Thus we have the new reckoning. The crisiswhich threatened to divide the friends of the Union is past. "

After alluding to his Proclamation of Amnesty, issued simultaneouslywith this Message, to all repentant Rebels who would take an oaththerein prescribed, and contending that such an oath should be (as hehad drawn it) to uphold not alone the Constitution and the Union, butthe Laws and Proclamations touching Slavery as well, President Lincolncontinued:

"In my judgment they have aided and will further aid, the Cause forwhich they were intended. To now abandon them, would be not only torelinquish a lever of power, but would also be a cruel and an astoundingbreach of faith. " And, toward the close of the Message, he added:

"The movements by State action, for Emancipation, in several of theStates not included in the Emancipation Proclamation, are matters ofprofound gratulation. And while I do not repeat in detail what I haveheretofore so earnestly urged upon the subject, my general views remainunchanged; and I trust that Congress will omit no fair opportunity ofAIDING THESE IMPORTANT STEPS TO A GREAT CONSUMMATION. "

Mr. Lincoln's patient but persistent solicitude, his earnest andunintermitted efforts--exercised publicly through his Messages andspeeches, and privately upon Members of Congress who called upon, orwhose presence was requested by him at the White House--in behalf ofincorporating Emancipation in the Constitution, were now to givepromise, at least, of bearing good fruit. 

Measures looking to this end were submitted in both Houses of Congresssoon after its meeting, and were referred to the respective JudiciaryCommittees of the same, and on the 10th of February, 1864, Mr. Trumbullreported to the Senate, from the Senate Judiciary Committee, of which hewas Chairman, a substitute Joint Resolution providing for the submissionto the States of an Amendment to the United States Constitution in thefollowing words:

"ART. XIII. , SEC. I. Neither Slavery nor Involuntary Servitude, exceptas a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been dulyconvicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject totheir jurisdiction. 

"SEC. II. Congress shall have power to enforce this Article byappropriate legislation. "

This proposed Amendment came up for consideration in the Senate, on the28th of March, and a notable debate ensued. 

On the same day, in the House of Representatives, Thaddeus Stevens--withthe object perhaps of ascertaining the strength, in that Body, of thefriends of out-and-out Emancipation--offered a Resolution proposing tothe States the following Amendments to the United States Constitution:

"ART. I. Slavery and Involuntary Servitude, except for the punishmentof crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, is foreverprohibited in the United States and all its Territories. 

"ART. II. So much of Article four, Section two, as refers to thedelivery up of Persons held to Service or Labor, escaping into anotherState, is annulled. "

The test was made upon a motion to table the Resolution, which motionwas defeated by 38 yeas to 69 nays, and showed the necessity forconverting three members from the Opposition. Subsequently, at theinstance of Mr. Stevens himself, the second Article of the Resolutionwas struck out by 72 yeas to 26 nays. 

The proceedings in both Houses of Congress upon these propositions toengraft upon the National Constitution a provision guaranteeing Freedomto all men upon our soil, were now interrupted by the death of one whowould almost have been willing to die twice over, if, by doing so, hecould have hastened their adoption. 

Owen Lovejoy, the life-long apostle of Abolitionism, the fervidgospeller of Emancipation, was dead; and it seemed almost the irony ofFate that, at such a time, when Emancipation most needed all its friendsto make it secure, its doughtiest champion should fall. 

But perhaps the eloquent tributes paid to his memory, in the Halls ofCongress, helped the Cause no less. They at least brought back to thepublic mind the old and abhorrent tyrannies of the Southern Slave power;how it had sought not not only to destroy freedom of Action, but freedomof Speech, and hesitated not to destroy human Life with these; remindedthe Loyal People of the Union of much that was hateful, from which theyhad escaped; and strengthened the purpose of Patriots to fix in thechief corner-stone of the Constitution, imperishable muniments of humanLiberty. 

Lovejoy's brother had been murdered at Alton, Illinois, whilevindicating freedom of Speech and of the Press; and the blood of thatmartyr truly became "the seed of the Church. " Arnold--recalling aspeech of Owen Lovejoy's at Chicago, and a passage in it, descriptive ofthe martyrdom, --said to the House, on this sad occasion: "I rememberthat, after describing the scene of that death, in words--which stirredevery heart, he said he went a pilgrim to his brother's grave, and, kneeling upon the sod beneath which sleeps that brother, he swore, bythe everlasting God, eternal hostility to African Slavery. " And, continued Arnold, "Well and nobly has he kept that oath. "

Washburne, too, reminded the House of the memorable episode in that veryHall when, (April 5, 1860), the adherents of Slavery crowding aroundLovejoy with fierce imprecations and threats, seeking then and there toprevent Free Speech, "he displayed that undaunted courage and matchlessbearing which extorted the admiration of even his most deadly foes. ""His"--continued the same speaker--"was the eloquence of Mirabeau, whichin the Tiers Etat and in the National Assembly made to totter the throneof France; it was the eloquence of Danton, who made all France totremble from his tempestuous utterances in the National Convention. Like those apostles of the French Revolution, his eloquence could stirfrom the lowest depths all the passions of Man; but unlike them, he wasas good and as pure as he was eloquent and brave, a noble mindedChristian man, a lover of the whole human Race, and of universal Libertyregulated by Law. "

Grinnell, in his turn, told also with real pathos, of his havingrecently seen Lovejoy in the chamber of sickness. "When, " saidGrinnell, "I expressed fears for his recovery, I saw the tears coursedown his manly cheek, as he said 'Ah! God's will be done, but I havebeen laboring, voting, and praying for twenty years that I might see thegreat day of Freedom which is so near and which I hope God will let melive to rejoice in. I want a vote on my Bill for the destruction ofSlavery, root and branch. '"

 [Sumner, afterward speaking of Lovejoy and this Measure, said: "On the 14th of December, 1863, he introduced a Bill, whose title discloses its character: 'A Bill to give effect to the Declaration of Independence, and also to certain Provisions of the Constitution of the United States. ' It proceeds to recite that All Men were Created Equal, and were Endowed by the Creator with the Inalienable Right to Life, Liberty and the Fruits of honest Toil; that the Government of the United States was Instituted to Secure those Rights; that the Constitution declares that No Person shall be Deprived of Liberty without due Process of Law, and also provides --article five, clause two--that this Constitution, and the Laws of the United States made in pursuance thereof, shall be the Supreme Law of the Land, and the Judges in each State shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution and Laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding; that it is now demonstrated by the Rebellion that Slavery is absolutely incompatible with the Union, Peace, and General Welfare for which Congress is to Provide; and it therefore Enacts that All Persons heretofore held in Slavery in any of the States or Territories of the United States are declared Freedmen, and are Forever Released from Slavery or Involuntary Servitude except as Punishment for Crime on due conviction. On the same day he introduced another Bill to Protect Freedmen and to Punish any one for Enslaving them. These were among his last Public acts, "--Cong. Globe, 1st S. , 38th C. , Pt. 2, p. 1334]

And staunch old Thaddeus Stevens said: "The change to him, is greatgain. The only regret we can feel is that he did not live to see thesalvation of his Country; to see Peace and Union restored, and universalEmancipation given to his native land. But such are the ways ofProvidence. Moses was not permitted to enter the Promised Land withthose he had led out of Bondage; he beheld it from afar off, and sleptwith his fathers. " "The deceased, " he impressively added, "needs noperishable monuments of brass or marble to perpetuate his name. So longas the English language shall be spoken or deciphered, so long asLiberty shall have a worshipper, his name will be known!"

What influence the death of Owen Lovejoy may have had on the subsequentproceedings touching Emancipation interrupted as we have seen by hisdemise--cannot be known; but among all the eloquent tributes to hismemory called forth by the mournful incident, perhaps none, could hehave heard it, would have better pleased him than those two openingsentences of Charles Summer's oration in the Senate--where he said ofOwen Lovejoy: "Could his wishes prevail, he would prefer much thatSenators should continue in their seats and help to enact into Law someone of the several Measures now pending to secure the obliteration ofSlavery. Such an Act would be more acceptable to him than any personaltribute, --" unless it might be these other words, which followed fromthe same lips: "How his enfranchised Soul would be elevated even inthose Abodes to which he has been removed, to know that his voice wasstill heard on Earth encouraging, exhorting, insisting that there shouldbe no hesitation anywhere in striking at Slavery; that this unpardonablewrong, from which alone the Rebellion draws its wicked life, must beblasted by Presidential proclamation, blasted by Act of Congress, blasted by Constitutional prohibition, blasted in every possible way, byevery available agency, and at every occurring opportunity, so that notrace of the outrage may continue in the institutions of the Land, andespecially that its accursed foot-prints may no longer defile theNational Statute-book. Sir, it will be in vain that you passResolutions in tribute to him, if you neglect that Cause for which helived, and do not hearken to his voice!"

 CHAPTER XXIII. 

 "THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT" IN THE SENATE. 

During the great debate, which now opened in the Senate, upon theJudiciary Committee's substitute resolution for the Amendment of theConstitution, so as forever to prohibit Slavery within the UnitedStates, and to empower Congress to pass such laws as would make thatprohibition effective--participated in by Messrs. Trumbull, Wilson, Saulsbury, Davis, Harlan, Powell, Sherman, Clark, Hale, Hendricks, Henderson, Sumner, McDougall and others--the whole history of Slaverywas enquired into and laid bare. 

Trumbull insisted that Slavery was at the bottom of all the internaltroubles with which the Nation had from its birth been afflicted, downto this wicked Rebellion, with all the resulting "distress, desolation, and death;" and that by 1860, it had grown to such power and arrogancethat "its advocates demanded the control of the Nation inits interests, failing in which, they attempted its overthrow. " Hereviewed, at some length, what had been done by our Government withregard to Slavery, since the breaking out of hostilities against us inthat mad attempt against the National life; how, "in the earlier stagesof the War, there was an indisposition on the part of the ExecutiveAuthority to interfere with Slavery at all;" how, for a long time, Slaves, escaping to our lines, were driven back to their Rebel masters;how the Act of Congress of July, 1861, which gave Freedom to all Slavesallowed by their Rebel masters to assist in the erection of Rebel worksand fortifications, had "not been executed, " and, said Mr. Trumbull, "sofar as I am advised, not a single Slave has been set at liberty underit;" how, "it was more than a year after its enactment before anyconsiderable number of Persons of African descent were organized andarmed" under the subsequent law of December, 1861, which not only gaveFreedom to all Slaves entering our Military lines, or who, belonging toRebel masters, were deserted by them, or were found in regions onceoccupied by Rebel forces and later by those of the Union, but alsoempowered the President to organize and arm them to aid in thesuppression of the Rebellion; how, it was not until this law had beenenacted that Union officers ceased to expel Slaves coming within ourlines--and then only when dismissal from the public service was made thepenalty for such expulsion; how, by his Proclamations of Emancipation, of September, 1862, and January, 1863, the President undertook tosupplement Congressional action--which had, theretofore, been confinedto freeing the Slaves of Rebels, and of such of these only as had comewithin the lines of our Military power-by also declaring, Free, theSlaves "who were in regions of country from which the authority of theUnited States was expelled;" and how, the "force and effect" of theseProclamations were variously understood by the enemies and friends ofthose measures--it being insisted on the one side that Emancipation as aWar-stroke was within the Constitutional War-power of the President asCommander-in-Chief, and that, by virtue of those Proclamations, "allSlaves within the localities designated become ipso facto Free, " and onthe other, that the Proclamations were "issued without competentauthority, " and had not effected and could not effect, "the Emancipationof a single Slave, " nor indeed could at any time, without additionallegislation, go farther than to liberate Slaves coming within the UnionArmy lines. 

After demonstrating that "any and all these laws and Proclamations, giving to each the largest effect claimed by its friends, areineffectual to the destruction of Slavery, " and protesting that somemore effectual method of getting rid of that Institution must beadopted, he declared, as his judgment, that "the only effectual way ofridding the Country of Slavery, so that it cannot be resuscitated, is byan Amendment of the Constitution forever prohibiting it within thejurisdiction of the United States. "

He then canvassed the chances of adoption of such an Amendment by anaffirmative vote of two thirds in each House of Congress, and of itssubsequent ratification by three-fourths of the States of the Union, anddeclared that "it is reasonable to suppose that if this proposedAmendment passes Congress, it will, within a year, receive theratification of the requisite number of States to make it a part of theConstitution. " His prediction proved correct--but only after aprotracted struggle. 

Henry Wilson also made a strong speech, but on different grounds. Heheld that the Emancipation Proclamations formed, together, a "complete, absolute, and final decree of Emancipation in Rebel States, " and, being"born of Military necessity" and "proclaimed by the Commander-in-Chiefof the Army and Navy, is the settled and irrepealable Law of theRepublic, to be observed, obeyed, and enforced, by Army and Navy, and isthe irreversible voice of the Nation. "

He also reviewed what had been done since the outbreak of the Rebellion, by Congress and the President, by Laws and Proclamations; and, whilestanding by the Emancipation Proclamations, declared that "the crowningAct, in this series of Acts, for the restriction and extinction ofSlavery in America, is this proposed Amendment to the Constitutionprohibiting the existence of Slavery in the Republic of the UnitedStates. "

The Emancipation Proclamation, according to his view, only neededenforcement, to give "Peace and Order, Freedom and Unity, to a nowdistracted Country;" but the "crowning act" of incorporating thisAmendment into the Constitution would do even more than all this, inthat it would "obliterate the last lingering vestiges of the SlaveSystem; its chattelizing, degrading, and bloody codes; its malignant, barbarizing spirit; all it was, and is; everything connected with it orpertaining to it, from the face of the Nation it has scarred with moraldesolation, from the bosom of the Country it has reddened with the bloodand strewn with the graves of patriotism. "

While the debate proceeded, President Lincoln watched it with carefulinterest. Other matters, however, had, since the Battle of Chattanooga, largely engrossed his attention. 

The right man had at last been found--it was believed--to control aswell as to lead our Armies. That man was Ulysses S. Grant. The gradeof Lieutenant General of the Army of the United States--in desuetudesince the days of Washington, except by brevet, in the case of WinfieldScott, --having been especially revived by Congress for and filled by theappointment and confirmation of Grant, March 2, 1864, that great soldierimmediately came on to Washington, received his commission at the handsof President Lincoln, in the cabinet chamber of the White House, on the9th, paid a flying visit to the Army of the Potomac, on the 10th, and atonce returned to Nashville to plan future movements. 

