Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 / From Lincoln to Garfield, with a Review of the Events Which Led to the Political Revolution of 1860

by James Gillespie Blaine

It was naturally inferred and was subsequently proved, that the Southern States would not have dared to take this hostile attitude except with the encouragement and the unqualified support of the President. He was undoubtedly in correspondence, directly and indirectly, with the political powers that were controlling the action of the insurrectionary States, and he was determined that the policy of Congress should not have the triumph that would be implied in a ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment by those States. Telegraphic correspondence clearly establishing the President's position, subsequently came to light. Governor Parsons of Alabama telegraphed him indicating that the rejection of the Fourteenth Amendment might be reconsidered by the Alabama Legislature, if in consequence thereof an enabling Act could be passed by Congress for the admission of the State to representation. Johnson promptly replied on the same day: "What possible good can be obtained by reconsidering the Constitutional Amendment? I know of none in the present posture of affairs, and I do not believe the people of the country will sustain any set of individuals in attempts to change the whole character of our Government by enabling Acts or otherwise. I believe on the contrary, that they will eventually uphold all those who have patriotism and courage to stand by the Constitution and who place their confidence in the people. There should be no faltering on the part of those who are honest in a determination to sustain the several co-ordinate Departments of the Government in accordance with the original design." It was evident from this disclosure that Johnson's hand was busy throughout the South, secretly as well as openly, and that he inspired the resolute obstinacy with which the insurrectionary States resisted the fair and magnanimous offers of Reconstruction made by Congress. The Rebel element of the South had gradually come to repose implicit confidence in Johnson, and this fact increased his power to sow dissension and produce discord. His stubborn and apparently malicious course at this time, was inspired in large part by a desire to be avenged on the Northern States and Northern leaders for the stinging rebuke administered to him in the recent election.

Sustained by the same popular sentiment which had given offense to the President, Congress did not doubt its duty or hesitate in its action. Its course, indeed, was firm to the point of severity. It met the spirit of defiance on the part of the South with an answer so decisive, that the misguided people of that section were rapidly undeceived as to their power to command the situation, even with all the aid the President could bring. The principal debates for the first two months of the session related wholly to the condition of the South, and on the 6th of February (1867) Mr. Stevens, from the Committee on Reconstruction, reported a bill which after sundry amendments became the leading measure of the Thirty-ninth Congress. In its original form the preamble declared that "whereas the pretended State governments of the late so-called Confederate States afford no adequate protection for life or property, but countenance and encourage lawlessness and crime; and whereas it is necessary that peace and good order should be enforced in said so-called Confederate States, until loyal State governments can be legally established; therefore be it enacted that said so-called Confederate States shall be divided into military districts, and made subject to the military authority of the United States, as hereinafter prescribed; and for that purpose Virginia shall constitute the first district, North Carolina and South Carolina the second district, Georgia, Alabama and Florida the third district, Mississippi and Arkansas the fourth district, and Louisiana and Texas the fifth district."

It was made the duty of the General of the Army to assign to the command of each of said districts an officer not below the rank of Brigadier-general, and to detail a sufficient force to enable such officer to perform his duties and enforce his authority within the district to which he was assigned. The protection of life and property, the suppression of insurrections, disorders, and violence, and the punishment of all criminals and disturbers of the public peace, were entrusted to the military authority, with the power to allow civil tribunals to take jurisdiction and try offenders; and if that was not sufficient in the officer's judgment, he was authorized to organize military commissions, "any thing in the constitutions and laws of these so-called Confederate States to the contrary notwithstanding." It was further declared that all legislative acts or judicial processes to prevent the proceedings of such tribunals, and all interference by "said pretended State governments with the exercise of military authority under this Act, shall be void and have no effect." The courts and judicial officers of the United States were forbidden to issue writs of habeas corpus, except under certain restrictions which further established the military authority over the people. Prompt trials were guaranteed to all persons arrested, cruel and unusual punishments were forbidden, and no sentence could be executed until it was approved by the officer in command of the district.

Mr. Stevens, in his speech upon introducing the bill, did not attempt to conceal its positive and peremptory character. "It provides," said he, "that the ten disorganized States shall be divided into five military districts; that the Commander of the Army shall take charge of them, through his officers not below the rank of Brigadier-general, who shall have the general supervision of the peace, quiet and protection of the people, loyal and disloyal, who reside within those precincts; and that to do so, he may use, as the law of nations would authorize him to do, the legal tribunals whenever he may deem them competent; but these tribunals are to be considered of no validity per se, of no intrinsic force, of no force in consequence of their origin; the question being wholly within the power of the conqueror, and to remain until that conqueror shall permanently supply their place with something else. That is the whole bill. It does not need much examination. One night's rest after its reading is enough to digest it."

Mr. Brandegee of Connecticut followed Mr. Stevens in a speech strongly supporting the measure. "Mr. Speaker, something must be done," said he. "The American people demand that we shall do something, and quickly. Already fifteen hundred Union men have been massacred in cold blood (more than the entire population of some of the towns in my district), whose only crime has been loyalty to your flag. . . . In all the revolted states, upon the testimony of your ablest generals, there is no safety to the property or lives of loyal men. Is this what the loyal North has been fighting for? Thousands of loyal white men, driven like partridges over the mountains, homeless, houseless, penniless, to-day throng this capital. They fill the hotels, they crowd the avenues, they gather in these marble corridors, they look down from these galleries, and with supplicating eye ask protection from the flag that hangs above the Speaker's chair—a flag which thus far has unfurled its stripes, but concealed the promise of its stars."

—Mr. Le Blond of Ohio declared that "the provisions of this bill strike down every important provision in the Constitution. You have already inaugurated enough here to destroy any government that was ever founded. . . . Now, Mr. Speaker, I do not predict any thing. I do not declare war, but as one American citizen I do prefer war to cowardly submission to a total destruction of the fundamental principles of our Government."

—He was followed by his colleague, Mr. Finck, who declared that "no member on this floor who understands the Constitution of the United States, and who is friend of our Government, will pretend to urge that we have any Constitutional power to pass this bill. . . . I declare it as my solemn conviction that no government can long continue to be free when one-third of its people and one-third of the States are controlled by military power."

—Mr. Bingham of Ohio, speaking for a more conservative type of republicanism than Mr. Stevens represented, begged gentlemen to "make haste slowly in the exercise of this highest possible power conferred by the Constitution upon the Congress of the United States. For myself, sir, I am not going to yield to the proposition of the chairman of the committee, for a single moment, that one rood of the territory within the line of the ten states enumerated in this bill is conquered territory. The Government of the United States does not conquer any territory that is under the jurisdiction of the Constitution."

—Mr. William Lawrence of Ohio said, "For myself I am ready to set aside by law all these illegal governments. They have rejected all fair terms of reconstruction. They have rejected the Constitutional amendments we have tendered them. They are engines of oppression against all loyal men. They are not republican in form or purpose. Let them not only be ignored as legal governments, but set aside because they are illegal." Mr. Lawrence suggested some amendments that would give to all the people the protection of the judiciary under National authority.

—Mr. Russell Thayer of Pennsylvania argued warmly for the bill, and said, "This measure will be of brief duration, and will be followed, as I am informed, by other measures, which will secure the permanent and peaceful restoration of these States to their proper and just position in the Union, upon their acceptance of such terms as are necessary for the future security of the country. When that is done, and when order is restored, and permanent protection is guaranteed to all the citizens of that section of the country, this measure will be abrogated and abandoned."