"A change of two votes would have defeated the amendment; and urgent business kept one man from being present to cast his vote against the measure, so it is seen that history came near being made another way that memorable day.
"The story was told, with all the vigor and freshness of a man just from the existing scenes and actions, by E. W. Barber, editor of the Jackson (Mich.) Daily Patriot, now at Crooked Lake, happy in the summer of Florida's winter. Mr. Barber was reading clerk for the thirty-eighth, thirty-ninth and fortieth congresses, from December, 1863 to 1869; and he is today the only official of that body who is living. He will be ninety years old on the third of July, coming, and is wonderfully preserved, all except his leg. Indeed he laughingly declared that he would have been a dead tree if he had not been pruned of a dead limb!
Tells of Memorable Day
"On the morning of December 26, 1863, said Mr. Barber, there was a stillness in the house that betokened doubt even then of the passage of the amendment, for but four men in the world knew that it was a matter of accomplishment before the roll was called.
"The senate had already passed the amendment, he said, and the house had defeated it in the first session of the congress; and there was a doubt of its passage over in the lower body.
"After its defeat in the house, the party machinery was put in motion to bring into line sufficient votes to make the necessary three-fourths required. J. M. Ashley of Toledo and Augustus Frank of Warsaw, N. Y., were appointed a committee of two to see if votes enough could be secured at the short session to pass the bill through the house.
"Edward W. Barber, the reading clerk, and Richard U. Sherman, the tally clerk, kept a secret rollcall under lock and key in their desk, and on this was marked the name of every man who had voted against the amendment. As a man was changed or converted, his name was reported to these two and his name added to those already secured for the amendment. One by one the change came, and at last one day when a name was added—the member from the Gettysburg district—Ashley exclaimed "There, by God. We've got enough."
"That day in the house Ashley, who had changed his vote to "nay" after the defeat of the bill earlier so he could move its reconsideration, and had complied with that parliamentary condition, gave notice that on January 26 he would call up the bill for a vote.
Measure Sways in Balance
"Betting ran high for and against the passage of the amendment, says Mr. Barber. The odds were that it would not be passed because of the violent opposition which it had evoked at the former attempt. There were but four men who knew how the matter would go, and those were E. W. Barber, reading clerk; Richard U. Sherman, tally clerk; J. M. Ashley, and Augustus Frank, the committee of two named to get the proper number of votes for the bill.