I am pained by this opposition. It is out of season. I am pained by it especially from the Senator from Iowa. I do not judge him. But he will pardon me, if I say that from the beginning he has shown a strange insensibility to this cause. He is for Liberty, but he will not help us assure it to those who have for generations been despoiled of it. Sir, I am in earnest. Seriously, religiously, I accept Emancipation as proclaimed by the President, and now, by the votes of both Houses of Congress, placed under the sanction of Constitutional Law. But even Emancipation is not enough. You must see to it that it is not nullified or evaded; and you must see to it especially that the new-made freedmen are protected in the rights now assured to them, and that they are saved from the prevailing caste, which menaces Slavery under some new form; and this is the object of the present measure.
Would you know the perils of freedmen ever since Emancipation? Listen, then, to the words of that true patriot, General Wadsworth, of New York, who, after his visit to the Valley of the Mississippi, and personal observation of the freedmen there, testified:—
“There is one thing that must be taken into account, and that is, that there will exist a very strong disposition among the masters to control these people and keep them as a subordinate and subjected class. Undoubtedly they intend to do that. I think the tendency to establish a system of serfdom is the great danger to be guarded against. I talked with a planter in the La Fourche district, near Thibodeauville. He said he was not in favor of secession; he avowed his hope and expectation that Slavery would be restored there in some form. I said, ‘If we went away and left these people now, do you suppose you could reduce them again to slavery?’ He laughed to scorn the idea that they could not. ‘What!’ said I, ‘these men who have had arms in their hands?’ ‘Yes,’ he said; ‘we should take the arms away from them, of course.’”[356]
But this emphatic attestation is simply in harmony with accumulated testimony from other quarters. The freedmen, rejoicing in recovered rights, must for a while be saved from the traditional harshness and cruelty to which for generations they have been exposed. Call it protection,—call it what you will: the power of the Government must be to them a shield. And yet you hesitate.
The Senator from Iowa renews the objections he made at an earlier stage. It will not be forgotten that he most earnestly protested against the bill, as giving to persons a control of the freedman. It was shown, I think, to demonstration, that he was mistaken. But, out of deference to his sensibilities, and that nothing might seem to be wanting, other safeguards were introduced, as amendments, on his motion, or in pursuance of his suggestions. But all this is not enough to secure his favor. He objects still.
Very well. So far as I understand his objection then and now, it is twofold: first, that the freedman is placed under constraint, and that he is not a freeman; and, secondly, that he is treated too much as an infant or a pupil. Now I undertake to say that the objection, in both these forms, is absolutely inapplicable.
The freedman is treated in every respect as a freeman. Again and again in the bill his rights are secured to him. Thus, for instance, in the fourth section, it is expressly provided that “every such freedman shall be treated in all respects as a free man, with all proper remedies in courts of justice, and no power or control shall be exercised with regard to him except in conformity with law.” Language cannot go further. In face of these positive words, so completely in harmony with the whole bill, it is vain to say that the freedman is not a freeman. Sir, he is a freeman just as much as the Senator himself, with a title derived from the Almighty, which no person can assail. When the Senator finds danger to the freedman, he consults his imagination, inflamed by hostile sentiments he has allowed himself to nurse.
But the Senator complains that the freedman is treated too much as an infant or a pupil. How? Where? Let him point out the objectionable words. Analyze the bill. The freedmen, it is admitted, are under the general superintendence of the Commissioner. But are we not all under the general superintendence of the police, to which we may appeal for protection in case of need? And just such protection the freedmen may expect from the Commissioner, according to his power. The Senator himself is under the superintendence of the Presiding Officer of the Senate, whose duty it is to see that he is protected in his rights on this floor. But the Presiding Officer can do nothing except according to law; and the Commissioner is bound by the same inevitable limitations.