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

Mr. Groesbeck next addressed the Senate on behalf of the President. He made a clear, forcible presentation of the grounds of defense. Mr. Boutwell had asserted "that the President cannot prove or plead the motive by which he professes to have been governed in his violation of the laws of the country. . . . The necessary, the inevitable presumption in law is that he acted under the influence of bad motives in so doing, and no evidence can be introduced controlling or coloring in any degree this necessary presumption of the law." In reviewing this position, Mr. Groesbeck reminded the Senate that President Lincoln had "claimed and exercised the power of organizing military commissions under which he arrested and imprisoned citizens within the loyal States. He had no Act of Congress warranting it, and the Supreme Court has decided that the act was against the express provisions of the Constitution. According to the gentleman on the other side, then, Mr. Lincoln must be convicted. . . . The gentleman seems to acknowledge that there must have been a motive. There can be no crime without motive; but when the party comes forward and offers to prove his motive, the answer is, 'You shall not prove it.' When he comes forward and offers to prove it from his warm, living heart, the answer is, 'We will make up your motive out of the presumptions of law and conclude you upon that subject. We will not hear you.'"

Mr. Boutwell renewed with vigor the argument that the exception made in the Tenure-of-office Act, in regard to members of the Cabinet, did not give the President power to remove Mr. Stanton. "We maintain," said Mr. Boutwell, "that Mr. Stanton was holding the office of Secretary of War for and in the term of President Lincoln, by whom he had been appointed. . . . It was not a new office; it was not a new term. Mr. Johnson succeeded to Mr. Lincoln's office and for the remainder of Mr. Lincoln's term of office. He is serving out Mr. Lincoln's term as President."

Mr. Groesbeck's reply on this point was effective: "The gentleman has said this is Mr. Lincoln's term. The dead have no ownership in offices or estate of any kind. Mr. Johnson is President of the United States with a term, and this is his term. But it would make no difference if Mr. Lincoln were living to-day. If Mr. Lincoln were the President to-day he could remove Mr. Stanton. Mr. Lincoln would not have appointed him during this term. It was during Mr. Lincoln's first term that Mr. Stanton received his appointment, and not this term; and an appointment by a President during one term, by the operation of this law, will not extend the appointee during another term because that same party may happen to be re-elected to the Presidency. Mr. Stanton therefore holds under his commission and not under the law."

Mr. Thaddeus Stevens attempted to address the Senate, but found himself too much exhausted and handed his manuscript to General Butler, who read it to the Senate. The argument had many of the significant features of Mr. Stevens's style, but lacked the vigor which in the day of his strength he had always shown. He was rapidly failing in health and was then within a few weeks of his death. Hon. Thomas Williams of Pennsylvania followed Mr. Stevens with a written argument, rhetorically finished and read with great emphasis. It presented in new and attractive form the arguments already submitted, but towards the close contained the imprudent expression that "the eyes of an expectant people are upon the Senate."

Mr. Evarts followed with an argument of great length, reviewing every phase and feature of the case and making a remarkably effective plea on behalf of his eminent client. It was as strong in its logic as it was faultless in its style. The concluding portion of the address was especially eloquent and convincing. "We never dreamed," said he, "that an instructed and equal people, with a government yielding so readily to the touch of popular will, would have come to the trial of force against it. We never thought that the remedy to get rid of a ruler would bring assassination into our political experience. We never thought that political differences under an elective Presidency would bring in array the departments of the Government against one another to anticipate by ten months the operation of the regular election. And yet we take them all, one after another, and we take them because we have grown to the full vigor of manhood. But we have met by the powers of the Constitution these great dangers—prophesied when they would arise as likely to be our doom—the distractions of civil strife, the exhaustions of powerful war, the intervention of the regularity of power through the violence of assassination. We could summon from the people a million of men and inexhaustible treasure to help the Constitution in its time of need. Can we summon now resources enough of civil prudence and of restraint of passion to carry us through this trial, so that whatever result may follow, in whatever form, the people may feel that the Constitution has received no wound? To this court, the last and best resort for its determination, it is to be left."

