William Pitt Fessenden
A statesman of a very different stamp was Senator Fessenden of Maine, who, being at the head of the senatorial part of the joint Committee on Reconstruction, presided over that important body. William Pitt Fessenden was a man who might easily have been overlooked in a crowd. There was nothing in his slight figure, his thin face framed in spare gray hair and side whiskers, and his quiet demeanor, to attract particular notice. Neither did his appearance in the Senate Chamber impress one at first sight as that of a great power in that important assembly. I saw him more than once there walk with slow steps up and down in the open space behind the seats, with his hands in his trousers pockets, with seeming listlessness, while another senator was speaking, and then ask to be heard, and, without changing his attitude, make an argument in a calm conversational tone, unmixed with the slightest oratorical flourish, so solid and complete that little more remained to be said on the subject in question. He gave the impression of having at his disposal a rich and perfectly ordered store of thought and knowledge upon which he could draw with perfect ease and assurance. When I was first introduced to him, he appeared to be rather distant in manner than inviting friendly approach. But I was told that ill health had made him unsociable and somewhat morose and testy, and, indeed, there was often the trace of suffering and weariness in his face. It was also remarked in the Senate that at times he was ill-tempered and inclined to indulge in biting sarcasms and to administer unkind lectures to other senators, which in some instances disturbed his personal intercourse with his colleagues. But there was not one of them who did not hold him in the highest esteem as a statesman of commanding ability and of lofty ideals, as a gentleman of truth and conscience, as a great jurist and an eminent constitutional lawyer, as a party man of most honorable principles and methods, and as a patriot of noblest ambition for his country.
WENDELL PHILLIPS
WHOM PRESIDENT JOHNSON NAMED AS ONE OF THE ENEMIES OF THE REPUBLIC IN HIS SPEECH OF FEBRUARY 22
Being a man also of conservative instincts, averse to unnecessary conflicts, and always disinclined to go to extremes, in action as well as in language, he was expected to exert a moderating influence in his committee; and this expectation was not disappointed so far as his efforts to prevent a final breach between the President and the Republican majority in Congress were concerned. But regarding the main question whether the "States lately in rebellion" should be fully restored to their self-governing functions and to full participation in the government of the Republic without having given reasonable guaranties for the maintenance of the "legitimate results of the war," he was in
point of principle not far apart from Mr. Stevens.
The President's Logic
It must be admitted that, if we accept his premises, Mr. Johnson made in point of logic a pretty plausible case. His proposition was that a State, in the view of the Federal Constitution, is indestructible; that an ordinance of secession adopted by its inhabitants, or its political organs, did not take it out of the Union; that by declaring and treating those ordinances of secession as "null and void," of no force, virtually non-existent, the Federal government itself had accepted and sanctioned that theory; that during the rebellion the constitutional rights and functions of those States were merely suspended, and that when the rebellion ceased they were ipso facto restored; that, therefore, the rebellion having actually ceased, those States were at once entitled to their former rights and privileges—that is, to the recognition of their self-elected State governments and to their representation in Congress. Admitting the premises, this was logically correct in the abstract.
But this was one of the cases to which a saying, many years later set afloat by President Cleveland, might properly have been applied: we were confronting a condition, not a theory. The condition was this: Certain States had through their regular political organs declared themselves independent of the Union. They had, for all practical purposes, actually separated themselves from the Union. They had made war upon the Union. That war put those States in a position not foreseen by the Constitution. It imposed upon the government of the Union duties not foreseen by the Constitution; by "military necessity," war necessity, the Union was compelled to emancipate the negroes from slavery and to accept their military services. The war had compelled the government of the Union to levy large loans of money and thus to contract a huge public debt. The government had also, in the course of the war, the aid of the Union men of the South. It had thus assumed solemn obligations for value received or services rendered. It had assumed the duty to protect the emancipated negroes in their freedom, the Southern Union men in their security, and the public creditor from loss. This duty was a duty of honor as well as of policy. The Union could, therefore, not consent, either in point of honor or of sound policy, to the restoration of the late rebel States to the functions of self-government and to full participation in the national government so long as that restoration was reasonably certain to put the freedom of the emancipated slaves, or the security of the Southern Union men, or the rights of the public creditor, into serious jeopardy.
