To the brave men who led the Republican party to its duty and its mission, who overcame the numbers of the opposition, who lifted their associates from the slough of prejudice and led them out of the darkness of tradition, let there be all honor and praise. They gave hope to the hopeless, help to the helpless, liberty to the downtrodden. They did more: they elevated the character and enlightened the conscience of the oppressing race. The struggle is not yet ended, the final battle is not yet fought; but complete victory sooner or later is assured. The three great Amendments to the Constitution were bought with a great price—even the blood of the slain—and they will assuredly, in their letter and in their spirit, be vindicated and enforced. Mr. Lincoln taught his countrymen the lesson that he who would be no slave must be content to have no slave. It is yet to be learned with equal emphasis that he who would preserve his own right to suffrage must never aid in depriving another citizen of the same great boon. In moral as in physical conflicts it may be easy to determine who strikes the first blow, but it is difficult to foresee who may strike the last.
[(1) The proposition of Messrs. Morton and Buckalew for a Sixteenth Article of Amendment was as follows:—
"The second clause, first section, second article of the Constitution of the United States shall be amended to read as follows: 'Each State shall appoint by vote of the people thereof qualified to vote for representatives in Congress, a number of electors equal to the whole number of senators and representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress; but no senator or representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector; and the Congress shall have power to prescribe the manner in which such electors shall be chosen by the people.'">[
CHAPTER XVII.
General Grant was inaugurated on Thursday, the 4th of March, 1869, amid a great display of popular enthusiasm. All parties joined in it. The Republicans, who had been embarrassed by President Johnson's conduct for the preceding four years, felt that they had overcome a political enemy rather than a man whom they had themselves placed in power; and the Democrats, who had supported Johnson so far as was necessary to embarrass and distract the Republicans, were glad to be released from an entangling alliance which had brought them neither profit or honor. Contrary to the etiquette of the occasion, the incoming President was not escorted to the Capitol by his predecessor. The exceptions to this usage have been few. John Adams was so chagrined by the circumstances attending his defeat that he would not remain in Washington to see Mr. Jefferson installed in power; and the long-established hatred which General Jackson and John Quincy Adams so heartily sustained for each other forbade any personal intercourse between them. General Grant had conceived so intense a dislike of Johnson, by reason of the effort to place him in a false position in connection with the removal of Stanton, that he would not officially recognize his predecessor, even so far as to drive from the White House to the Capitol in the same carriage.
The Inaugural Address of the President was brief and characteristic. "I have," said he, "taken the oath of office without mental reservation, and with the determination to do to the best of my ability all that it requires of me. The responsibilities of the position I feel, but accept them without fear. The office has come to me unsought. I commence its duties untrammeled. I bring to it a conscientious desire and determination to fill it to the best of my ability, and to the satisfaction of the people." He declared that on all subjects he should have "a policy to recommend, but none to enforce against the will of the people. Laws are to govern all alike, —those opposed as well as those who favor them. I know of no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution." He was very emphatic upon the duty and necessity of upholding the public credit and paying the public debt. "Let it be understood," said he, "that no repudiator of one farthing of our public debt will be trusted in public place, and it will go far to strengthen our public credit, which ought to be the best in the world." "The question of suffrage," he said, "is one which is likely to agitate the public so long as a portion of the citizens of the Nation are excluded from its privileges in any State. It seems to me very desirable that this question should be settled now; and I entertain the hope and express the desire that it may be by the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution."
General Grant had never been in any way connected with the civil administration of Nation or State. The charge of being a mere military chieftain had been in vain preferred against some of his most illustrious predecessors; but with the possible exception of General Taylor, no President ever came to the office with so little previous experience in civil affairs. Washington's fame, prior to his accession to the Presidency, rested mainly on his victorious leadership of the Revolutionary army; but he had, as a young man, served in the Provincial Assembly of Virginia, had been a member of the Continental Congress, and had, after the close of his miliary career, presided over the convention that framed the Constitution. Jackson was chosen President on account of his campaign in the South-West, ending in his brilliant triumph at New Orleans; but his experience in civil life had already been long and varied. He entered Congress as a representative from Tennessee when Washington was President, took his seat in the Senate of the United States the day John Adams was inaugurated, and afterwards served as a judge of the Supreme Court of Tennessee. All these civil duties had been performed before he received a military commission. After his stormy career in the army had ended, he was again sent to the Senate during the second term of President Monroe. President Taylor, like General Grant, had been simply a soldier; but the people remembered that his service in the Executive Chair was faithful, resolute, and intelligent; and they remembered also that some of the greatest military heroes of the world had been equally distinguished as civil rulers. Cromwell, William III., Frederick the Great, the First Napoleon, left behind them records of civil administration which for executive force and personal energy established a fame as great as they had acquired on the field of battle. The inexperience of General Grant had not therefore hindered his election, and left no ground for apprehension as to the successful conduct of his administration.
The President had so well kept his own counsels in regard to the members of his Cabinet that not a single name was anticipated with certainty. Five of the appointments were genuine surprises.
—Elihu B. Washburne, long the faithful friend of General Grant, was nominated for Secretary of State. He had just entered upon his ninth term as representative in Congress from Illinois, and resigned immediately after swearing in Mr. Blaine as Speaker,—a duty assigned to him as the oldest member of the House in consecutive service. He was elected to Congress in 1852, from the Galena district, and his first term began on the day Franklin Pierce was inaugurated President. His period of service was crowded with events of great magnitude, commencing with the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and ending with the elevation to the Presidency of the chief hero in the great civil war, to which that repeal proximately led. During all these years Mr. Washburne was an aggressive, courageous, faithful representative, intelligent in all his actions, loyal to the Nation, devoted to the interests of his State.
—Jacob D. Cox, of Ohio, who had acquired credit in the war, and added to it by his service as Governor of his State, was nominated for Secretary of the Interior, and was universally considered to be an admirable selection. His thorough training and his intellectual strength fitted him for any station.