Then I proceeded to ask:—
“How shall these ideas be saved? How shall the war waged by Abraham Lincoln be brought to an end, so as to assure peace, tranquillity, and reconciliation?”[212]
In the speech at Worcester, before the Republican State Convention, September 14, 1865, I insisted upon guaranties for the national freedman and the national creditor; and until these were accomplished, proposed to exclude the Rebel from political power:—
“I ask not his punishment. I would not be harsh. There is nothing humane that I would reject. Nothing in hate. Nothing in vengeance. Nothing in passion. I am for gentleness. I am for a velvet glove; but for a while I wish the hand of iron. I confess that I have little sympathy with those hypocrites of magnanimity whose appeal for the Rebel master is only a barbarous indifference towards the slave; and yet they cannot more than I desire the day of Reconciliation.”[213]
Thus constantly did this idea return.
And yet again, in a letter to the “Evening Post” of New York, dated September 28, 1865, after insisting upon “supplementary safeguards” for the protection of the freedman, I used these words:—
“Without this additional provision, I see small prospect of that peace and reconciliation which are the objects so near our hearts.”[214]
Again it appeared in a telegraphic dispatch to President Johnson, dated November 12, 1865, and afterwards published. Asking the President to suspend his “policy towards the Rebel States,” I said:—
“I should not present this prayer, if I were not painfully convinced that thus far it has failed to obtain any reasonable guaranties for that security in the future which is essential to peace and reconciliation.… The Declaration of Independence asserts the equality of all men, and that rightful government can be founded only on the consent of the governed. I see small chance of peace, unless these great principles are practically established. Without this, the house will continue divided against itself.”[215]
Here Reconciliation is associated with Reconstruction on the basis of the Equality of All Men.