On the 12th, a General Order of the War Department (No. 98) was issued, relieving Major-General Halleck, "at his own request, " from duty as"General-in-Chief" of the Army, and assigning Lieutenant-General U. S. Grant to "the command of the Armies of the United States, " "theHeadquarters of the Army" to be in Washington, and also withLieutenant-General Grant in the Field, Halleck being assigned to "duty, in Washington, as Chief-of-staff of the Army, under the direction of theSecretary of War and the Lieutenant-General commanding. "

By the same order, Sherman was assigned to the command of the "MilitaryDivision of the Mississippi, " composed of the Departments of the Ohio, the Cumberland, the Tennessee, and the Arkansas; and McPherson to thatof the Department and Army of the Tennessee. 

On the 23rd of March, Grant was back again at Washington, and at onceproceeded to Culpepper Court-house, Virginia, where his Headquarters inthe field were, for a time, to be. 

Here he completed his plans, and reorganized his Forces, for the comingconflicts, in the South-west and South-east, which were to result in afull triumph to the Union Arms, and Peace to a preserved Union. 

It is evident, from the utterances of Mr. Lincoln when Vicksburg fell, that he had then become pretty well satisfied that Grant was "the comingman, " to whom it would be safe to confide the management and chiefleadership of our Armies. Chattanooga merely confirmed that belief--asindeed it did that of Union men generally. But the concurrent judgmentof Congress and the President had now, as we have seen, placed Grant inthat chief command; and the consequent relief to Mr. Lincoln, in thushaving the heavy responsibility of Army-control, long unwillinglyexercised by him, taken from his own shoulders and placed upon those ofthe one great soldier in whom he had learned to have implicit faith, --afaith earned by steady and unvaryingly successful achievements in theField--must have been most grateful. 

Other responsibilities would still press heavily enough upon thePresident's time and attention. Questions touching the Military andCivil government of regions of the Enemy's country, conquered by theUnion arms; of the rehabilitation or reconstruction of the Rebel States;of a thousand and one other matters, of greater or lesser perplexity, growing out of these and other questions; besides the ever pressing andgigantic problems involved in the raising of enormous levies of troops, and prodigious sums of money, needed in securing, moving, and supplyingthem, and defraying the extraordinary expenses growing out of thenecessary blockade of thousands of miles of Southern Coast, and otherNaval movements; not to speak of those expenditures belonging to themore ordinary business transactions of the Government. 

But chief of all things claiming his especial solicitude, as we haveseen, was this question of Emancipation by Constitutional enactment, thedebate upon which was now proceeding in the Senate. That solicitude wasnecessarily increased by the bitter opposition to it of NorthernCopperheads, and by the attitude of the Border-State men, upon whosefinal action, the triumph or defeat of this great measure mustultimately depend. 

Many of the latter, were, as has already been shown in these pages, loyal men; but the loyalty of some of these to their Country, was stillso questionably and so thoroughly tainted with their worshipful devotionto Slavery--although they must have been blind indeed not to havediscovered, long ere this, that it was a "slowly-dying cause"--that theywere ever on the alert to delay, hamper, and defeat, any action, whetherExecutive or Legislative, and however necessary for the preservation ofthe Union and the overthrow of its mortal enemies, which, never solightly, impinged upon their "sacred Institution. "

This fact was well set forth, in this very debate, by a Senator from NewEngland--[Wilson of Massachusetts]--when, after adjuring theanti-Slavery men of the age, not to forget the long list of Slavery'scrimes, he eloquently proceeded:

"Let them remember, too, that hundreds of thousands of our countrymen inLoyal States--since Slavery raised the banners of Insurrection, and sentdeath, wounds, sickness, and sorrow, into the homes of the People--haveresisted, and still continue to resist, any measure for the defense ofthe Nation, if that measure tended to impair the vital and animatingpowers of Slavery. They resisted the Act making Free the Slaves used byRebels for Military purposes; the Confiscation of Rebel property and theFreedom of the Slaves of Rebel masters; the Abolition of Slavery in theCapital of the Nation, and the consecration of the Territories to FreeLabor and Free laboring men; the Proclamation of Emancipation; theenlistment of Colored men to fight the battles of the Country; theFreedom of the Black soldier, who is fighting, bleeding, dying for theCountry; and the Freedom of his wife and children. And now, when Warhas for nearly three years menaced the life of the Nation, bathed theLand in blood, and filled two hundred thousand graves with our slainsons, these men of the Loyal States still cling to the falling fortunesof the relentless and unappeasable Enemy of their Country and itsdemocratic institutions; they mourn, and will not be comforted, over theexpiring System, in the Border Slave-States; and, in tones ofindignation or of anguish, they utter lamentations over the Proclamationof Emancipation, and the policy that is bringing Rebel States back againradiant with Freedom. "

Among these "loyal" Democratic opponents of Emancipation, in any shape, or any where, were not wanting men--whether from Loyal Northern orBorder States--who still openly avowed that Slavery was right; thatRebellion, to preserve its continuance, was justifiable; and that therewas no Constitutional method of uprooting it. 

Saulsbury of Delaware, was representative and spokesman of this class, and he took occasion during this very debate--[In the Senate, March 31, 1864. ]--to defend Slavery as a Divine Institution, which had thesanction both of the Mosaic and Christian Dispensations!

 [Said he: "Slavery had existed under some form or other from the first period of recorded history. It dates back even beyond the period of Abraham, the Father of the Faithful, in whose seed all the Nations of the Earth were to be blessed. We find that, immediately after the Flood, the Almighty, for purposes inscrutable to us, condemned a whole race to Servitude: 'Vayomer Orur Knoan Efet Afoatim Yeahio Le-echot:' 'And he said, Cursed be Canaan; Slave of Slaves he shall be to his brethren. ' It continued among all people until the advent of the Christian era. It was recognized in that New Dispensation, which was to supersede the Old. It has the sanction of God's own Apostle; for when Paul sent back Onesimus to Philemon, whom did he send? A Freeman? No, Sir. He sent his (doulos, ) a Slave, born as such, not even his andrapodon, who was such by captivity in War. Among all people, and in all ages, has this Institution, if such it is to be called, existed, and had the countenance of wise and good men, and even of the Christian Church itself, until these modern times, up at least to the Nineteenth Century. It exists in this Country, and has existed from the beginning. "

 Mr. Harlan's reply to the position of Mr. Saulsbury that Slavery is right, is a Divine Institution, etc. , was very able and interesting. He piled up authority after authority, English as well as American, to show that there is no support of Slavery--and especially of the title to services of the adult offspring of a Slave--at Common Law; and, after also proving, by the mouth of a favorite son of Virginia, that it has no legal existence by virtue of any Municipal or Statutory Law, he declared that the only remaining Law that can be cited for its support is the Levitical Code"--as follows:

 "'Both thy Bondmen, and thy Bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy Bondmen and Bondmaids. 

 "'Moreover, of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land; and they shall be your possession. 

 "'And ye shall take them as an Inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your Bondmen forever. "'

 "I remark, " said he, "in this connection, that the Levitical Code, or the Hebrew Law, contains a provision for the Naturalization of Foreigners, whether captives of War, or voluntary emigrants. By compliance with the requirements of this law they became citizens, entitled to all the rights and privileges and immunities of native Hebrews. The Hebrew Slave Code, applicable to Enslaved Hebrews, is in these words:

 "'And if thy brother, an Hebrew man, or an Hebrew woman, be sold unto thee, and serve thee six years, then in the seventh year thou shalt let him go Free from thee. '

 "Here I request the attention of those who claim compensation for Emancipated Slaves to the text:

 "'And when thou sendest him out Free from thee, thou shalt not let him go away empty:

 "'Thou shalt furnish him liberally out of thy floor'--

 "Which means granaries--

 "'and out of thy wine-press: of that wherewith the Lord thy God hath blessed thee, thou shalt give unto him. '

 "'It shall not seem hard unto thee, when thou sendest him away Free from thee, for he hath been worth a double-hired servant to thee, in serving thee six years. '

 "These Hebrew Statutes provide that the heathen might be purchased and held as Slaves, and their posterity after them; that under their Naturalization Laws all strangers and sojourners, Bond and Free, have the privilege of acquiring the rights of citizenship; that all Hebrews, natives or naturalized, might assert and maintain their right to Freedom. 

 "At the end of six years a Hebrew Slave thus demanding his Liberty, was not to be sent away empty; the owner, so far from claiming compensation from his neighbors or from the Public Treasury for setting him Free, was bound to divide with the Freedman, of his own possessions: to give him of his flocks, of his herds, of his granary, and of his winepress, of everything with which the Lord Almighty had blessed the master during the years of his Servitude; and then the owner was admonished that he was not to regard it as a hardship to be required to Liberate the Slave, and to divide with him of his substance. 

 "The Almighty places the Liberated Slave's claim to a division of his former master's property on the eternal principles of Justice, the duty to render an equivalent for an equivalent. The Slave having served six years must be paid for his Service, must be paid liberally because he had been worth even more than a hired servant during the period of his enslavement. 

 "If, then, " continued Mr. Harlan, "the justice of this claim cannot be found either in Reason, Natural Justice, or the principles of the Common Law, or in any positive Municipal or Statute regulation of any State, or in the Hebrew Code written by the Finger of God protruded from the flame of fire on the summit of Sinai, I ask whence the origin of the title to the services of the adult offspring of the Slave mother? or is it not manifest that there is no just title? Is it not a mere usurpation without any known mode of justification, under any existing Code of Laws, human or Divine?"]

He also undertook to justify Secession on the singular ground that "weare sprung from a Race of Secessionists, " the proof of which he held tobe in the fact that, while the preamble to, as well as the body of theConvention of Ratification of, the old Articles of Confederation betweenthe States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island andProvidence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, andGeorgia, declared that Confederation to be a "Perpetual Union, " yet, within nine years thereafter, all the other States Seceded from NewYork, Virginia, North Carolina, and Rhode Island by ratifying the newConstitution for "a more perfect Union. "

He also endeavored to maintain the extraordinary proposition that "ifthe Senate of the United States were to adopt this Joint-resolution, andwere to submit it to all the States of this Union, and if three-fourthsof the States should ratify the Amendment, it would not be binding onany State whose interest was affected by it, if that State protestedagainst it!" And beyond all this, he re-echoed the old, old cry of theBorder-state men, that "the time is unpropitious for such a measure asthis. "

Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland, however, by his great speech, of April5th, in the Senate, did much to clear the tangle in the minds of somefaltering Union statesmen on this important subject. 

He reviewed the question of human Slavery from the time when theConstitutional Convention was held; showed that at that period, as wellas at the time of the Declaration of our Independence "there was but onesentiment upon the subject among enlightened Southern statesmen"--andthat was, that Slavery "is a great affliction to any Country where itprevails;" and declared that "a prosperous and permanent Peace can neverbe secured if the Institution is permitted to survive. "

He then traversed the various methods by which statesmen were seeking toprevent that survival of Slavery, addressing himself by turns to thearguments of those who, with John Sherman, "seemed, " said he, "toconsider it as within the power of Congress by virtue of its Legislativeauthority;" to those of the "many well-judging men, with the Presidentat their head, who, " to again use his own words, "seem to suppose thatit is within the reach of the Executive;" and lastly, to those "whoexpress the opinion that it is not within the scope of either Executiveor Legislative authority, or of Constitutional Amendment;" and afterdemolishing the arguments of those who held the two former of thesepositions, he proceeded to rebut the assumption that Slavery could notbe abolished at all because it was not originally abolished by theConstitution. 

Continuing, he said: "Remember, now, the question is, can thatInstitution, which deals with Humanity as Property, which claims toshackle the mind, the soul, and the body, which brings to the level ofthe brute a portion of the race of Man, cease to be within the reach ofthe political power of the People of the United States, not because itwas not at one time within their power, but because at that time theydid not exert the power?

"What says the Preamble to the Constitution? How pregnant with aconclusive answer is the Preamble, to the proposition that Slaverycannot be abolished! What does that Preamble state to have been thechief objects that the great and wise and good men had at heart, inrecommending the Constitution, with that Preamble, to the adoption ofthe American People? That Justice might be established; thatTranquillity might be preserved; that the common Defense and generalWelfare might be maintained; and, last and chief of all, that Libertymight be secured. 

"Is there no Justice in putting an end to human Slavery? Is there nodanger to the Tranquillity of the Country in its existence? May it notinterfere with the common Defense and general Welfare? And, above all, is it consistent with any notion, which the mind of man can conceive, ofhuman Liberty?"

He held that the very Amendatory clause of the Constitution under whichit was proposed to make this Amendment, was probably inserted there froma conviction of that coming time "when Justice would call so loudly forthe extinction of the Institution that her call could not be disobeyed, "and, when "the Peace and Tranquillity of the Land would demand, inthunder tones, " its destruction, "as inconsistent with such Peace andTranquillity. "

To the atrocious pretence that "there was a right to make a Slave of anyhuman being"--which he said would have shocked every one of the framersof the Constitution had they heard it; and, what he termed, the nauseousdeclaration that "Slavery of the Black race is of Divine origin, " andwas intended to be perpetual; he said:

"The Saviour of Mankind did not put an end to it by physical power, orby the declaration of any existing illegality, in word. His missionupon Earth was not to propagate His doctrines by force. He came tosave, not to conquer. His purpose was not to march armed legionsthroughout the habitable Globe, securing the allegiance of those forwhose safety He was striving. He warred by other influences. He aimedat the heart, principally. He inculcated his doctrines, more ennoblingthan any that the World, enlightened as it was before His advent uponEarth, had been able to discover. He taught to Man the obligation ofbrotherhood. He announced that the true duty of Man was to do to othersas he would have others do to him--to all men, the World over; andunless some convert to the modern doctrine that Slavery itself finds notonly a guarantee for its existence, but for its legal existence, in theScripture, excepts from the operation of the influences which Hismorality brought to bear on the mind of the Christian world, the Blackman, and shows that it was not intended to apply to Black men, then itis not true, it cannot be true, that He designed His doctrine not to beequally applicable to the Black and to the White, to the Race of Man ashe then existed, or as he might exist in all after-time. "

To the assumption that the African Slaves were too utterly deficient anddegraded, mentally and morally, to appreciate the blessings of Freedom, he opposed the eloquent fact that "wherever the flag of the UnitedStates, the symbol of human Liberty, now goes; under it, from theirhereditary bondage, are to be found men and women and childrenassembling and craving its protection 'fleeing from' the iron ofoppression that had pierced their souls, to the protection of that flagwhere they are 'gladdened by the light of Liberty. '"

"It is idle to deny, " said he--"we feel it in our own persons--how, withreference to that sentiment, all men are brethren. Look to theillustrations which the times now afford, how, in the illustration ofthat sentiment, do we differ from the Black man? He is willing to incurevery personal danger which promises to result in throwing down hisshackles, and making him tread the Earth, which God has created for all, as a man, and not as a Slave. "

Said he: "It is an instinct of the Soul. Tyranny may oppress it forages and centuries; the pall of despotism may hang over it; but thesentiment is ever there; it kindles into a flame in the very furnace ofaffliction, and it avails itself of the first opportunity that offers, promising the least chance of escape, and wades through blood andslaughter to achieve it, and, whether it succeeds or fails, demonstrates, vindicates in the very effort, the inextinguishable rightto Liberty. "

He thought that mischiefs might result from this measure, owing to theuneducated condition of the Slave, but they would be but temporary. Atall events to "suffer those Africans, " said he, "whom we are callingaround our standard, and asking to aid us in restoring the Constitutionand the power of the Government to its rightful authority, to be reducedto bondage again, " would be "a disgrace to the Nation. " The"Institution" must be terminated. 

