Disunion and Restoration in Tennessee / Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Political Science, Columbia University

by John Randolph Neal

[12] Acts of Tennessee, 1866-67, p. 26.

CHAPTER V

RECOGNITION BY CONGRESS

The Radical leaders in Tennessee naturally expected that the readmission of the Representatives to their seats in Congress would immediately follow the restoration of the State government. Therefore, upon the assembling of the first session of the Thirty-ninth Congress, the full delegation from Tennessee was present on the floor, ready to answer to their names. When Mr. Edward McPherson, the clerk of the House, omitted the name of Tennessee along with the other Southern States from the preliminary roll-call, Mr. Horace Maynard created a dramatic scene by waving aloft his certificate of election, and demanding recognition. In the discussion which followed the roll-call, the cause of Mr. Maynard was championed by Mr. Brooks, the leader of the Democratic minority. “If Mr. Maynard,” he said, “is not a loyal man, and is not from a State in this Union, what man, then, is loyal? In the darkest and most doubtful period of the war, when an exile from his own State, I heard his eloquent voice on the banks of the St. Lawrence rousing the people of my State to discharge their duties to their country.” The action of Mr. McPherson was upheld by a vote of the House.

This refusal to seat the Tennessee Representatives arose, partly on account of the failure to distinguish between the loyal government in Tennessee, and the so-called Johnson governments, but chiefly because the Republican leaders wished to delay action until a complete reconstruction policy could be mapped out. The Representatives continued, however, to press the claims of the State for recognition before the “Joint Committee of Fifteen,” to which was referred all measures affecting the status of the Southern States.

This Committee was just on the point of yielding, when the veto of the Freedman Bureau Bill occurred. The day after the veto, Mr. Stevens brought before the House, from the Committee of Fifteen, a “concurrent resolution concerning the insurrectionary States,” as follows: “Be it resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), that in order to close agitation upon a question which seems likely to disturb the action of the Government, as well as to quiet the uncertainty which is agitating the minds of the people of the eleven States which have been declared to be in insurrection, no Senator or Representative shall be admitted to either branch of Congress, from any of the said States until Congress shall have declared such State entitled to such representation.” A strong effort was made to exempt Tennessee from the provisions of the Resolution. Mr. Grider, a member of the Committee of Fifteen, offered, to that effect, a minority report as follows: “The minority of the Committee on Reconstruction, on the part of the House, beg leave to report that said committee have caused an inquiry to be made as to the condition and loyalty of Tennessee. There has been a large amount of evidence taken, a part of it conducing to show that at some localities occasionally there have been some irregularities and disaffection, yet the main direction and weight of the testimony are ample and conclusive to show that a great body of the people in said State are not only loyal and willing, but anxious to have and maintain amicable, sincere, and patriotic relations with the General Government. Such being the state of facts, we offer the following resolution, to wit:

“Resolved, That the State of Tennessee is entitled to representation in the Thirty-ninth Congress, and the representatives elected from and by said State are hereby admitted to take their seats therein upon being qualified by oath according to law.”

In speaking in opposition to this minority resolution, Mr. Stevens said: “I think I may say without impropriety, that until yesterday there was an investigation into the condition of Tennessee, to see whether by act of Congress we could admit that State to a condition of representation here, and admit its members to seats here, but since yesterday there has arisen a state of things which the committee deem puts it out of their power to proceed further without surrendering a great principle, without the loss of all their dignity, without surrendering the rights of this body to the usurpation of another power.” The “Concurrent Resolution,” introduced by Mr. Stevens, was carried without amendment, so the readmission of Tennessee was again postponed indefinitely.

Two months later, however, its readmission was foreshadowed in a speech by Mr. Bingham on the Fourteenth Amendment. “I trust,” he said, “that this amendment will pass this House, that the day will soon come when Tennessee—​loyal Tennessee—​loyal in the very heart of the rebellion, her mountains and plains blasted by the very ravagers of war and stained with blood of her faithful children fallen in the great struggle for the maintenance of the Union, having already conformed her constitution and laws to every provision of this amendment, will at once, upon its submission by Congress, irrevocably ratify it, and be, without further delay, represented in Congress by her loyal Representatives and Senators. Let that great example be set by Tennessee, and it will be worth a hundred thousand votes to the loyal people in the free North.”

The suggestion contained in this speech was promptly acted upon by the Radical government in Tennessee. On the 19th of June, the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified by the Legislature. Mr. Brownlow immediately sent the following telegram to Washington: