History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States

by William Horatio Barnes

"'Executes the freeman's will
As lightning does the will of God.'"

Concerning the amendment proposed by Mr. Henderson, Mr. Williams said: "All the impassioned declamation and all the vehement assertions of the honorable Senator do not change or affect the evidence before our eyes that the people of these United States are not prepared to surrender to Congress the absolute right to determine as to the qualifications of voters in the respective States, or to adopt the proposition that all persons, without distinction of race or color, shall enjoy political rights and privileges equal to those now possessed by the white people of the country. Sir, some of the States have lately spoken upon that subject. Wisconsin and Connecticut, Northern, loyal, and Republican States, have recently declared that they would not allow the negroes within their own borders political rights; and is it probable that of the thirty-six States, more than six, at the most, would at this time adopt the constitutional amendment proposed by the gentleman?"

Notwithstanding the temporary darkness of the political sky, Mr. Williams saw brilliant prospects before the country. "This nation," said he, "is to live and not die. God has written it among the shining decrees of destiny. Inspired by this hope and animated by this faith, we will take this country through all its present troubles and perils to the promised land of perfect unity and peace, where freedom, equality, and justice, the triune and tutelar deity of the American Republic, will rule with righteousness a nation 'whose walls shall be salvation and whose gates praise.'"

At the close of this speech, the Senate being about to proceed to a vote upon the pending amendment, it was proposed to defer action and adjourn the question over to the following day, for the purpose of affording an opportunity for speeches by Senators who were not prepared to proceed immediately. Mr. Fessenden, who had the measure in charge, protested against the delays of the Senate. "This subject," said he, "has dragged along now for nearly two weeks. If members desire to address the Senate, they must be prepared to go on and do so without a postponement from day to day for the purpose of allowing every gentleman to make his speech in the morning, and then adjourning early every evening. We shall never get through in that way. I give notice to gentlemen that I shall begin to be a little more quarrelsome—I do not know that it will do any good—after to-day."

On the day following, Mr. Hendricks delivered a speech of considerable length in opposition to the constitutional amendment. After having maintained that the proposition did not rest the right of representation upon population, nor upon property, nor upon voters, Mr. Hendricks inquired: "Upon what principle do Senators propose to adopt this amendment to the Constitution? I can understand it if you say that the States shall be represented in the House of Representatives upon their population; I can understand it if you say that they shall be represented upon their voters; but when you say that one State shall have the benefit of its non-voting population and another State shall not, I can not understand the principle of equity and justice which governs you in that measure. Sir, if it does not stand upon a principle, upon what does it rest? It rests upon a political policy. A committee that had its birth in a party caucus brings it before this body, and does not conceal the fact that it is for party purposes. This measure, if you ever allow the Southern States to be represented in the House of Representatives, will bring them back shorn of fifteen or twenty Representatives; it will bring them back so shorn in their representation that the Republican party can control this country forever; and if you cut off from fifteen to thirty votes for President of the United States in the States that will not vote for a Republican candidate, it may be that you can elect a Republican candidate in 1868."

Mr. Hendricks thought that "this proposition was designed to accomplish three objects: first, to perpetuate the rule and power of a political party; in the second place, it is a proposition the tendency of which is to place agriculture under the control and power of manufactures and commerce forever; and, in the third place, it is intended, I believe, as a punishment upon the Southern States."

In reference to changing the basis of representation as a punishment for the Southern States, Mr. Hendricks said: "Now that the war is over; now that the Southern people have laid down their arms; now that they have sought to come again fully and entirely into the Union; now that they have pledged their honors and their fortunes to be true to the Union and to the flag; now that they have done all that can be done by a conquered people, is it right, after a war has been fought out, for us to take from them their political equality in this Union for the purpose of punishment? The Senator from Maine, the chairman of the committee, says that the right to control the suffrage is with the States, but if the States do not choose to do right in respect to it, we propose to punish them. You do not punish New York for not letting the foreigner vote until he resides there a certain period. You do not punish Indiana because she will not allow a foreigner to vote until he has been in the country a year. These States are not to be punished because they regulate the elective franchise according to their sovereign pleasures; but if any other States see fit to deny the right of voting to a class that is peculiarly guarded and taken care of here, then they are to be punished."

Referring to the speech of the Senator from New Hampshire, Mr. Hendricks asked: "Had the white men of this country a right to establish a Government, and thereby a political community? If so, they had a right to say who should be members of that political community. They had a right to exclude the colored man if they saw fit. Sir, I say, in the language of the lamented Douglas, and in the language of President Johnson, this is the white man's Government, made by the white man for the white man. I am not ashamed to stand behind such distinguished men in maintaining a sentiment like that. Nor was my judgment on the subject changed the day before yesterday by the lamentations of the Senator from New Hampshire, [Mr. Clark,] sounding through this body like the wailing of the winds in the dark forest, 'that it is a horrible thing for a man to say that this is a white man's Government.'

"Mr. President, there is a great deal said about the part the colored soldiers have taken in putting down this rebellion—a great deal more than there is any occasion for, or there is any support for in fact or history. This rebellion was put down by the white soldiers of this country."

Criticising sentiments toward the South, expressed by Senators, Mr. Hendricks said: "We hear a good deal said about blood now. Yesterday the Senator from Oregon [Mr. Williams] criticised the President for his leniency toward the South. A few days ago, the Senator from Ohio [Mr. Wade] made a severe criticism on the President for his leniency, and my colleague asks for blood. Mr. President, this war commenced with blood; nay, blood was demanded before the war. When the good men and the patriotic, North and South, representing the yearning hearts of the people at home, came here, in the winter and spring of 1861, in a peace congress, if possible to avoid this dreadful war, right then the Senator from Michigan [Mr. Chandler] announced to his Governor and the country that this Union was scarcely worth preserving without some blood-letting. His cry before the war was for blood. Allow me to say that when the Senator's name is forgotten because of any thing he says or does in this body, in future time it will be borne down upon the pages of history as the author of the terrible sentiment that the Union of the people that our fathers had cemented by the blood of the Revolution and by the love of the people; that that Union, resting upon compromise and concession, resting upon the doctrine of equality to all sections of the country; that that Union which brought us so much greatness and power in the three-quarters of a century of our life; that that Union that had brought us so much prosperity and greatness, until we were the mightiest and proudest nation on God's footstool; that that grand Union was not worth preserving unless we had some blood-letting!"