"Terminate it, " continued he, "and the wit of man will, as I think, beunable to devise any other topic upon which we can be involved in afratricidal strife. God and nature, judging by the history of the past, intend us to be one. Our unity is written in the mountains and therivers, in which we all have an interest. The very differences ofclimate render each important to the other, and alike important. 

"That mighty horde which, from time to time, have gone from theAtlantic, imbued with all the principles of human Freedom which animatedtheir fathers in running the perils of the mighty Deep and seekingLiberty here, are now there; and as they have said, they will continueto say, until time shall be no more: 'We mean that the Government infuture shall be, as it has been in the past--Once an exemplar of humanFreedom, for the light and example of the World; illustrating in theblessings and the happiness it confers, the truth of the principlesincorporated into the Declaration of Independence, that Life and Libertyare Man's inalienable right. "

Fortunately the Democratic opposition, in the Senate, tothis measure, was too small in numbers to beat the proposed Amendment, but by offering amendments to it, its enemies succeeded in delaying itsadoption. 

However, on the 5th of April, an amendment, offered by Garrett Davis, was acted upon. It was to strike out all after the preamble of theXIIIth Article of Amendment to the Constitution, proposed by theJudiciary Committee, and insert the words:

"No Negro, or Person whose mother or grandmother is or was a Negro, shall be a citizen of the United States and be eligible to any Civil orMilitary office, or to any place of trust or profit under the UnitedStates. "

Mr. Davis's amendment was rejected by a vote of 5 yeas to 32 nays; whenhe immediately moved to amend, by adding precisely the same words at theend of Section 1 of the proposed Article. It was again rejected. Hethen moved to amend by adding to the said Section these words:

"But no Slave shall be entitled to his or her Freedom under thisAmendment if resident at the time it takes effect in any State, the lawsof which forbid Free Negroes to reside therein, until removed from suchState by the Government of the United States. "

This also was rejected. Whereupon Mr. Powell moved to add, at the endof the first Section, the words:

"No Slave shall be Emancipated by this Article unless the owner thereofshall be first paid the value of the Slave or Slaves so Emancipated. "

This likewise was rejected, on a yea and nay vote, by 2 yeas (Davis andPowell) to 34 nays; when Mr. Davis moved another amendment, viz. : to addat the end of Section 2 of the proposed Article, the following:

"And when this Amendment of the Constitution shall have taken effect byFreeing the Slaves, Congress shall provide for the distribution andsettlement of all the population of African descent in the United Statesamong the several States and Territories thereof, in proportion to theWhite population of each State and Territory to the aggregate populationof those of African descent. "

This met a like fate; whereupon the Senate adjourned, but, on thefollowing day, the matter came up again for consideration:

Hale, of New Hampshire, jubilantly declared that "this is a day that Iand many others have long wished for, long hoped for, long striven for. * * * A day when the Nation is to commence its real life; or, if it isnot the day, it is the dawning of the day; the day is near at hand * * *when the American People are to wake up to the meaning of the sublimetruths which their fathers uttered years ago, and which have slumbered, dead-letters, upon the pages of our Constitution, of our Declaration ofIndependence, and of our history. "

McDougall, of California, on the other hand, --utterly regardless of thegrandly patriotic resolutions of the Legislature of his State, which hadjust been presented to the Senate by his colleague--lugubriouslydeclared:

"In my judgment, it may well be said of us:

 'Let the Heavens be hung in black And let the Earth put mourning on, '

for in the history of no Free People, since the time the Persians camedown upon Athens, have I known as melancholy a period as this day andyear of Our Lord in our history; and if we can, by the blessing of Godand by His favor, rise above it, it will be by His special providence, and by no act of ours. "

The obstructive tactics were now resumed, Mr. Powell leading off by amotion to amend, by adding to the Judiciary Committee's proposedThirteenth Article of the Constitution, the following:

"ART. 14. --The President and Vice-President shall hold their Offices forthe term of four--[Which he subsequently modified to: 'six years']--years. The person who has filled the Office of President shall not bereeligible. "

This amendment was rejected by 12 yeas to 32 nays; whereupon Mr. Powellmoved to add to the Committee's Proposition another new Article, asfollows:

"ART. 14. --The principal Officer in each of the Executive Departments, and all persons connected with the Diplomatic Service, may be removedfrom office at the pleasure of the President. All other officers of theExecutive Departments may be removed at any time by the President orother appointing power when their services are unnecessary, or fordishonesty, incapacity, inefficiency, misconduct, or neglect of duty, and when so removed, the removal shall be reported to the Senate, together with the reasons therefor. "

This amendment also being rejected, Mr. Powell offered another, whichwas to add a separate Article as follows:

"ART. 14. --Every law, or Resolution having the force of law, shallrelate to but one subject, and that shall be expressed in its title. "

This also being rejected--the negative vote being, as in other cases, without reference to the merits of the proposition--and Mr. Powellhaving now apparently exhausted his obstructive amendatory talents, Mr. Davis came to the aid of his Kentucky colleague by moving an amendment, to come in as an additional Article, being a new plan of Presidentialelection designed to do away with the quadrennial Presidential campaignbefore the People by giving to each State the right to nominate onecandidate, and leaving it to a Convention of both Houses of Congress--and, in case of disagreement, to the Supreme Court of the United States--to elect a President and a Vice-President. 

The rejection of this proposition apparently exhausted the stock ofpossible amendments possessed by the Democratic opposition, and theJoint Resolution, precisely as it came from the Judiciary Committee, having been agreed to by that body, "as in Committee of the Whole, " wasnow, April 6th, reported to the Senate for its concurrence. 

On the following day, Mr. Hendricks uttered a lengthy jeremiad on theWar, and its lamentable results; intimated that along the Mississippi, the Negroes, freed by the advance of our invading Armies and Navies, instead of being happy and industrious, were without protection orprovision and almost without clothing, while at least 200, 000 of themhad prematurely perished, and that such was the fate reserved for the4, 000, 000 Negroes if liberated; and declared he would not vote for theResolution, "because, " said he, "the times are not auspicious. "

Very different indeed was the attitude of Mr. Henderson, of Missouri, Border-State man though he was. In the course of a speech, of muchpower, which he opened with an allusion to the 115, 000 Slaves owned inhis State in 1860--as showing how deeply interested Missouri "must be inthe pending proposition"--the Senator announced that: "Our greatinterest, as lovers of the Union, is in the preservation andperpetuation of the Union. " He declared himself a Slaveholder, yet nonethe less desired the adoption of this Thirteenth Article of Amendment, for, said he: "We cannot save the Institution if we would. We ought notif we could. * * * If it were a blessing, I, for one, would bedefending it to the last. It is a curse, and not a blessing. Thereforelet it go. * * * Let the iniquity be cast away!"

It was about this time that a remarkable letter written by Mr. Lincolnto a Kentuckian, on the subject of Emancipation, appeared in print. Itis interesting as being not alone the President's own statement of hisviews, from the beginning, as to Slavery, and how he came to be "driven"to issue the Proclamation of Emancipation, and as showing how the UnionCause had gained by its issue, but also in disclosing, indirectly, howincessantly the subject was revolved in his own mind, and urged by himupon the minds of others. The publication of the letter, moreover, wasnot without its effect on the ultimate action of the Congress and theStates in adopting the Thirteenth Amendment. It ran thus:

 "EXECUTIVE MANSION. "WASHINGTON, April 4, 1864. 

"A. G. HODGES, Esq. , Frankfort, Ky. 

"MY DEAR SIR: You ask me to put in writing the substance of--what Iverbally said the other day, in your presence, to Governor Bramlette andSenator Dixon. It was about as follows:

"I am naturally anti-Slavery. If Slavery is not wrong, nothing iswrong. I cannot remember when I did not so think and feel, and yet Ihave never understood that the 'Presidency conferred upon me anunrestricted right to act officially upon this judgment and feeling. 

"It was in the oath I took, that I would to the best of my abilitypreserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. Icould not take the Office without taking the oath. Nor was it my viewthat I might take an oath to get power, and break the oath in using thepower. 

"I understood, too, that in ordinary and Civil Administration this oatheven forbade me to practically indulge my primary abstract judgment onthe moral question of Slavery. I had publicly declared this many times, and in many ways. 

"And I aver that, to this day, I have done no Official act in meredeference to my abstract judgment and feeling on Slavery. 

"I did understand, however, that my oath to preserve the Constitution tothe best of my ability, imposed upon me the duty of preserving by everyindispensable means, that Government--that Nation, of which thatConstitution was the Organic Law. 

"Was it possible to lose the Nation and yet preserve the Constitution?

"By General Law, life and limb must be protected; yet often a limb mustbe amputated to save a life; but a life is never wisely given to save alimb. I felt that measures, otherwise Unconstitutional, might becomelawful, by becoming Indispensable to the Constitution through thepreservation of the Nation. 

"Right or wrong, I assumed this ground, and now avow it. I could notfeel that, to the best of my ability, I have even tried to preserve theConstitution, if, to save Slavery, or any minor matter, I should permitthe wreck of Government, Country, and Constitution, altogether. 

"When, early in the War, General Fremont attempted MilitaryEmancipation, I forbade it, because I did not then think it anIndispensable Necessity. 

"When, a little later, General Cameron, then Secretary of War, suggestedthe Arming of the Blacks, I objected, because I did not yet think it anIndispensable Necessity. 

"When, still later, General Hunter attempted Military Emancipation, Iagain forbade it, because I did not yet think the IndispensableNecessity had come. 

"When in March, and May, and July, 1862, I made earnest and successiveappeals to the Border-States to favor compensated Emancipation, Ibelieved the Indispensable Necessity for Military Emancipation andarming the Blacks would come, unless averted by that measure. 

"They declined the proposition, and I was, in my best judgment, drivento the alternative of either surrendering the Union, and with it, theConstitution, or of laying strong hand upon the Colored element. Ichose the latter. In choosing it, I hoped for greater gain than loss, but of this I was not entirely confident. 

"More than a year of trial now shows no loss by it in our ForeignRelations, none in our home popular sentiment, none in our whiteMilitary force, no loss by it anyhow, or anywhere. On the contrary, itshows a gain of quite a hundred and thirty thousand soldiers, seamen, and laborers. 

"These are palpable facts, about which, as facts, there can be nocavilling. We have the men; and we could not have had them without themeasure. 

"And now let any Union man who complains of this measure, test himselfby writing down in one line, that he is for subduing the Rebellion byforce of arms; and in the next, that he is for taking one hundred andthirty thousand men from the Union side, and placing them where theywould be best for the measure he condemns. If he cannot face his caseso stated, it is only because he cannot face the truth. 

"I add a word which was not in the verbal conversation. In telling thistale, I attempt no compliment to my own sagacity. I claim not to havecontrolled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me. Now at the end of three years' struggle, the Nation's condition is notwhat either Party, or any man, devised or expected. God alone can claimit. 

"Whither it is tending seems plain. If God now wills the removal of agreat wrong, and wills also that we of the North, as well as you of theSouth, shall pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong, impartialhistory will find therein new causes to attest and revere the Justiceand goodness of God. "Yours truly, "A. LINCOLN. "

The 8th of April (1864) turned out to be the decisive field-day in theSenate. Sumner endeavored to close the debate on that day in a speechremarkable no less for its power and eloquence of statement, itsstrength of Constitutional exposition, and its abounding evidences ofextensive historical research and varied learning, than for itspatriotic fervor and devotion to human Freedom. 

Toward the end of that great speech, however, he somewhat weakened itsforce by suggesting a change in the phraseology of the proposedThirteenth Amendment, so that, instead of almost precisely following thelanguage of the Jeffersonian Ordinance of 1787, as recommended by theJudiciary Committee of the Senate, it should read thus:

"All Persons are Equal before the Law, so that no person can holdanother as a Slave; and the Congress may make all laws necessary andproper to carry this Article into effect everywhere within the UnitedStates and the jurisdiction thereof. "

Mr. Sumner's idea in antagonizing the Judiciary Committee's propositionwith this, was to introduce into our Organic Act, distinctive wordsasserting the "Equality before the Law" of all persons, as expressed inthe Constitutional Charters of Belgium, Italy and Greece, as well as inthe various Constitutions of France--beginning with that of September, 1791, which declared (Art. 1) that "Men are born and continue Free andEqual in Rights;" continuing in that of June, 1793, which declares that"All Men are Equal by Nature and before the Law:" in that of June, 1814, which declares that "Frenchmen are Equal before the Law, whatever may beotherwise their title and ranks;" and in the Constitutional Charter ofAugust, 1830 in similar terms to the last. 