Mr. Stanbery, unable to deliver his well-prepared argument, employed one of the officers of the Attorney-General's department to read the greater part of it. During his service as Attorney-General he had become personally and deeply attached to the President, and now made an earnest plea in his behalf. "During the eighty years of our political existence," said Mr. Stanbery, "we have witnessed the fiercest contests of party. . . . A favorite legislative policy has more than once been defeated by the obstinate and determined resistance of the President, upon some of the gravest and most important questions we have ever had or are ever likely to have. The Presidential policy and the legislative policy have stood in direct antagonism. During all that time this fearful power of Impeachment was in the hands of the legislative department, and more than once a resort to it has been advised by extreme party men, as a sure remedy for party purposes; but happily that evil hitherto has not come upon us."

Hon. John A. Bingham summed up the case on behalf of the House and reviewed all the charges against the President, answering point by point the argument of his counsel. "I ask you, senators," said Mr. Bingham, "how long men would deliberate upon the question of whether a private citizen, arraigned at the bar of one of your tribunals of justice for criminal violation of law, should be permitted to interpose a plea in justification of his criminal act that his only purpose was to interpret the Constitution and laws for himself, that he violated the law in the exercise of his prerogative to test its validity hereafter, at such day as might suit his own convenience, in the courts of justice. Surely, senators, it is as competent for the private citizen to interpose such justification in answer to crime as it is for the President of the United States to interpose it, and for the simple reason that the Constitution is no respecter of persons, and vests neither in the President nor in the private citizen judicial power. . . . For the Senate to sustain any such plea would in my judgment be a gross violation of the already violated Constitution and laws of a free people."

When the counsel on both sides had finished, a certain period was allowed for senators to prepare and file their opinions on the case. This was done by twenty-nine senators(4) and the question was thus re-argued with consummate ability, for the Senate contained a number of lawyers of high rank and long experience at the bar. On the 11th of May the Senate was ready to vote, and the interest in the result was intense. There had been much speculation as to the position of certain senators, but as all the members of the body had maintained discreet silence during the trial, it was impossible to forecast the result with any degree of certainty. The only judgment that had the least significance was founded on the votes given to admit or to reject certain testimony proposed by the President's counsel. This of course gave no certain indication of the vote of senators; though the general belief was that the Impeachment would fail. The transfer of the entire House to the floor of the Senate, the galleries crowded with citizens from all parts of the Republic, the presence of all the foreign ministers in the Diplomatic Gallery eagerly watching the possible and peaceful deposition of a sovereign ruler, the large attendance of the representatives of the press,—all attested the profound impression which the trial had made and the intense anxiety with which its conclusion was awaited.

By an order of the Senate the first vote was taken on the last Article, which was a summary of many of the charges set forth at greater length in some of the preceding Articles of Impeachment. Upon the call of his name each senator was required to rise and answer "Guilty" or "Not guilty." The roll was called in breathless silence, with hundreds of tally-papers in the hands of eager observers on the floor and in the gallery, carefully noting each response as given. The result, announced at once by the Chief Justice, showed that thirty-five senators had declared the President "guilty" and nineteen had declared him "not guilty."(5) As conviction required two-thirds the Impeachment on the Eleventh Article had failed. A debate then arose on a proposition to rescind the resolution in regard to the order in which the vote should be taken upon the other Articles of Impeachment, but without reaching a conclusion, the Senate as a Court of Impeachment adjourned, on motion of Mr. Cameron of Pennsylvania, until Tuesday the 26th day of May.

During the intervening period of fifteen days the air was filled with rumors that the result would be different when the Senate should come to vote on the remaining Articles. A single senator changing against the President would give thirty-six for conviction, and leave only eighteen for acquittal. This would be fatal to the President, as it would give the two-thirds necessary for conviction. But it was not so ordained. When the Senate re-assembled on the 26th, the vote was taken on the Second Article, and then upon the Third, with precisely the same results as was previously reached on the Eleventh Article. When Mr. Ross of Kansas answered "Not guilty," there was an audible sensation of relief on the part of some, and of surprise on the part of others, showing quite plainly that rumor had been busy with his name as that of the senator who was expected to change his position. Satisfied that further voting was useless, the Senate abandoned the remaining Articles, and as a Court of Impeachment adjourned sine die.