RECONSTRUCTION AGAIN: GUARANTIES AND SAFEGUARDS AGAINST SLAVERY AND FOR PROTECTION OF FREEDMEN.
Resolutions in the Senate, February 8, 1864.
In the Senate, February 8, 1864, the following resolutions, submitted by Mr. Sumner, were read and ordered to be printed.
Resolutions defining the character of the national contest, and protesting against any premature restoration of Rebel States, without proper guaranties and safeguards against Slavery and for the protection of Freedmen.
RESOLVED, That, in determining the duties of the National Government, it is of first importance that we should see and understand the real character of the contest forced upon the United States, for failure to appreciate this contest must end in failure of those proper efforts essential to the reëstablishment of unity and concord; that, recognizing the contest in its real character, as it must be recorded by history, it is apparent that it is not an ordinary rebellion or an ordinary war, but that it is absolutely without precedent, differing from every other rebellion and every other war, inasmuch as it is an audacious attempt, for the first time in history, to found a wicked power on the corner-stone of Slavery; and that such an attempt, having this single object,—whether regarded as rebellion or war,—is so completely penetrated and absorbed, so entirely filled and possessed by Slavery, that it can be regarded as nothing else than the huge impersonation of this crime, at once rebel and belligerent, or, in other words, as Slavery in arms.
2. That, recognizing the identity of the Rebellion and Slavery, so that each is to the other as another self, it becomes plain that the Rebellion cannot be crushed without crushing Slavery, as Slavery cannot be crushed without crushing the Rebellion; that every forbearance to the one is forbearance to the other, and every blow at the one is a blow at the other; that all who tolerate Slavery tolerate the Rebellion, and all who strike at Slavery strike at the Rebellion; and that, therefore, it is our supreme duty, in which all other present duties are contained, to take care that the barbarism of Slavery, in which alone the Rebellion has its origin and life, is so utterly trampled out that it can never spring up again anywhere in the Rebel and belligerent region; for, leaving this duty undone, nothing is done, and all our blood and treasure are lavished in vain.
3. That, in dealing with the Rebel War, the National Government is invested with two classes of rights,—one the Rights of Sovereignty, inherent and indefeasible everywhere within the national limits, and the other the Rights of War, or belligerent rights, superinduced by the nature and extent of the contest; that, by virtue of the Rights of Sovereignty, the Rebel and belligerent region is now subject to the nation as its only rightful government, bound under the Constitution to all the duties of sovereignty, and by special mandate bound also to guaranty to every State a republican form of government, and to protect it against invasion; that, by virtue of the Rights of War, this same region is subject to all the conditions and incidents of war, according to the established usages of Christian nations, out of which is derived the familiar maxim of public duty, “Indemnity for the past and security for the future.”
4. That, in seeking restoration of the States to their proper places as members of the Republic, so that every State shall enjoy again its constitutional functions, and every star on the national flag shall represent a State in reality as well as in name, care must be taken that the Rebellion is not allowed, through any negligence or mistaken concession, to retain the least foothold for future activity, or the least germ of future life; that, whether proceeding by the exercise of sovereign rights or of belligerent rights, the same precautions must be exacted against future peril; that, therefore, any system of “Reconstruction” must be rejected which does not provide by irreversible guaranties against the continued existence or possible revival of Slavery, and that such guaranties can be primarily obtained only through the agency of the National Government, which to this end must assert a temporary supremacy, military or civil, throughout the Rebel and belligerent region, of sufficient duration to stamp upon this region the character of Freedom.