"But, " said he, "while desirous of seeing the great rule of Freedomwhich we are about to ordain, embodied in a text which shall be like theprecious casket to the more precious treasure, yet * * * I am consoledby the thought that the most homely text containing such a rule will bemore beautiful far than any words of poetry or eloquence, and that itwill endure to be read with gratitude when the rising dome of thisCapitol, with the Statue of Liberty which surmounts it, has crumbled todust. "

Mr. Sumner's great speech, however, by no means ended the debate. Itbrought Mr. Powell to his feet with a long and elaborate contentionagainst the general proposition, in the course of which he took occasionto sneer at Sumner's "most remarkable effort, " as one of his "longillogical rhapsodies on Slavery, like:

 '--a Tale Told by an Idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing. '"

He professed that he wanted "the Union to be restored with theConstitution as it is;" that he verily believed the passage of thisAmendment would be "the most effective Disunion measure that could bepassed by Congress"--and, said he, "As a lover of the Union I opposeit. "

 [This phrase slightly altered, in words, but not in meaning, to "The Union as it was, and the Constitution as it is, " afterward became the Shibboleth under which the Democratic Party in the Presidential Campaign of 1864, marched to defeat. ]

He endeavored to impute the blame for the War, to the northernAbolitionists, for, said he: "Had there been no Abolitionists, North, there never would have been a Fire-eater, South, "--apparently ignoringthe palpable fact that had there been no Slavery in the South, therecould have been no "Abolitionists, North. "

He heatedly denounced the "fanatical gentlemen" who desired the passageof this measure; declared they intended by its passage "to destroy theInstitution of Slavery or to destroy the Union, " and exclaimed: "Passthis Amendment and you make an impassable chasm, as if you were to put alake of burning fire, between the adhering States and those who are out. You will then have to make it a War of conquest and extermination beforeyou can ever bring them back under the flag of the Government. There isno doubt about that proposition. "

Mr. Sumner, at this point, withdrew his proposed amendment, at thesuggestion of Mr. Howard, who expressed a preference "to dismiss allreference to French Constitutions and French Codes, and go back to thegood old Anglo-Saxon language employed by our Fathers, in the Ordinanceof 1787, (in) an expression adjudicated upon repeatedly, which isperfectly well understood both by the public and by Judicial Tribunals--a phrase, which is peculiarly near and dear to the people of theNorthwestern Territory, from whose soil Slavery was excluded by it. "

 [The following is the language of "the Ordinance of 1787" thus referred to:

 "ART. 6. --There shall be neither Slavery nor Involuntary Servitude in the said Territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: * * *. "]

Mr. Davis thereupon made another opposition speech and, at itsconclusion, Mr. Saulsbury offered, as a substitute, an Article, comprising no less than twenty sections--that, he said, "embodied inthem some things" which "did not meet his personal approbation, " but hehad consented to offer them to the Senate as "a Compromise"--as "a Peaceoffering. "

The Saulsbury substitute being voted down, the debate closed with aspeech by Mr. McDougall--an eloquent protest from his standpoint, inwhich, after endorsing the wild statement of Mr. Hendricks that 250, 000of the people of African descent had been prematurely destroyed on theMississippi, he continued. 

"This policy will ingulf them. It is as simple a truth as has ever beentaught by any history. The Slaves of ancient time were not the Slavesof a different Race. The Romans compelled the Gaul and the Celt, brought them to their own Country, and some of them became great poets, and some eloquent orators, and some accomplished wits, and they becamecitizens of the Republic of Greece, and of the Republic of Rome, and ofthe Empire. 

"This is not the condition of these persons with whom we are nowassociated, and about whose affairs we undertake to establishadministration. They can never commingle with us. It may not be withinthe reading of some learned Senators, and yet it belongs to demonstratedScience, that the African race and the European are different; and Ihere now say it as a fact established by science, that the eighthgeneration of the Mixed race formed by the union of the African andEuropean, cannot continue their species. Quadroons have few children;with Octoroons reproduction is impossible. 

"It establishes as a law of nature that the African has no properrelation to the European, Caucasian, blood. I would have them kindlytreated. * * * Against all such policy and all such conduct I shallprotest as a man, in the name of humanity, and of law, and of truth, andof religion. "

The amendment made, as in Committee of the Whole, having been concurredin, etc. , the Joint Resolution, as originally reported by the JudiciaryCommittee, was at last passed, (April 8th)--by a vote of 38 yeas to 6nays--Messrs. Hendricks and McDougall having the unenviable distinctionof being the only two Senators, (mis-)representing Free States, whovoted against this definitive Charter of American Liberty. 

 [The full Senate vote, on passing the Thirteenth Amendment, was:

 YEAS-Messrs. Anthony, Brown, Chandler, Clark, Collamer, Conness, Cowan, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Foot, Foster, Grimes, Hale, Harding, Harlan, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Johnson, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nesmith, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Ten Eyck, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Wilkinson, Willey, and Wilson--38. 

 NAYs--Messrs. Davis, Hendricks, McDougall, Powell, Riddle, and Saulsbury. ]

 CHAPTER XXIV. 

 TREASON IN THE NORTHERN CAMPS. 

The immortal Charter of Freedom had, as we have seen, with comparativeease, after a ten days' debate, by the power of numbers, run thegauntlet of the Senate; but now it was to be subjected to the much moretrying and doubtful ordeal of the House. What would be its fate there?This was a question which gave to Mr. Lincoln, and the other friends ofLiberty and Union, great concern. 

It is true that various votes had recently been taken in that body, uponpropositions which had an indirect bearing upon the subject ofEmancipation, as, for instance, that of the 1st of February, 1864, when, by a vote of 80 yeas to 46 nays, it had adopted a Resolution declaring"That a more vigorous policy to enlist, at an early day, and in largernumbers, in our Army, persons of African descent, would meet theapprobation of the House;" and that vote, although indirect, being sovery nearly a two-thirds vote, was most encouraging. But, on the otherhand, a subsequent Resolution, squarely testing the sense of the Houseupon the subject, had been carried by much less than a two-thirds vote. 

This latter Resolution, offered by Mr. Arnold, after conference with Mr. Lincoln, with the very purpose of making a test, was in these directterms:

"Resolved, That the Constitution shall be so amended as to AbolishSlavery in the United States wherever it now exists, and to prohibit itsexistence in every part thereof forever. "

The vote, adopting it, was but 78 yeas to 62 nays. * This vote, therefore, upon the Arnold Resolution, being nowhere near the two-thirdsaffirmative vote necessary to secure the passage through the House ofthe Senate Joint Resolution on this subject amendatory of theConstitution, was most discouraging. 

It was definite enough, however, to show the necessity of a change fromthe negative to the affirmative side of at least fifteen votes. Whiletherefore the outlook was discouraging it was far from hopeless. Thedebate in the Senate had already had its effect upon the public mind. That, and the utterances of Mr. Lincoln--and further discussion in theHouse, it was thought, might produce such a pressure from the loyalconstituencies both in the Free and Border Slave-States as to compelsuccess. 

But from the very beginning of the year 1864, as if instinctively awarethat their Rebel friends were approaching the crisis of their fate, andneeded now all the help that their allies of the North could give them, the Anti-War Democrats, in Congress, and out, had been stirringthemselves with unusual activity. 

In both Houses of Congress, upon all possible occasions, theyhad been striving, as they still strove, with the venom of theirwidely-circulated speeches, to poison the loyal Northern andBorder-State mind, in the hope that the renomination of Mr. Lincolnmight be defeated, the chance for Democratic success at the comingPresidential election be thereby increased, and, if nothing else cameof it, the Union Cause be weakened and the Rebel Cause correspondinglystrengthened. 

At the same time, evidently under secret instructions from theirfriends, the Conspirators in arms, they endeavored to createheart-burnings and jealousies and ill-feeling between the Eastern(especially the New England) States and the Western States, andunceasingly attacked the Protective-Tariff, Internal Revenue, theGreenback, the Draft, and every other measure or thing upon which thelife of the Union depended. 

Most of these Northern-Democratic agitators, "Stealing the livery ofHeaven to serve the Devil in, " endeavored to conceal their treacherousdesigns under a veneer of gushing lip-loyalty, but that disguise was"too thin" to deceive either their contemporaries or those who comeafter them. Some of their language too, as well as their blusteringmanner, strangely brought back to recollection the old days of Slaverywhen the plantation-whip was cracked in the House, and the air was bluewith execration of New England. 

Said Voorhees, of Indiana, (January 11, 1864) when the House wasconsidering a Bill "to increase the Internal Revenue and for otherpurposes:"

"I want to know whether the West has any friends upon the floor of thisHouse? We pay every dollar that is to be levied by this Tax Bill. * ** The Manufacturing Interest pays not a dollar into the public Treasurythat stays there. And yet airs of patriotism are put on here by menrepresenting that interest. I visited New England last Summer, * * *when I heard the swelling hum of her Manufactories, and saw those whoonly a short time ago worked but a few hands, now working theirthousands, and rolling up their countless wealth, I felt that it was anunhealthy prosperity. To my mind it presented a wealth wrung from thelabor, the sinews, the bone and muscle of the men who till the soil, taxed to an illegitimate extent to foster and support that great Systemof local wealth. * * * I do not intend to stand idly by and see oneportion of the Country robbed and oppressed for the benefit of another. "

And the same day, replying to Mr. Morrill of Vermont, he exclaimed: "Lethim show me that the plethoric, bloated Manufacturers of New England arepaying anything to support the Government, and I will recognize it. "

Washburne, of Illinois got back at this part of Mr. Voorhees's speechrather neatly, by defending the North-west as being "not only willing tostand taxation" which had been "already imposed, but * * * anyadditional taxation which, " said he, "may be necessary to crush out thisRebellion, and to hang the Rebels in the South, and the Rebelsympathizers in the North. " And, he pointedly added: "Complaint hasbeen made against New England. I know that kind of talk. I have heardtoo often that kind of slang about New England. I heard it here for tenyears, when your Barksdales, and your Keitts's, and your other Traitors, now in arms against the Government, filled these Halls with theirpestilential assaults not only upon New England, but on the Free Northgenerally. "

Kelley of Pennsylvania, however, more fitly characterized the speech ofVoorhees, when he termed it "a pretty, indeed a somewhat striking, paraphrase of the argument of Mr. Lamar, the Rebel Agent, --[in 1886, Secretary of the Interior]--to his confreres in Treason, as we find itin the recently published correspondence: 'Drive gold coin out of theCountry, and induce undue Importation of Foreign products so as tostrike down the Financial System. You can have no further hope forForeign recognition. It is evident the weight of arms is against us;and it is clear that we can only succeed by striking down the FinancialSystem of the Country. ' It was an admirable paraphrase of theInstructions of Mr. Lamar to the Rebel Agents in the North. "

The impression was at this time abroad, and there were not wantingelements of proof, that certain members of Congress were trustedLieutenants of the Arch-copperhead and Outlaw, Vallandigham. Certain itis, that many of these leaders, six months before, attended andaddressed the great gathering from various parts of the Country, ofnearly one hundred thousand Vallandigham-Anti-War Peace-Democrats, atSpringfield, Illinois--the very home of Abraham Lincoln--which adopted, during a lull, when they were not yelling themselves hoarse forVallandigham, a resolution declaring against "the further offensiveprosecution of the War" as being subversive of the Constitution andGovernment, and proposing a National Peace Convention, and, as aconsequence, Peace, "the Union as it was, " and, substantially suchConstitutional guarantees as the Rebels might choose to demand! Andthis too, at a time (June 13, 1863), when Grant, after many recentglorious victories, had been laying siege to Vicksburg, and its RebelArmy of 37, 000 men, for nearly a month, with every reason to hope forits speedy fall. 

No wonder that under such circumstances, the news of such a gathering ofthe Northern Democratic sympathizers with Treason, and of their adoptionof such treasonable Resolutions, should encourage the Rebels in the samedegree that Union men were disheartened! No wonder that Lee, elated bythis and other evidences of Northern sympathy with Rebellion, at oncedetermined to commence a second grand invasion of the North, and on thevery next day (June 14th, ) moved Northward with all his Rebel hosts tobe welcomed, he fondly hoped, by his Northern friends of Maryland andelsewhere! As we have seen, it took the bloody Battle of Gettysburg toundeceive him as to the character of that welcome. 

Further than this, Mr. Cox had stumped Ohio, in the succeeding election, in a desperate effort to make the banished Traitor, Vallandigham--theChief Northern commander of the "Knights of the Golden Circle"(otherwise known as the "Order of the Sons of Liberty, " and "O. A. K. "or "Order of American Knights")--Governor of that great State. 

 [The Rebel General Sterling Price being the chief Southern commander of this many-named treasonable organization, which in the North alone numbered over 500, 000 men. 

 August, 1864. --See Report of Judge Advocate Holt on certain "Secret Associations, " in Appendix, ]

And it only lacked a few months of the time when quantities of copies ofthe treasonable Ritual of the "Order of American Knights"--as well ascorrespondence touching the purchase of thousands of Garibaldi riflesfor transportation to the West--were found in the offices of leadingDemocrats then in Congress. 

When, therefore, it is said, and repeated, that there were not wantingelements of proof, outside of Congressional utterances and actions, thatleading Democrats in Congress were trusted Lieutenants of the SupremeCommander of over half a million of Northern Rebel-sympathizers boundtogether, and to secrecy, by oaths, which were declared to be paramountto all other oaths, the violation of which subjected the offender to ashameful death somewhat like that, of being "hung, drawn, andquartered, " which was inflicted in the middle ages for the crime ofTreason to the Crown--it will be seen that the statement is supported bycircumstantial, if not by positive and direct, evidence. 

Whether the Coxes, the Garret Davises, the Saulsburys, the FernandoWoods, the Alexander Longs, the Allens, the Holmans, and many otherprominent Congressmen of that sort, --were merely in close communion withthese banded "Knights, " or were actual members of their secretorganizations, may be an open question. But it is very certain that ifthey all were not oath-bound members, they generally pursued the precisemethods of those who were; and that, as a rule, while they often loudlyproclaimed loyalty and love for the Union, they were always ready to actas if their loyalty and love were for the so-called Confederacy. 

Indeed, it was one of these other "loyal" Democrats, who even precededVoorhees, in raising the Sectional cry of: The West, against NewEngland. It was on this same Internal Revenue Bill, that Holman ofIndiana had, the day before Voorhees's attack, said:

"If the Manufacture of the Northwest is to be taxed so heavily, acorresponding rate of increase must be imposed on the Manufactures ofNew England and Pennsylvania, or, will gentlemen tax us without limitfor the benefit of their own Section? * * * I protest against what Ibelieve is intended to be a discrimination against one Section of theCountry, by increasing the tax three-fold, without a correspondingincrease upon the burdens of other Sections. "

But these dreadfully "loyal" Democrats--who did the bidding oftraitorous masters in their Treason to the Union, and thus, whileposturing as "Patriots, " "fired upon the rear" of our hard-pressedArmies--were super-sensitive on this point. And, when they could gethold of a quiet sort of a man, inclined to peaceful methods ofdiscussion, how they would, terrier-like, pounce upon him, and extractfrom him, if they could, some sort of negative satisfaction!

Thus, for instance, on the 22nd of January, when one of these quiet men--Morris of New York--was in the midst of an inoffensive speech, Mr. Cox"bristled up, " and blusteringly asked whether he meant to say that he(Cox) had "ever been the apologist or the defender of a Traitor?"

And Morris not having said so, mildly replied that he did "not socharge"--all of which little bit of by-play hugely pleased the touchyMr. Cox, and his clansmen. 

But on the day following, their smiles vanished under the words ofSpalding or Ohio, who, after referring to the crocodile-tears shed byDemocratic Congressmen over the Confiscation Resolution--on the pretensethat it would hunt down "innocent women and children" of the Rebels, when they had never a word of sympathy for the widows and children ofthe two hundred thousand dead soldiers of the Union-continued:

"They can see our poor soldiers return, minus an arm, minus a leg, asthey pass through these lobbies, but their only care is to protect theproperty of Rebels. And we are asked by one of my colleagues, (Mr. Cox)does the gentleman from New York intend to call us Traitors? My friend, Mr. Morris, modestly answered no! If he had asked that question of me, he knows what my answer would have been! I have seen Rebel officers atJohnson's Island, and I have taken them by the hand because they havefought us fairly in the field and did not seek to break down theGovernment while living under its protection. Yes, Sir, that gentlemanknows that I would have said to him that I have more respect for an openand avowed Traitor in the field, than for a sympathizer in this Hall. Four months have scarcely gone by since that gentleman and his politicalfriends were advocating the election of a man for the Gubernatorialoffice in my State, who was an open and avowed advocate of Secession--ANOUTLAW AT THAT!"

