History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States

by William Horatio Barnes

Two days after, on the 22d of February, the President greatly damaged his cause by denouncing a Senator and a Representative, and using the slang of the stump against the Secretary of the Senate in the midst of an uproarious Washington mob. The people were mortified that the Executive of the nation should have committed so serious an indiscretion.

The incident received notice in Congress in a humorous speech of Thaddeus Stevens, who declared that the alleged speech could never have been delivered; that it was "a part of the cunning contrivance of the copperhead party, who have been persecuting our President;" that it was "one of the grandest hoaxes ever perpetrated."

Congress, now aware that it must achieve its greatest works of legislation over the obstructing veto of the President, moved forward with caution and deliberation. Every measure was well weighed and carefully matured, since, in order to win its way to the favor of a triumphant majority in Congress and the country, it must be as free as possible from all objectionable features.

Impartial suffrage, as provided in the District of Columbia Suffrage Bill, being a subject upon which the people had not yet spoken, the Senate determined that it would be better not to risk the uncertainty of passing the measure over the inevitable veto until the people should have an opportunity of speaking at the ballot-box.

The President applied his veto to the Civil Rights Bill and the second Freedmen's Bureau Bill, but a majority of more than the requisite two-thirds placed these measures among the laws of the land. In the House of Representatives, Mr. Raymond was the only Republican member who voted to sustain the veto of the Civil Rights Bill. The temptation to be friends of the President, in order to aid him in the distribution of patronage, was very great with members of Congress, and the wonder is that so many were able to reject it all, and adhere to principles against which the Executive brought to bear all his power of opposition.

On the adjournment of Congress in July, at the close of the first session, the contest was still continued, though in another arena. Members of Congress went to their several districts, submitted their doings to their constituents, and took counsel of the people. The President also traversed the States from the Atlantic to the Mississippi. He made numerous speeches, and endeavored to popularize his policy.

The people gave their verdict at the ballot-box in favor of Congress. The reëlection of Congress was the rejection of the President. The ruin of the President's fortunes was shared by his followers. No gentleman ever entered the House of Representatives with more eclat than that with which Mr. Raymond took his seat as a member of the Thirty-ninth Congress, but his constituents did not see proper to elect him for a second term. Delano and Stillwell, of the West, were left at home. Cowan, in the Senate, elected six years before as a Republican, was superseded, and Doolittle was instructed by his Legislature to resign.

The message of the President at the opening of the second session displayed no disposition to yield to the people or to Congress. He declared to a State delegation that waited on him that he was too old to learn.

One of the first acts of Congress after reässembling was to accept the sanction of the people for impartial suffrage, and pass the District Suffrage Bill over the President's veto. The President deemed it due to his consistency to return bills, with his "objections thereto in writing," to the very last. Among the last doings of the Thirty-ninth Congress was the passage of the Tenure-of-office Bill and the Military Reconstruction Bill over vetoes. In humiliating contrast with the circumstances one year before, when the veto of the Freedmen's Bureau Bill prevailed, the veto of the Military Reconstruction Bill had but ten supporters in the Senate.

The following is a complete list of the bills vetoed by the President during the Thirty-ninth Congress, and of the bills which were passed over the veto, and those which became laws without the President's signature: