The service required is too vast and complex for unorganized individuals. It must proceed from the National Government. This alone can supply the adequate machinery, and extend the proper network of assistance, with the proper unity of operation. The National Government must interfere in the case, precisely as in building the Pacific Railroad. Private charity in our country is active and generous; but it is powerless to cope with the evils arising from a wicked institution; nor can it provide a remedy, where society itself is overthrown.
There are few who will not admit that something must be done by the Government. Cold must be the heart that could turn away from this call. But whatever is done must be through some designated agency; and this brings me to another aspect of the question.
The President in his Proclamation of Emancipation has used the following language: “I recommend to them,”—that is, to the freedmen,—“that in all cases, when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages.” Such is the recommendation from that supreme authority which decreed Emancipation. They are to labor, and for reasonable wages. But the President does not undertake to say how this opportunity shall be obtained,—how the laborer shall be brought in connection with the land, how his rights shall be protected, and how his new-found liberty shall be made a blessing. It was enough, perhaps, on the occasion of the Proclamation, that the suggestion should be made. Faithful labor and reasonable wages: let these be secured, and everything else will follow. But how shall they be secured?
Different subjects, as they become important, are committed to special bureaus. I need only refer to Patents, Agriculture, Public Lands, Pensions, and Indian Affairs,—each under the charge of a separate Commissioner. Clearly, the time has come for a Bureau of Freedmen. In speaking of this agency, I mean a bureau which will be confined in operation to the affairs of freedmen, and not travel beyond this increasing class to embrace others, although of African descent. Our present necessity is to help those made free by the present war; and the term “freedmen” describes sufficiently those who have once been slaves. It is this class we propose to help during the transition period from Slavery to Freedom. Call it charity or duty, it is sacred as humanity.
And here a practical question arises with regard to the department in which this bureau should be placed. There are reasons for placing it in the War Department, at least during the war. There are other reasons for placing it in the Department of the Interior, which has charge of Indian Affairs, Pensions, and Patents. But, whatever the reasons on general grounds for placing it in one of these two departments, there are other reasons, of special importance at this moment, which point to the Treasury Department. Indeed, after careful consideration, the Committee were satisfied that it was so clearly associated with other interests already intrusted to this department, that it could not be advantageously administered elsewhere. Although beginning this inquiry with a conviction in favor of the War Department, I could not resist the conclusion of the Committee.
Look, for one moment, at the class of duties already imposed upon the Treasury Department in connection with the very homes of these freedmen.
Congress has, by special Acts, conferred upon the Secretary of the Treasury extraordinary powers with regard to trade in the Rebel States. There is, first, the Act of July 13, 1861, entitled “An Act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports, and for other purposes,” which declares that commercial intercourse with any State or part of a State in rebellion, when licensed by the President, “shall be conducted and carried on only in pursuance of rules and regulations prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury.” And it is further provided, that “the Secretary of the Treasury may appoint such officers, at places where officers of the customs are not now authorized by law, as may be needed to carry into effect such licenses, rules, and regulations.”[346]
There is another Act of Congress, approved May 20, 1862, supplementary to that just named, which confers additional powers upon the Secretary of the Treasury with reference to trade with “any place in the possession or under the control of insurgents against the United States.”[347]
There is also the Act of June 7, 1862, entitled “An Act for the collection of direct taxes in insurrectionary districts within the United States, and for other purposes.” In this Act it is provided, (section nine,) that, where the Board of Commissioners shall be satisfied that the owners of lands “have left the same to join the Rebel forces, or otherwise to engage in and abet this Rebellion, and the same shall have been struck off to the United States at public sale, the said Commissioners shall, in the name of the United States, enter upon and take possession of the same, and may lease the same, together or in parcels, to any person or persons who are citizens of the United States”; and (section ten) the Commissioners “shall from time to time make such temporary rules and regulations and insert such clauses in said leases as shall be just and proper to secure proper and reasonable employment and support, at wages or upon shares of the crop, of such persons and families as may be residing upon the said parcels or lots of land, which said rules and regulations are declared to be subject to the approval of the President.”[348] The execution of this Act is lodged in the Treasury Department.
Then comes the Act of Congress, approved March 12, 1863, entitled “An Act to provide for the collection of abandoned property and for the prevention of frauds in insurrectionary districts within the United States,” under which the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized “to appoint a special agent or agents to receive and collect all abandoned or captured property in any State or Territory or any portion of any State or Territory of the United States, designated as in insurrection against the lawful Government of the United States.” The Act proceeds with details on the subject.[349]