And old Thaddeus Stevens--the clear-sighted and courageous "OldCommoner"--followed up Spalding, and struck very close to the root andanimus of the Democratic opposition, when he exclaimed:

"All this struggle by calm and dignified and moderate 'Patriots;' allthis clamor against 'Radicals;' all this cry of 'the Union as it Was, and the Constitution as it Is;' is but a persistent effort toreestablish Slavery, and to rivet anew and forever the chains of Bondageon the limbs of Immortal beings. May the God of Justice thwart theirdesigns and paralyze their wicked efforts!"

 CHAPTER XXV. 

 "THE FIRE IN THE REAR. "

The treacherous purposes of professedly-loyal Copperheads being seenthrough, and promptly and emphatically denounced to the Country by Unionstatesmen, the Copperheads aforesaid concluded that the profusecirculation of their own Treason-breeding speeches--through the mediumof the treasonable organizations before referred to, permeating theNorthern States, --would more than counteract all that Union men couldsay or do. Besides, the fiat had gone forth, from their Rebel mastersat Richmond, to Agitate the North. 

Hence, day after day, Democrat after Democrat, in the one House or theother, continued to air his disloyal opinions, and to utter more or lessvirulent denunciations of the Government which guarded and protectedhim. 

Thus, Brooks, of New York, on the 25th of January (1864), sneeringlyexclaimed: "Why, what absurdity it is to talk at this Capitol ofprosecuting the War by the liberation of Slaves, when from the dome ofthis building there can be heard at this hour the booming of cannon inthe distance!"

Thus, also, on the day following, Fernando Wood--the same man who, while Mayor of New York at the outbreak of the Rebellion, had, underRebel-guidance, proposed the Secession from the Union, and theIndependence, of that great Metropolis, --declared to the House that: "NoGovernment has pursued a foe with such unrelenting, vindictive malignityas we are now pursuing those who came into the Union with us, whoseblood has been freely shed on every battle-field of the Country untilnow, with our own; who fought by our side in the American Revolution, and in the War of 1812 with Great Britain; who bore our banners bravestand highest in our victorious march from Vera Cruz to the City ofMexico, and who but yesterday sat in these Halls contributing toward themaintenance of our glorious institutions. "

Then he went on, in the spirit of prophecy, to declare that: "No purelyagricultural people, fighting for the protection of their own DomesticInstitutions upon their own soil, have ever yet been conquered. I sayfurther, that no revolted people have ever been subdued after they havebeen able to maintain an Independent government for three years. " Andthen, warming up to an imperative mood, he made this explicitannouncement: "We are at War. * * * Whether it be a Civil War, Rebellion, Revolution, or Foreign War, it matters little. IT MUSTCEASE; and I want this Administration to tell the American People WHENit will cease!" Again, only two days afterward, he took occasion tocharacterize a Bill, amendatory of the enrollment Act, as "thisinfamous, Unconstitutional conscription Act!"

C. A. White, of Ohio, was another of the malcontents who undertook, withothers of the same Copperhead faith, to "maintain, that, " as heexpressed it, "the War in which we are at present engaged is wrong initself; that the policy adopted by the Party in power for itsprosecution is wrong; that the Union cannot be restored, or, ifrestored, maintained, by the exercise of the coercive power of theGovernment, by War; that the War is opposed to the restoration of theUnion, destructive of the rights of the States and the liberties of thePeople. It ought, therefore, to be brought to a speedy and immediateclose. "

It was about this time also that, emboldened by immunity from punishmentfor these utterances in the interest of armed Rebels, Edgerton ofIndiana, was put forward to offer resolutions "for Peace, upon the basisof a restoration of the Federal Union under the Constitution as it is, "etc. 

Thereafter, in both Senate and House, such speeches byRebel-sympathizers, the aiders and abettors of Treason, grew morefrequent and more virulent than ever. As was well said to the House, by one of the Union members from Ohio (Mr. Eckley):

"A stranger, if he listened to the debates here, would think himself inthe Confederate Congress. I do not believe that if these Halls wereoccupied to-day by Davis, Toombs, Wigfall, Rhett, and Pryor, they couldadd anything to the violence of assault, the falsity of accusation, orthe malignity of attack, with which the Government has been assailed, and the able, patriotic, and devoted men who are charged with itsAdministration have been maligned, in both ends of the Capitol. Theclosing scenes of the Thirty-Sixth Congress, the treasonabledeclarations there made, contain nothing that we cannot hear, in thefreedom of debate, without going to Richmond or to the camps of Treason, where most of the actors in those scenes are now in arms against us. "

With such a condition of things in Congress, it is not surprising thatthe Richmond Enquirer announced that the North was "distracted, exhausted, and impoverished, " and would, "through the agency of a strongconservative element in the Free States, " soon treat with the Rebels "onacceptable terms. "

Things indeed had reached such a pass, in the House of Representativesespecially, that it was felt they could not much longer go on in thismanner; that an example must be made of some one or other of theseCopperheads. But the very knowledge of the existence of such a feelingof just and patriotic irritation against the continued free utterance ofsuch sentiments in the Halls of Congress, seemed only to make some ofthem still more defiant. And, when the 8th of April dawned, it wasknown among all the Democrats in Congress, that Alexander Long proposedthat day to make a speech which would "go a bow-shot beyond them all" inuttered Treason. He would speak right out, what the other Conspiratorsthought and meant, but dared not utter, before the World. 

A crowded floor, and packed galleries, were on hand to listen to thewritten, deliberate Treason, as it fell from his lips in the House. Hisspeech began with an arraignment of the Government for treachery, incompetence, failure, tyranny, and all sorts of barbarous actions andharsh intentions, toward the Rebels--which led him to the indignantexclamation:

"Will they throw down their arms and submit to the terms? Who shallbelieve that the free, proud American blood, which courses with as quickpulsation through their veins as our own, will not be spilled to thelast drop in resistance?"

Warming up, he proceeded to say: "Can the Union be restored by War? Ianswer most unhesitatingly and deliberately, No, never; 'War is final, eternal separation. '"

He claimed that the War was "wrong;" that it was waged "in violation ofthe Constitution, " and would "if continued, result speedily in thedestruction of the Government and the loss of Civil Liberty, and oughttherefore, to immediately cease. "

He held also "that the Confederate States are out of the Union, occupying the position of an Independent Power de facto; have beenacknowledged as a belligerent both by Foreign Nations and our ownGovernment; maintained their Declaration of Independence, for threeyears, by force of arms; and the War has cut asunder all the obligationsthat bound them under the Constitution. "

"Much better, " said he, "would it have been for us in the beginning, much better would it be for us now, to consent to a division of ourmagnificent Empire, and cultivate amicable relations with our estrangedbrethren, than to seek to hold them to us by the power of the sword. ** * I am reluctantly and despondingly forced to the conclusion that theUnion is lost, never to be restored. * * * I see neither North norSouth, any sentiment on which it is possible to build a Union. * * * inattempting to preserve our Jurisdiction over the Southern States we havelost our Constitutional Form of Government over the Northern. * * * Thevery idea upon which this War is founded, coercion of States, leads todespotism. * * * I now believe that there are but two alternatives, andthey are either an acknowledgment of the Independence of the South as anindependent Nation, or their complete subjugation and extermination as aPeople; and of these alternatives I prefer the former. "

As Long took his seat, amid the congratulations of his Democraticfriends, Garfield arose, and, to compliments upon the former's peculiarcandor and honesty, added denunciation for his Treason. After drawingan effective parallel between Lord Fairfax and Robert E. Lee, both ofwhom had cast their lots unwillingly with the enemies of this Land, whenthe Wars of the Revolution and of the Rebellion respectively opened, Garfield proceeded:

"But now, when hundreds of thousands of brave souls have gone up to Godunder the shadow of the Flag, and when thousands more, maimed andshattered in the Contest, are sadly awaiting the deliverance of death;now, when three years of terrific warfare have raged over us, when ourArmies have pushed the Rebellion back over mountains and rivers andcrowded it back into narrow limits, until a wall of fire girds it; now, when the uplifted hand of a majestic People is about to let fall thelightning of its conquering power upon the Rebellion; now, in the quietof this Hall, hatched in the lowest depths of a similar dark Treason, there rises a Benedict Arnold and proposes to surrender us all up, bodyand spirit, the Nation and the Flag, its genius and its honor, now andforever, to the accursed Traitors to our Country. And that propositioncomes--God forgive and pity my beloved State!--it comes from a citizenof the honored and loyal Commonwealth of Ohio! I implore you, brethrenin this House, not to believe that many such births ever gave pangs tomy mother-State such as she suffered when that Traitor was born!"

As he uttered these sturdy words, the House and galleries were agitatedwith that peculiar rustling movement and low murmuring sound known as a"sensation, " while the Republican side with difficulty restrained theapplause they felt like giving, until he sadly proceeded:

"I beg you not to believe that on the soil of that State another suchgrowth has ever deformed the face of Nature and darkened the light ofGod's day. "

The hush that followed was broken by the suggestive whisper:"Vallandigham!"

"But, ah, " continued the Speaker--as his voice grew sadder still--"I amreminded that there are other such. My zeal and love for Ohio havecarried me too far. I retract. I remember that only a few days since, a political Convention met at the Capital of my State, and almostdecided, to select from just such material, a representative for theDemocratic Party in the coming contest; and today, what claims to be amajority of the Democracy of that State say that they have been cheatedor they would have made that choice!"

 [This refers to Horatio Seymour, the Democratic Governor of New York. ]

After referring to the "insidious work" of the "Knights of the GoldenCircle" in seeking "to corrupt the Army and destroy its efficiency;" the"riots and murders which, " said he, "their agents are committingthroughout the Loyal North, under the lead and guidance of the Partywhose Representatives sit yonder across the aisle;" he continued: "andnow, just as the time is coming on when we are to select a President forthe next four years, one rises among them and fires the Beacon, throwsup the blue-light--which will be seen, and rejoiced over, at the RebelCapital in Richmond--as the signal that the Traitors in our camp areorganized and ready for their hellish work! I believe the utterance ofto-day is the uplifted banner of revolt. I ask you to mark the signalthat blazes here, and see if there will not soon appear the answeringsignals of Traitors all over the Land. * * * If these men do mean tolight the torch of War in all our homes; if they have resolved to beginthe fearful work which will redden our streets, and this Capitol, withblood, the American People should know it at once, and prepare to meetit. "

At the close of Mr. Garfield's patriotic and eloquent remarks, Mr. Longagain got the floor, declared that what he had said, he believed to beright, and he would "stand by it, " though he had to "stand solitary andalone, " and "even if it were necessary to brave bayonets, and prisons, and all the tyranny which may be imposed by the whole power and force ofthe Administration. "

Said he: "I have deliberately uttered my sentiments in that speech, andI will not retract one syllable of it. " And, to "rub it in" a littlestronger, he exclaimed, as he took his seat, just before adjournment:"Give me Liberty, even if confined to an Island of Greece, or a Cantonof Switzerland, rather than an Empire and a Despotism as we have hereto-day!"

This treasonable speech naturally created much excitement throughout theCountry. 

On the following day (Saturday, April 9, 1864), immediately afterprayer, the reading of the Journal being dispensed with, the Speaker ofthe House (Colfax) came down from the Speaker's Chair, and, from thefloor, offered a Preamble and Resolution, which ended thus:

"Resolved, That Alexander Long, a Representative from the seconddistrict of Ohio, having, on the 8th day of April, 1864, declaredhimself in favor of recognizing the Independence and Nationality of theso-called Confederacy now in arms against the Union, and thereby 'givenaid, Countenance and encouragement to persons engaged in armed hostilityto the United States, ' is hereby expelled. "

The debate which ensued consumed nearly a week, and every member ofprominence, on both the Republican and Democratic sides, took part init--the Democrats almost invariably being careful to protest their ownloyalty, and yet attempting to justify the braver and more candidutterances of the accused member. 

Mr. Cox led off, April 9th, in the defense, by counterattack. He quotedremarks made to the House (March 18, 1864) by Mr. Julian, of Indiana, tothe effect that "Our Country, united and Free, must be saved, atwhatever hazard or cost; and nothing, not even the Constitution, must beallowed to hold back the uplifted arm of the Government in blasting thepower of the Rebels forever;"--and upon this, adopting the language ofanother--[Judge Thomas, of Massachusetts. ]--Mr. Cox declared that "tomake this a War, with the sword in one hand to defend the Constitution, and a hammer in the other to break it to pieces, is no less treasonablethan Secession itself; and that, outside the pale of the Constitution, the whole struggle is revolutionary. "

He thought, for such words as he had just quoted, Julian ought to havebeen expelled, if those of Long justified expulsion!

Finally, being pressed by Julian to define his own position, as betweenthe Life of the Nation, and the Infraction of the United StatesConstitution, Mr. Cox said: "I will say this, that UNDER NOCIRCUMSTANCES CONCEIVABLE BY THE HUMAN MIND WOULD I EVER VIOLATE THATCONSTITUTION FOR ANY PURPOSE!"

This sentiment was loudly applauded, and received with cries of "THAT ISIT!" "THAT'S IT!" by the Democratic side of the House, apparently inutter contempt for the express and emphatic declaration of Jeffersonthat: "A strict observance of the written laws is doubtless one of thehighest duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The lawsof Necessity, of Self-preservation, of SAVING OUR COUNTRY WHEN INDANGER, are of higher obligation. To LOSE OUR COUNTRY by a scrupulousadherence to written law WOULD BE TO LOSE THE LAW ITSELF, with Life, Liberty, Property, and all those who are enjoying them with us; thusabsolutely SACRIFICING THE END TO THE MEANS. "

 [In a letter to J. B. Colvin, Sept. 20, 1810, quoted at the time for their information, and which may be found at page 542 of vol. V. , of Jefferson's Works. ]

Indeed these extreme sticklers for the letter of the Constitution, whowould have sacrificed Country, kindred, friends, honesty, truth, and allambitions on Earth and hopes for Heaven, rather than violate it--forthat is what Mr. Cox's announcement and the Democratic endorsement of itmeant, if they meant anything--were of the same stripe as thosequerulous Ancients, for the benefit of whom the Apostle wrote: "For THELETTER KILLETH, but the Spirit giveth life. "

And now, inspired apparently by the reckless utterancesof Long, if not by the more cautious diatribe of Cox, Harris ofMaryland, determining if possible to outdo them all, not only declaredthat he was willing to go with his friend Long wherever the House choseto send him, but added: "I am a peace man, a radical peace man; and I amfor Peace by the recognition of the South, for the recognition of theSouthern Confederacy; and I am for acquiescence in the doctrine ofSecession. " And, said he, in the midst of the laughter which followedthe sensation his treasonable words occasioned, "Laugh as you may, youhave got to come to it!" And then, with that singular obfuscation ofideas engendered, in the heads of their followers, by the astuteRebel-sympathizing leaders, he went on:

"I am for Peace, and I am for Union too. I am as good a Union man asany of you. [Laughter. ] I am a better Union man than any of you![Great Laughter. ] * * * I look upon War as Disunion. "

After declaring that, if the principle of the expulsion Resolution wasto be carried out, his "friend, " Mr. Long, "would be a martyr in aglorious cause"--he proceeded to announce his own candidacy forexpulsion, in the following terms:

"Mr. Speaker, in the early part of this Secession movement, there was aResolution offered, pledging men and money to carry on the War. Myprinciples were then, and are now, against the War. I stood, solitaryand alone, in voting against that Resolution, and whenever a similarproposition is brought here it will meet with my opposition. Not onedollar, nor one man, I swear, by the Eternal, will I vote for thisinfernal, this stupendous folly, more stupendous than ever disgraced anycivilized People on the face of God's Earth. If that be Treason, makethe most of it!

"The South asked you to let them go in peace. But no, you said youwould bring them into subjugation. That is not done yet, and GodAlmighty grant that it never may be. I hope that you will neversubjugate the South. If she is to be ever again in the Union, I hope itwill be with her own consent; and I hope that that consent will beobtained by some other mode than by the sword. 'If this be Treason, make the most of it!'"

An extraordinary scene at once occurred--Mr. Tracy desiring "to knowwhether, in these Halls, the gentleman from Maryland invoked AlmightyGod that the American Arms should not prevail?" "Whether such languageis not Treason?" and "whether it is in order to talk Treason in thisHall?"--his patriotic queries being almost drowned in the incessantcries of "Order!" "Order!" and great disorder, and confusion, on theDemocratic side of the House. 

Finally the treasonable language was taken down by the Clerk, and, whilea Resolution for the expulsion of Mr. Harris was being written out, Mr. Fernando Wood--coming, as he said, from a bed of "severe sickness, "quoted the language used by Mr. Long, to wit:

"I now believe there are but two alternatives, and they are either theacknowledgment of the Independence of the South as an independentNation, or their complete subjugation and extermination as a People; andof these alternatives I prefer the former"--and declared that "if he isto be expelled for the utterance of that sentiment, you may include mein it, because I concur fully in that sentiment. "

 [He afterwards (April 11, ) said he did not agree with Mr. Long's opinions. ]

Every effort was unavailingly made by the Democrats, under the lead ofMessrs. Cox--[In 1886 American Minister at Constantinople. ]--andPendleton, --[In 1886 American Minister at Berlin. ]--to prevent actionupon the new Resolution of expulsion, which was in these words:

"Whereas, Hon. Benjamin G. Harris, a member of the House ofRepresentatives of the United States from the State of Maryland, has onthis day used the following language, to wit: 'The South asked you tolet them go in peace. But no; you said you would bring them intosubjection. That is not done yet, and God Almighty grant that it nevermay be. I hope that you will never subjugate the South. ' And whereas, such language is treasonable, and is a gross disrespect of this House:Therefore, 'Be it Resolved, That the said Benjamin G. Harris be expelledfrom this House. '"

Upon reaching a vote, however, the Resolution was lost, there being only81 yeas, to 58 (Democratic) nays--two-thirds not having votedaffirmatively. Subsequently, despite Democratic efforts to obstruct, aResolution, declaring Harris to be "an unworthy Member" of the House, and "severely" censuring him, was adopted. 

The debate upon the Long-expulsion Resolution now proceeded, and itsmover, in view of the hopelessness of securing a two-thirds affirmativevote, having accepted an amendment comprising other two Resolutions anda Preamble, the question upon adopting these was submitted on the 14thof April. They were in the words following:

"Whereas, ALEXANDER LONG, a Representative from the second district ofOhio, by his open declarations in the National Capitol, and publicationsin the City of New York, has shown himself to be in favor of arecognition of the so-called Confederacy now trying to establish itselfupon the ruins of our Country, thereby giving aid and comfort to theEnemy in that destructive purpose--aid to avowed Traitors, in creatingan illegal Government within our borders, comfort to them by assurancesof their success and affirmations of the justice of their Cause; andwhereas, such conduct is at the same time evidence of disloyalty, andinconsistent with his oath of office, and his duty as a Member of thisBody: Therefore, "Resolved, That the said Alexander Long, a Representative from thesecond district of Ohio, be, and he is hereby declared to be an unworthyMember of the House of Representatives. 

"Resolved, That the Speaker shall read these Resolutions to the saidAlexander Long during the session of the House. "

The first of these Resolutions was adopted, by 80 yeas to 69 nays; thesecond was tabled, by 71 yeas to 69 nays; and the Preamble was agreedto, by 78 yeas to 63 nays. 

And, among the 63 Democrats, who were not only unwilling to declareAlexander Long "an unworthy Member, " or to have the Speaker read such adeclaration to him in a session of the House, but also refused by theirvotes even to intimate that his conduct evidenced disloyalty, or gaveaid and comfort to the Enemy, were the names of such democrats as Cox, Eldridge, Holman, Kernan, Morrisson, Pendleton, Samuel J. Randall, Voorhees, and Fernando Wood. 

Hence Mr. Long not only escaped expulsion for his treasonableutterances, but did not even receive the "severe censure" which, inaddition to being declared (like himself) "an unworthy Member, " had beenvoted to Mr. Harris for recklessly rushing into the breach to help him!

 [The Northern Democracy comprised two well-recognized classes: The Anti-War (or Peace) Democrats, commonly called "Copperheads, " who sympathized with the Rebellion, and opposed the War for the Union; and the War (or Union) Democrats, who favored a vigorous prosecution of the War for the preservation of the Union. ]

 CHAPTER XXVI. 

 "THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT" DEFEATED IN THE HOUSE. 

The debate in the House of Representatives, upon the ThirteenthAmendment to the Constitution--interrupted by the treasonable episodereferred to in the last Chapter--was subsequently resumed. 

Meanwhile, however, Fort Pillow had been stormed, and its garrison ofWhites and Blacks, massacred. 

And now commenced the beginning of the end-so far as the Military aspectof the Rebellion was concerned. Early in May, Sherman's AtlantaCampaign commenced, and, simultaneously, General Grant began hismovement toward Richmond. In quick succession came the news of thebloody battles of the Wilderness, and those around Spottsylvania, Va. ;at Buzzard Roost Gap, Snake Creek Gap, and Dalton, Ga. ; Drury's Bluff, Va. ; Resaca, Ga. ; the battles of the North Anna, Va. ; those aroundDallas, and New Hope church, Ga; the crossing of Grant's forces to theSouth side of the James and the assault on Petersburg. While the UnionArmies were thus valiantly attacking and beating those of the Rebels, onmany a sanguinary field the loyal men of the North, both in and out ofCongress, pressed for favorable action upon the Thirteenth Amendment. "Friends of the wounded in Fredericksburg from the Battle of theWilderness"--exclaimed Horace Greeley in the New York Tribune, of May31st, --"friends and relatives of the soldiers of Grant's Army beyond theWilderness, let us all join hands and swear upon our Country's altarthat we will never cease this War until African Slavery in the UnitedStates is dead forever, and forever buried!"

Peace Democrats, however, were deaf to all such entreaties. On the verysame day, Mr. Holman, in the House, objected even to the second readingof the Joint Resolution Amendatory of the Constitution, and there wereso many "Peace Democrats" to back him, that the vote was: 55 yeas to 76nays, on the question "shall the Joint Resolution be rejected!"

The old cry, that had been repeated by Hendricks and others, in theSenate and House, time and again, was still used--threadbare though itwas--"this is not the right time for it!" On this very day, forinstance, Mr. Herrick said: "I ask if this is the proper time for ourPeople to consider so grave a measure as the Amendment of theConstitution in so vital a point? * * * this is no fitting time forsuch work. "

Very different was the attitude of Kellogg, of New York, and well did heshow up the depths to which the Democracy--the Peace Democracy--had nowfallen. "We are told, " said he, "of a War Democracy, and such thereare--their name is legion--good men and true; they are found in theUnion ranks bearing arms in support of the Government and theAdministration that wields it. At the ballot-box, whether at home or inthe camp, they are Union men, and vote as they fight, and hold little incommon with the political leaders of the Democratic Party in or out ofthis Hall--the Seymours, the Woods, the Vallandighams, the Woodwards, and their indorsers, who hold and control the Democratic Party here, andtaint it with Treason, till it is a stench in the nostrils of allpatriotic men. "

After referring to the fact that the leaders of the Rebellion had fromthe start relied confidently upon assistance from the NorthernDemocracy, he proceeded:

"The Peace Democracy, and mere Party-hacks in the North, are fulfillingtheir masters' expectations industriously, unceasingly, and as far as inthem lies. Not even the shouts for victory, in these Halls, can diverttheir Southern allies here. A sullen gloom at the defeat anddiscomfiture of their Southern brethren settles down on their disastrouscountenances, from which no ray of joy can be reflected. * * * Theyeven vote solid against a law to punish guerrillas. 

"Sir, " continued he, "in my judgment, many of those who withhold fromtheir Country the support they would otherwise give, find allegiance toParty too strong for their patriotism. * * * Rejecting the example andcounsels of Stanton and Dickinson and Butler and Douglas and Dix andHolt and Andrew Johnson and Logan and Rosecrans and Grant and a host ofothers, all Democrats of the straightest sect, to forget all other ties, and cleave only to their Country for their Country's sake, and rejectingthe overtures and example of the Republican Party to drop and forgettheir Party name, that all might unite and band together for theirCountry's salvation as Union men, they turn a deaf ear and coldshoulder, and sullenly pass by on the other side, thanking God they arenot as other men are, and lend, if at all, a calculating, qualified, andconditional and halting support, under protest, to their Country'scause; thus justifying the only hope of the Rebellion to-day, that Partyspirit at the North will distract its counsels, divide and discourageand palsy its efforts, and ultimately make way for the Traitor and theparricide to do their worst. "

Besides the set speeches made against the proposedConstitutional amendment in the House, Peace-Democrats of the Senatecontinued to keep up a running fire at it in that Chamber, on everypossible occasion. Garrett Davis was especially garrulous on thesubject, and also launched the thunders of his wrath at the Presidentquite frequently and even vindictively. For instance, speaking in theSenate--[May 31, 1864, ]--of the right of Property in Slaves; said he:

"This new-born heresy 'Military Necessity, ' as President Lincoln claims, and exercises it, is the sum of all political and Military villainies* * * and it is no less absurd than it is villainous. * * * The manhas never spoken or lived who can prove by any provision of theConstitution, or by any principle, or by any argument to be deducedlogically and fairly from it, that he has any such power as this vast, gigantic, all-conquering and all-crushing power of Military Necessitywhich he has the audacity to claim. 

"This modern Emperor, this Tiberius, a sort of a Tiberius, and hisSejanus, a sort of a Sejanus, the head of the War Department, areorganizing daily their Military Courts to try civilians. * * *

"Sir, I want one labor of love before I die. I want the President ofthe United States, I want his Secretary of War, I want some of his highofficers in Military command to bring a civilian to a Militaryexecution, and me to have the proud privilege of prosecuting them formurder. * * * I want the law and its just retribution to be visitedupon these great delinquents. 

"I would sooner, if I had the power, bring about such an atonement asthat, than I would even put down the Rebellion. It would be a greatervictory in favor of Freedom and Constitutional Liberty, a thousand-fold, of all the People of America besides, than the subjugation of the RebelStates could possibly be. "

But there seemed to be no end to the' attacks upon the Administration, made, in both Houses, by these peculiar Peace-Democrats. Union bloodmight flow in torrents on the fields of the rebellious South, atrocitiesinnumerable might be committed by the Rebels, cold-blooded massacres ofBlacks and Whites, as at Fort Pillow, might occur without rebuke fromthem; but let the Administration even dare to sneeze, and--woe to theAdministration. 

It was not the Thirteenth Amendment only, that they assailed, buteverything else which the Administration thought might help it in itseffort to put down the Rebellion. Nor was it so much their malignantactivity in opposition to any one measure intended to strengthen thehands of the Union, but to all such measures; and superadded to this wasthe incessant bringing forward, in both Houses of Congress, by theserestless Rebel-sympathizers, of Peace-Resolutions, the mere presentationof which would be, and were, construed by the Rebel authorities atRichmond, as evidences of a weakening. 

Even some of the best of the Peace-Democrats, like S. S. Cox, forinstance, not only assailed the Tariff--under which the Union RepublicanParty sought to protect and build up American Industry, as well as toraise as much revenue as possible to help meet the enormous currentexpenditures of the Government--but also denounced our great paper-moneysystem, which alone enabled us to secure means to meet all deficienciesin the revenues otherwise obtained, and thus to ultimately conquer thehosts of Rebellion. 

He declared (June 2, 1864) that "The People are the victims of thejoint-robbery of a system of bounties under the guise of duties, and ofan inconvertible and depreciated paper currency under the guise ofmoney, " and added: "No man is now so wise and gifted that he can savethis Nation from bankruptcy. * * * No borrowing system can save us. The scheme of making greenbacks a legal tender, which enabled the debtorto cheat his creditor, thereby playing the old game of kingcraft, todebase the currency in order to aid the designs of despotism, may floatus for a while amidst the fluctuations and bubbles of the day; but as noone possesses the power to repeal the Law of the Almighty, which decrees(and as our Constitution has established) that gold and silver shall bethe standard of value in the World, so they will ever thus remain, notwithstanding the legislation of Congress. "

Not satisfied with this sort of "fire in the rear, " it was attempted bymeans of Democratic Free-Trade and antipaper-currency sophistries, toarouse jealousies, heart-burnings and resentful feelings in the breastsof those living in different parts of the Union--to implant bitterSectional antagonisms and implacable resentments between the EasternStates, on the one hand, and the Western States, on the other--and thus, by dividing, to weaken the Loyal Union States. 

That this was the cold-blooded purpose of all who pursued this course, would no doubt be warmly denied by some of them; but the fact remains noless clear, that the effect of that course, whether so intended or not, was to give aid and comfort to the Enemy at that critical time when theNation most needed all the men, money, and moral as well as materialsupport, it was possible to get, to put an end to the bloody Rebellion, now--under the continuous poundings of Grant's Army upon that of Lee inVirginia, and the advance of Sherman's Army upon that of Johnston inGeorgia--tottering to its overthrow. Thus this same speaker (S. S. Cox), in his untimely speech, undertook to divide the Union-loving States"into two great classes: the Protected States and the UnprotectedStates;" and--having declared that "The Manufacturing States, mainly theNew England States and Pennsylvania, are the Protected States, " and "TheAgricultural States, " mainly the eleven Western States, which he named, "are the Unprotected States"--proceeded to intemperately and violentlyarraign New England, and especially Massachusetts, in the same way thathad years before been adopted by the old Conspirators of the South whenthey sought--alas, too successfully!--to inflame the minds of Southerncitizens to a condition of unreasoning frenzy which made attemptedNullification and subsequent armed Rebellion and Secession possible. 

Well might the thoroughly loyal Grinnell, of Iowa--after exposing whathe termed the "sophistry of figures" by which Mr. Cox had seen fit "tomisrepresent and traduce" the Western States-exclaim: "Sir, I have nowords which I can use to execrate sufficiently such language, inarraying the Sections in opposition during a time of War; as if we werenot one People, descended from one stock, having one interest, and boundup in one destiny!"

The damage that might have been done to the Union Cause by suchmalignant Democratic attacks upon the National unity and strength, maybe imagined when we reflect that at this very time the annual expensesof our Government were over $600, 000, 000, and growing still larger; andthat $1. 90 in legal tender notes of the United States was worth but$1. 00 in gold, with a downward tendency. Said stern old ThaddeusStevens, alluding on this occasion, to Statesmanship of the peculiarstamp of the Coxes and Fernando Woods: "He who in this time will pursuesuch a course of argument for the mere sake of party, can never hope tobe ranked among Statesmen; nay, Sir, he will not even rise to thedignity of a respectable Demagogue!"

Within a week after this, (June 9, 1864), we find in the Senate also, similarly insidious attacks upon the strength of the Government, made bycertain Northern Democrats, who never tired of undermining Loyalty, andcreating and spreading discontent among the People. The Bill then up, for consideration, was one "to prohibit the discharge of persons fromliability to Military duty, by reason of the payment of money. "

In the terribly bloody Campaign that had now been entered upon by Grant--in the West, under Sherman, and in the East, under his own personaleye--it was essential to send to the front, every man possible. Hencethe necessity for a Bill of this sort, which moreover provided, in orderas far as possible to popularize conscription, that all calls for draftstheretofore made under the Enrolling Act of March 3, 1863, should be fornot over one year's service, etc. 

This furnished the occasion for Mr. Hendricks, among other PeaceDemocrats, to make opposing speeches. He, it seems, had all along beenopposed to drafting Union soldiers; and because, during the previousWinter, the Senate had been unwilling to abolish the clause permitting adrafted man to pay a commutation of $300 (with which money a substitutecould be procured) instead of himself going, at a time when men were notquite so badly needed as now, therefore Mr. Hendricks pretended to thinkit very strange and unjustifiable that now, when everything depended ongetting every possible man in the field, the Senate should think of"abandoning that which it thought right last Winter!"

He opposed drafting; but if drafting must be resorted to, then hethought that what he termed "the Horror of the Draft" should be felt byas many of the Union people as possible!--or, in his own words: "theHorror of the Draft ought to be divided among the People. " As if thiswere not sufficient to conjure dreadful imaginings, he added: "if oneset of men are drafted this year to serve twelve months, and they haveto go because the power of the Government makes them go, whether theycan go well or not, then at the end of the year their neighbors shouldbe subjected to the same Horror, and let this dreadful demand upon theservice, upon the blood, and upon the life of the People be distributedupon all. "

And, in order apparently to still further intensify public feelingagainst all drafting, and sow the seeds of dissatisfaction in the heartsof those drafted at this critical time, when the fate of the Union andof Republican Government palpably depended upon conscription, he added:"It is not so right to say to twenty men in a neighborhood: 'You shallgo; you shall leave your families whether you can or not; you shall gowithout the privilege of commutation whether you leave starving wivesand children behind you or not, ' and then say to every other man of theneighborhood: 'Because we have taken these twenty men for three years, you shall remain with your wives and children safely and comfortably athome for these three years. ' I like this feature of the amendment, because it distributes the Horror of the Draft more equally and justlyover the whole People. "

Not satisfied with rolling the "Horror of the Draft" so often andtrippingly over his tongue, he also essayed the role of Prophet in theinterest of the tottering god of Slavery. "The People, " said he, "expect great results from this Campaign; and when another year comesrolling around, and it is found that this War is not closed, and thatthere is no reasonable probability of its early close, my colleague(Lane) and other Senators who agree with him will find that the Peoplewill say that this effusion of blood must stop; that THERE MUST BE SOMEADJUSTMENT. I PROPHESY THIS. "

And, as a further declaration likely to give aid and comfort to theRebel leaders, he said: "I do not believe many men are going to beobtained by a draft; I do not believe a very good Army will be got by adraft; I do not believe an Army will be put in the field, by a draft, that will whip General Lee. "

But while all such statements were, no doubt, intended to help the foesof the Union, and dishearten or dismay its friends, the really loyalPeople, understanding their fell object, paid little heed to them. Thepredictions of these Prophets of evil fell flat upon the ears of loversof their Country. Conspirators, however much they might masquerade inthe raiment of Loyalty, could not wholly conceal the ear-marks ofTreason. The hand might be the hand of Esau, but the voice was thevoice of Jacob. 

On the 8th of June--after a month of terrific and bloody fightingbetween the immediate forces of Grant and Lee--a dispatch from Sherman, just received at Washington, was read to the House of Representatives, which said: "The Enemy is not in our immediate front, but his signalsare seen at Lost Mountain, and Kenesaw. " So, at the same time, at theNational Capital, while the friends of the Union there, were notimmediately confronted with an armed Enemy, yet the signals of hisAllies could be seen, and their fire upon our rear could be heard, dailyand almost hourly, both in the Senate and the House of Representatives. 

The fight in the House, upon the Thirteenth Amendment, now seemedindeed, to be reaching a climax. During the whole of June 14th, untilmidnight, speech after speech on the subject, followed each other inrapid succession. Among the opposition speeches, perhaps those ofFernando Wood and Holman were most notable for extravagant andunreasoning denunciation of the Administration and Party in power--whoseevery effort was put forth, and strained at this very time to theutmost, to save the Union. 

Holman, for instance, declared that, "Of all the measures of thisdisastrous Administration, each in its turn producing new calamities, this attempt to tamper with the Constitution threatens the mostpermanent injury. " He enumerated the chief measures of theAdministration during its three and a half years of power-among them theEmancipation Proclamation, the arming of the Blacks, and what hesneeringly termed "their pet system of finance" which was to "sustainthe public credit for infinite years, " but which "even now, " said he, "totters to its fall!" And then, having succeeded in convincing himselfof Republican failure, he exultingly exclaimed: "But why enumerate?What measure of this Administration has failed to be fatal! Every stepin your progress has been a mistake. I use the mildest terms ofcensure!"

Fernando Wood, in his turn also, "mildly" remarked upon Republicanpolicy as "the bloody and brutal policy of the Administration Party. "He considered this "the crisis of the fate of the Union;" declared thatSlavery was "the best possible condition to insure the happiness of theNegro race"--a position which, on the following day, he "reaffirmed"--and characterized those members of the Democratic Party who saw Treasonin the ways and methods and expressions of Peace Democrats of his ownstamp, as a "pack of political jackals known as War Democrats. "

On the 15th of June, Farnsworth made a reply to Ross--who had claimed tobe friendly to the Union soldier--in which the former handled theDemocratic Party without gloves. "What, " said he, referring to Mr. Ross, "has been the course of that gentleman and his Party on this floorin regard to voting supplies to the Army? What has been their course inregard to raising money to pay the Army? His vote will be foundrecorded in almost every instance against the Appropriation Bills, against ways and means for raising money to pay the Army. It is only aweek ago last Monday, that a Bill was introduced here to punishguerrillas * * * and how did my colleague vote? Against the Bill. * * *On the subject of arming Slaves, of putting Negroes into the Army, howhas my colleague and his Party voted? Universally against it. Theywould strip from the backs of these Black soldiers, now in the serviceof the Country, their uniforms, and would send them back to Slavery withchains and manacles. And yet they are the friends of the soldier!"* * *"On the vote to repeal the Fugitive Slave Law, how did that (Democratic)side of the House vote? Does not the Fugitive Slave Law affect theBlack soldier in the Army who was a Slave? That side of the House arein favor of continuing the Fugitive Slave Law, and of disbanding Coloredtroops. How did that side of the House vote on the question of armingSlaves and paying them as soldiers? They voted against it. They are infavor of disbanding the Colored regiments, and, armed with the FugitiveSlave Law, sending them back to their masters!"

He took occasion also to meet various Democratic arguments against theResolution, --among them, one, hinging on the alleged right of Propertyin Slaves. This was a favorite idea with the Border-State menespecially, that Slaves were Property--mere chattels as it were, --and, only the day before, a Northern man, Coffroth of Pennsylvania, had said:

"Sir, we should pause before proceeding any further in thisUnconstitutional and censurable legislation. The mere abolition ofSlavery is not my cause of complaint. I care not whether Slavery isretained or abolished by the people of the States in which it exists--the only rightful authority. The question to me is, has Congress aright to take from the people of the South their Property; or, in otherwords, having no pecuniary interest therein, are we justified in freeingthe Slave-property of others? Can we Abolish Slavery in the Loyal Stateof Kentucky against her will? If this Resolution should pass, and beratified by three-fourths of the States--States already Free--andKentucky refuses to ratify it, upon what principle of right or law wouldwe be justified in taking this Slave-property of the people of Kentucky?Would it be less than stealing?"

And Farnsworth met this idea--which had also been advanced by Messrs. Ross, Fernando Wood, and Pruyn--by saying: "What constitutes property?I know it is said by some gentlemen on the other side, that what thestatute makes property, is property. I deny it. What 'vested right'has any man or State in Property in Man? We of the North hold property, not by virtue of statute law, not by virtue of enactments. Our propertyconsists in lands, in chattels, in things. Our property was madeproperty by Jehovah when He gave Man dominion over it. But nowhere didHe give dominion of Man over Man. Our title extends back to thefoundation of the World. That constitutes property. There is where weget our title. There is where we get our 'vested rights' to property. "

Touching the ethics of Slavery, Mr. Arnold's speech on the same occasionwas also able, and in parts eloquent, as where he said: 'Slavery isto-day an open enemy striking at the heart of the Republic. It is thesoul and body, the spirit and motive of the Rebellion. It is Slaverywhich marshals yonder Rebel hosts, which confront the patriot Armiesof Grant and Sherman. It is the savage spirit of this barbarousInstitution which starves the Union prisoners at Richmond, whichassassinates them at Fort Pillow, which murders the wounded on the fieldof battle, and which fills up the catalogue of wrong and outrage whichmark the conduct of the Rebels during all this War. 

"In view of all the long catalogue of wrongs which Slavery has inflictedupon the Country, I demand to-day, of the Congress of the United States, the death of African Slavery. We can have no permanent Peace, whileSlavery lives. It now reels and staggers toward its last death-struggle. Let us strike the monster this last decisive blow. "

And, after appealing to both Border-State men, and Democrats of the FreeStates, not to stay the passage of this Resolution which "will strikethe Rebellion at the heart, " he continued: "Gentlemen may flatterthemselves with a restoration of the Slave-power in this Country. 'TheUnion as it was!' It is a dream, never again to be realized. TheAmerica of the past, has gone forever. A new Nation is to be born fromthe agony through which the People are now passing. This new Nation isto be wholly Free. Liberty, Equality before the Law, is to be the greatCorner-stone. "

So, too, Mr. Ingersoll eloquently said--among many other good things:--"It is well to eradicate an evil. That Slavery is an evil, no sane, honest man will deny. It has been the great curse of this Country fromits infancy to the present hour, And now that the States in Rebellionhave given the Loyal States the opportunity to take off that curse, towipe away the foul stain, I say let it be done. We owe it to ourselves;we owe it to posterity; we owe it to the Slaves themselves toexterminate Slavery forever by the adoption of the proposed Amendment tothe Constitution. * * * I believe Slavery is the mother of thisRebellion, that this Rebellion can be attributed to no other cause butSlavery; from that it derived its life, and gathers its strength to-day. Destroy the mother, and the child dies. Destroy the cause, and theeffect will disappear. 

"Slavery has ever been the enemy of liberal principles. It has everbeen the friend of ignorance, prejudice, and all the unlawful, savage, and detestable passions which proceed therefrom. It has ever beendomineering, arrogant, exacting, and overbearing. It has claimed to bea polished aristocrat, when in reality it has only been a coarse, swaggering, and brutal boor. It has ever claimed to be a gentleman, when in reality it has ever been a villain. I think it is high time toclip its overgrown pretensions, strip it of its mask, and expose it, inall its hideous deformity, to the detestation of all honest andpatriotic men. "

After Mr. Samuel J. Randall had, at a somewhat later hour, patheticallyand poetically invoked the House, in its collective unity, as a"Woodman, " to "spare that tree" of the Constitution, and to "touch not asingle bough, " because, among other reasons, "in youth it sheltered"him; and furthermore, because "the time" was "most inopportune;" and, after Mr. Rollins, of Missouri, had made a speech, which he afterwardsuppressed; Mr. Pendleton closed the debate in an able effort, from hispoint of view, in which he objected to the passage of the JointResolution because "the time is not auspicious;" because, said he, "itis impossible that the Amendment proposed, should be ratified without afraudulent use of the power to admit new States, or a fraudulent use ofthe Military power of the Federal Government in the Seceded States, "--and, said he, "if you should attempt to amend the Constitution by suchmeans, what binding obligation would it have?"

He objected, also, because "the States cannot, under the pretense ofamending the Constitution, subvert the structure, spirit, and theory ofthis Government. " "But, " said he, "if this Amendment were within theConstitutional power of amendment; if this were a proper time toconsider it; if three-fourths of the States were willing to ratify it;and if it did not require the fraudulent use of power, either in thisHouse or in the Executive Department, to secure its adoption, I wouldstill resist the passage of this Resolution. It is another step towardconsolidation, and consolidation is Despotism; confederation isLiberty. "

It was about 4 o'clock in the afternoon of June 15th, that the Housecame to a vote, on the passage of the Joint Resolution. At first thestrain of anxiety on both sides was great, but, as the roll proceeded, it soon became evident that the Resolution was doomed to defeat. And soit transpired. The vote stood 93 yeas, to 65 nays--Mr. Ashley havingchanged his vote, from the affirmative to the negative, for the purposeof submitting, at the proper time, a motion to reconsider. 

That same evening, Mr. Ashley made the motion to reconsider the vote bywhich the proposed Constitutional Amendment was rejected; and the motionwas duly entered in the Journal, despite the persistent efforts ofMessrs. Cox, Holman, and others, to prevent it. 

On the 28th of June, just prior to the Congressional Recess, Mr. Ashleyannounced that he had been disappointed in the hope of securing enoughvotes from the Democratic side of the House to carry the Amendment. "Those, " said he, "who ought to have been the champions of this greatproposition are unfortunately its strongest opponents. They havepermitted the golden opportunity to pass. The record is made up, and wemust go to the Country on this issue thus presented. " And then he gavenotice that he would call the matter up, at the earliest possible momentafter the opening of the December Session of Congress. 

 CHAPTER XXVII. 

 SLAVERY DOOMED AT THE POLLS. 

The record was indeed made up, and the issue thus made, between Slaveryand Freedom, would be the chief one before the People. Already theRepublican National Convention, which met at Baltimore, June 7, 1864, had not only with "enthusiastic unanimity, " renominated Mr. Lincoln forthe Presidency, but amid "tremendous applause, " the delegates rising andwaving their hats--had adopted a platform which declared, in behalf ofthat great Party: "That, as Slavery was the cause, and now constitutesthe strength, of this Rebellion, and as it must be, always andeverywhere, hostile to the principles of Republican government, Justiceand the National safety demand its utter and complete extirpation fromthe soil of the Republic; and that while we uphold and maintain the Actsand Proclamations by which the Government, in its own defense, has aimeda death-blow at this gigantic evil, we are in favor, furthermore, ofsuch an Amendment to the Constitution, to be made by the People inconformity with its provisions, as shall terminate and forever prohibitthe existence of Slavery within the limits or the jurisdiction of theUnited States. "

So, too, with vociferous plaudits, had they received and adopted anotherResolution, wherein they declared "That we approve and applaud thepractical wisdom, the unselfish patriotism and the unswerving fidelityto the Constitution and the principles of American Liberty, with whichAbraham Lincoln has discharged, under circumstances of unparalleleddifficulty, the great duties and responsibilities of the PresidentialOffice; that we approve and endorse, as demanded by the emergency, andessential to the preservation of the Nation, and as within theprovisions of the Constitution; the Measures and Acts which he hasadopted to defend the Nation against its open and secret foes; that weapprove, especially, the Proclamation of Emancipation, and theemployment, as Union soldiers, of men heretofore held in Slavery; andthat we have full confidence in his determination to carry these and allother Constitutional Measures essential to the salvation of the Country, into full and complete effect. "

Thus heartily, thoroughly and unreservedly, endorsed in all the greatacts of his Administration--and even more emphatically, if possible, inhis Emancipation policy--by the unanimous vote of his Party, Mr. Lincoln, although necessarily "chagrined and disappointed" by theHouse-vote which had defeated the Thirteenth Amendment, might well feelundismayed. He always had implicit faith in the People; he felt surethat they would sustain him; and this done, why could not the votes of adozen, out of the seventy Congressional Representatives opposing thatAmendment, be changed? Even failing in this, it must be but a questionof time. He thought he could afford to bide that time. 

On the 29th of August, the Democratic National Convention met atChicago. Horatio Seymour was its permanent President; that sameGovernor of New York whom the 4th of July, 1863, almost at the momentwhen Vicksburg and Gettysburg had brought great encouragement to theUnion cause, and when public necessity demanded the enforcement of theDraft in order to drive the Rebel invader from Northern soil and bringthe Rebellion speedily to an end--had threateningly said to theRepublicans, in the course of a public speech, during the Draft-riots atNew York City: "Remember this, that the bloody, and treasonable, andrevolutionary doctrine of public necessity can be proclaimed by a mob aswell as by a Government. * * * When men accept despotism, they may havea choice as to who the despot shall be!"

In his speech to this Democratic-Copperhead National Convention, therefore, it is not surprising that he should, at this time, declarethat "this Administration cannot now save this Union, if it would. "That the body which elected such a presiding officer, --after the bloodyseries of glorious Union victories about Atlanta, Ga. , then fast leadingup to the fall of that great Rebel stronghold, (which event actuallyoccurred long before most of these Democratic delegates, on theirreturn, could even reach their homes)--should adopt a Resolutiondeclaring that the War was a "failure, " was not surprising either. 

That Resolution--"the material resolution of the Chicago platform, " asVallandigham afterward characters it, was written and "carried throughboth the Subcommittee and the General Committee" by that Arch-Copperheadand Conspirator himself. --[See his letter of October 22, 1864, to theeditor of the New York News, ]

It was in these words: "Resolved, That this Convention does explicitlydeclare as the sense of the American People, that after four years offailure to restore the Union by the experiment of War, during which, under the pretense of a military necessity, or War-power higher than theConstitution, the Constitution itself has been disregarded in everypart, and public Liberty and private right alike trodden down and thematerial prosperity of the Country essentially impaired--Justice, Humanity, Liberty, and the public welfare demand that immediate effortsbe made for a cessation of hostilities, with a view to an ultimateConvention of the States, or other peaceable means, to the end that atthe earliest practicable moment Peace may be restored on the basis ofthe Federal Union of the States. "

With a Copperhead platform, this Democratic Convention thought itpolitic to have a Union candidate for the Presidency. Hence, thenomination of General McClellan; but to propitiate the out-and-outVallandigham Peace men, Mr. Pendleton was nominated to the second placeon the ticket. 

This combination was almost as great a blunder as was the platform--thanwhich nothing could have been worse. Farragut's Naval victory atMobile, and Sherman's capture of Atlanta, followed so closely upon theadjournment of the Convention as to make its platform and candidates thelaughing stock of the Nation; and all the efforts of Democratic orators, and of McClellan himself, in his letter of acceptance, could not preventthe rise of that great tidal-wave of Unionism which was soon to engulfthe hosts of Copperhead-Democracy. 

The Thanksgiving-services in the churches, and the thundering salutes of100 guns from every Military and Naval post in the United States, which--during the week succeeding that Convention's sitting--betokened theNation's especial joy and gratitude to the victorious Union Forces ofSherman and Farragut for their fortuitously-timed demonstration that the"experiment of War" for the restoration of the Union was anything but a"Failure" all helped to add to the proportions of that rapidly-swellingvolume of loyal public feeling. 

The withdrawal from the canvass, of General Fremont, nominated for thePresidency by the "radical men of the Nation, " at Cleveland, alsocontributed to it. In his letter of withdrawal, September 17th, hesaid:

"The Presidential contest has, in effect, been entered upon in such away that the union of the Republican Party has become a paramountnecessity. The policy of the Democratic Party signifies eitherseparation, or reestablishment with Slavery. The Chicago platform issimply separation. General McClellan's letter of acceptance isreestablishment, with Slavery. The Republican candidate is, on thecontrary, pledged to the reestablishment of the Union without Slavery;and, however hesitating his policy may be, the pressure of his Partywill, we may hope, force him to it. Between these issues, I think noman of the Liberal Party can remain in doubt. "

And now, following the fall of Atlanta before Sherman's Forces, Granthad stormed "Fort Hell, " in front of Petersburg; Sheridan had routed theRebels, under Early, at Winchester, and had again defeated Early atFisher's Hill; Lee had been repulsed in his attack on Grant's works atPetersburg; and Allatoona had been made famous, by Corse and his 2, 000Union men gallantly repulsing the 5, 000 men of Hood's Rebel Army, whohad completely surrounded and attacked them in front, flank, and rear. 

All these Military successes for the Union Cause helped the Unionpolitical campaign considerably, and, when supplemented by theremarkable results of the October elections in Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Maryland, made the election of Lincoln and Johnson a foregoneconclusion. 

The sudden death of Chief-Justice Taney, too, happening, by a strangecoincidence, simultaneously with the triumph of the Union Party ofMaryland in carrying the new Constitution of that State, whichprohibited Slavery within her borders, seemed to have a significance*not without its effect upon the public mind, now fast settling down tothe belief that Slavery everywhere upon the soil of the United Statesmust die. 

 [Greeley well said of it: "His death, at this moment, seemed to mark the transition from the Era of Slavery to that of Universal Freedom. "]

Then came, October 19th, the Battle of Cedar Creek, Va. Where the RebelGeneral Early, during Sheridan's absence, surprised and defeated thelatter's forces, until Sheridan, riding down from Winchester, turneddefeat into victory for the Union Arms, and chased the armed Rebels outof the Shenandoah Valley forever; and the fights of October 27th and28th, to the left of Grant's position, at Petersburg, by which therailroad communications of Lee's Army at Richmond were broken up. 

At last, November 8, 1864, dawned the eventful day of election. Bymidnight of that date it was generally believed, all over the Union, that Lincoln and Johnson were overwhelmingly elected, and that the Lifeas well as Freedom of the Nation had thus been saved by the People. 

Late that very night, President Lincoln was serenaded by a Pennsylvaniapolitical club, and, in responding to the compliment, modestly said:

"I earnestly believe that the consequences of this day's work (if it beas you assure, and as now seems probable) will be to the lastingadvantage, if not to the very salvation, of the Country. I cannot atthis hour say what has been the result of the election. But whatever itmay be, I have no desire to modify this opinion, that all who havelabored to-day in behalf of the Union organization have wrought for thebest interests of their Country and the World, not only for the presentbut for all future ages. 

"I am thankful to God, " continued he, "for this approval of the People;but, while deeply gratified for this mark of their confidence in me, ifI know my heart, my gratitude is free from any taint of personaltriumph. I do not impugn the motives of any one opposed to me. It isno pleasure to me to triumph over any one; but I give thanks to theAlmighty for this evidence of the People's resolution to stand by FreeGovernment and the rights of Humanity. "

On the 10th of November, in response to another serenade given at theWhite House, in the presence of an immense and jubilantly enthusiasticgathering of Union men, by the Republican clubs of the District ofColumbia, Mr. Lincoln said:

"It has long been a grave question whether any Government, not toostrong for the Liberties of its People, can be strong enough to maintainits existence in great emergencies. On this point the presentRebellion. Has brought our Republic to a severe test, and aPresidential election, occurring in regular course during the Rebellion, has added not a little to the strain. * * * But the election, alongwith its incidental and undesired strife, has done good, too. It hasdemonstrated that a People's Government can sustain a National electionin the midst of a great Civil War, until now it has not been known tothe World that this was a possibility. It shows, also, how sound andhow strong we still are. 

"But, " said he, "the Rebellion continues; and now that the election isover, may not all having a common interest reunite in a common effort tosave our common Country?

"For my own part, " continued he--as the cheering, elicited by thisforcible appeal, ceased--"I have striven, and shall strive, to avoidplacing any obstacle in the way. So long as I have been here I have notwillingly planted a thorn in any man's bosom. While I am deeplysensible to the high compliment of a reelection, and duly grateful, as Itrust, to Almighty God for having directed my countrymen to a rightconclusion, as I think, for their own good, it adds nothing to mysatisfaction that any other man may be disappointed or pained by theresult. "

And, as the renewed cheering evoked by this kindly, Christian utterancedied away again, he impressively added: "May I ask those who have notdiffered with me, to join with me in this same spirit, towards those whohave?"

So, too, on the 17th of November, in his response to the complimentaryaddress of a delegation of Union men from Maryland. 

 [W. H. Purnell, Esq. , in behalf of the Committee, delivered an address, in which he said they rejoiced that the People, by such an overwhelming and unprecedented majority, had again reelected Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency and endorsed his course--elevating him to the proudest and most honorable position on Earth. They felt under deep obligation to him because he had appreciated their condition as a Slave-State. It was not too much to say that by the exercise of rare discretion on his part, Maryland to-day occupies her position in favor of Freedom. Slavery has been abolished therefrom by the Sovereign Decree of the People. With deep and lasting gratitude they desired that his Administration, as it had been approved in the past, might also be successful in the future, and result in the Restoration of the Union, with Freedom as its immutable basis. They trusted that, on retiring from his high and honorable position, the universal verdict might be that he deserved well of mankind, and that favoring Heaven might 'Crown his days with loving kindness and tender mercies. ']

The same kindly anxiety to soften and dispel the feeling ofbitterness that had been engendered in the malignant bosoms of theCopperhead-Democracy by their defeat, was apparent when he said withemphasis and feeling:

"I have said before, and now repeat, that I indulge in no feeling oftriumph over any man who has thought or acted differently from myself. I have no such feeling toward any living man;" and again, aftercomplimenting Maryland for doing "more than double her share" in theelections, in that she had not only carried the Republican ticket, butalso the Free Constitution, he added: "Those who have differed with usand opposed us will yet see that the result of the Presidential electionis better for their own good than if they had been successful. "

The victory of the Union-Republican Party at this election was anamazing one, and in the words of General Grant's dispatch ofcongratulation to the President, the fact of its "having passed offquietly" was, in itself, "a victory worth more to the Country than abattle won, "--for the Copperheads had left no stone unturned in theirefforts to create the utmost possible rancor, in the minds of theirpartisans, against the Administration and its Party. 

Of twenty-five States voting, Lincoln and Johnson had carried theelectoral votes of twenty-two of them, viz. : Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, California, Oregon, Kansas, West Virginia, and Nevada; while McClellan and Pendleton had carried the twenty-oneelectoral votes of the remaining three, viz. : New Jersey, Delaware, andKentucky--the popular vote reaching the enormous number of 2, 216, 067 forLincoln, to 1, 808, 725 for McClellan--making Lincoln's popular majority407, 342, and his electoral majority 191!

But if the figures upon the Presidential candidacy were so gratifyingand surprising to all who held the cause of Union above all others, noless gratifying and surprising were those of the Congressionalelections, which indicated an entire revulsion of popular feeling on thesubject of the Administration's policy. For, while in the currentCongress (the 38th), there were only 106 Republican-Union to 77Democratic Representatives, in that for which the elections had justbeen held, (the 39th), there would be 143 Republican-Union to 41Democratic Representatives. 

It was at once seen, therefore, that, should the existing House ofRepresentatives fail to adopt the Thirteenth Amendment to theConstitution, there would be much more than the requisite two-thirdsmajority for such a Measure in both Houses of the succeeding Congress;and moreover that in the event of its failure at the coming Session, itwas more than probable that President Lincoln would consider himselfjustified in calling an Extra Session of the Thirty-ninth Congress forthe especial purpose of taking such action. So far then, as theprospects of the Thirteenth Amendment were concerned, they lookeddecidedly more encouraging.