History of the Antislavery Measures of the Thirty-seventh and Thirty-eighth United States Congresses, 1861-65, by Henry Wilson, 1865.

CHAPTER XIII.

AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION.

MR. ASHLEY'S BILL. — MR. WILSON'S JOINT RESOLUTION, — HOUSE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY. MR. HENDERSON'S JOINT RESOLUTION. — MR. SUMNER'S RESOLUTION. — MR, HENDERSON'S AMENDMENT REPORTED WITH AN AMENDMENT, — REMARKS OF MR. TRUMBULL, — MR. WILSON, MR. DAVIS'S AMENDMENT, — REMARKS OF MR. SAULSBURY. MR. CLARK, — MR. HOWE, MR. JOHNSON. — MR. DAVIS'S AMENDMENTS. — MR. POWELL'S AMENDMENT, — REMARKS OF MR. HARLAN. — MR. HALE, — MR. M'DOUGALL. — MR. HENDRICKS, — MR. HENDERSON. — MR. SUMNER, — MR. SUMNER'S AMENDMENT, — REMARKS OF MR. TRUMBULL, — MR. HOWARD. — PASSAGE OF THE JOINT RESOLUTION IN THE SENATE, — MR. MORRIS'S SPEECH, — REMARKS OF MR. HERRICK. — MR. KELLOGG, — MR. PRUYN, — MR. WOOD, — MR. HIGBY. — MR. Wheeler's amendment, — MR. KELLOGG OF MICHIGAN, — MR. ROSS, — MR. HOLMAN, — MR. THAYER, — MR. MALLORY, — MR, INGERSOLL. — MR. PENDLETON'S AMENDMENT. — JOINT RESOLUTION DEFEATED. MR. ASHLEY'S MOTION TO RECONSIDER.

THE Speaker of the House of Representatives, on Monday the 14th of December, 1863, after announcing the standing committees, stated that the first business in order was the call of the States for bills and joint resolutions. When the State of Ohio was called, Mr. Ashley (Rep.), Chairman of the Committee on Territories, introduced a bill to provide for submitting to the States a proposition to amend the Constitution, prohibiting slavery. The proposed amendment de clared that " slavery is hereby for ever prohibited in all the States of the Union, and in all Territories now owned, or which may hereafter be acquired, by the United States," Mr. William J. Allen (Dem.) of Page 250 Illinois demanded the reading of the bill, and it was read in full by the clerk, Mr. Ashley then moved its reference to the Committee on the Judiciary, Mr. Holman (Dem.) of Indiana objected to its second reading ; but the Speaker overruled his point of order, and the bill was read twice, and referred to the Judiciary Committee.

When the State of Iowa was called, Mr. Wilson (Rep.), Chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, introduced a joint resolution, submitting to the legislatures of the States this amendment to the Constitution : —

"Sect. 1. — Slavery, being incompatible with a free government, is for ever prohibited in the United States ; and involuntary servitude shall be permitted only as a punishment for crime.

" Sect. 2. — Congress shall have power to enforce the fore going section of this article by appropriate legislation."

Mr. Fernando Wood of New York, the acknowledged leader, in the House, of the peace Demo crats, demanded the reading of the amendment; and it was read twice, and referred to the Judiciary Committee.

The Committee on the Judiciary, to whom the House committed the bill of Mr. Ashley and the joint resolution of Mr. Wilson, was made up, by Speaker Colfax, of five Republicans, three Democrats, and Ex-Governor Thomas of Maryland, who generally sustained the pol icy of the Administration. Mr. Wilson of Iowa, chairman of the committee, Ex-Governor Boutwell of Massachusetts, and Mr. Williams of Pennsylvania, were known to be earnest and uncompromising anti-slavery Page 251 slavery men ; Mr. Woodbridge of Vermont and Mr. Morris of New York, though less known, were hardly less firm in adherence to the policy of emancipation ; Ex-Governor King (Dem.) of Missouri had allied him self to the slave-preserving interests of his State ; Mr. Bliss (Dem.) of Ohio was an avowed enemy of the emancipation policy of the Administration ; and Mr. Kernan (Dem.) of New York, though an able lawyer and liberal legislator, was the personal associate and political adherent of Governor Seymour, and was generally regarded as too deeply interested in the aspirations and fortunes of his friend and leader always to follow the convictions of his judgment or the generous im pulses of his heart. Ex-Governor Thomas of Maryland had recently committed himself to the policy of emancipation, and had allied himself to the party destined to make his native State a free commonwealth.

On the llth of January, 1864, Mr. Henderson (Ind.) of Missouri introduced into the Senate a joint resolution, proposing an amendment to the Constitution, providing that slavery shall not exist In the United States. The proposed amendment was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. That committee was composed of five Republicans, — Mr. Trumbull of Illinois, Mr. Foster of Connecticut, Mr. Ten Eyck of New Jersey, Mr. Harris of New York, and Mr. How and of Michigan; and of two Democrats, — Mr. Bayard of Delaware and Mr. Powell of Kentucky.

Mr. Sumner of Massachusetts, on the 8th of February, introduced a joint resolution, providing that, " everywhere -within the limits of the United States, and of each State or Territory thereof, all persons are Page 252 equal before the law, so that no person can hold another as a slave." Mr. Sumner moved the reference of the resolution to the Select Committee on Slavery, of which he was chairman. Mr. Trumbull would refer it to the Committee on the Judiciary, that had under consideration the amendment introduced early in the session by Mr. Henderson of Missouri. Mr. Fessenden suggested that Mr. Trumbull move to amend the motion of reference so as to substitute the Committee on the Judiciary. Mr. Trumbull replied, that he had suggested that reference to the senator from Massachusetts, thinking he would give it that direction. Mr. Doolittle of Wisconsin had never before heard that an amendment to the Constitution was ever referred to any other than the Judiciary Committee, and he thought it clearly ought to go to that committee. Mr. Sumner thought the resolution under which the Select Committee on Slavery was raised broad enough to cover any proposition in regard to slavery ; but If the senator from Illinois de sired the resolution to go to the Judiciary Committee, of which that senator was the honored head, he should consent with the greatest pleasure. Mr. Saulsbury of Delaware moved the indefinite postponement of the resolution : eight senators voted yea, and thirty-one senators voted nay. The resolution was then referred to the Judiciary Committee.

On the 10th of Febuary, Mr. Trumbull, from the Committee on the Judiciary, reported advisedly on Mr. Sumner’s resolution. At the same time, he made a report on the joint resolution originally introduced by Mr. Henderson, to strike out all after the resolving clause, and insert, —

Page 253 "That the following article bo proposed to the legislatures of the several States, as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by three-fourths of said legislatures, shall be valid, to all intents and purposes, as a part of the said Constitution ; namely : —

"Art. 13, Sect. 1. — Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. "

Sect. 2. — Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

On Monday, the 28th of March, the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, proceeded to consider the joint resolution ; the pending question being the amendment proposed by the Judiciary Committee to the original resolution introduced by Mr. Henderson. The chairman of the committee, Mr. Trumbull, opened the debate in a brief, clear, and comprehensive statement of the question. Speaking for the committee, he said, "I think, then, it is reasonable to suppose, that, if this proposed amendment passes Congress, it will, within a year, receive the ratification of the requisite number of States to make it a part of the Constitution. That accomplished, we are for ever freed of this troublesome question. We accomplish then what the statesmen of this country have been struggling to accomplish for years. We take this question entirely away from the politics of the country. We relieve Congress of sectional strifes ; and, what is better than all, we restore to a whole race that freedom which is theirs by the gift of God but which we for generations have wickedly denied them."

Page 254 Mr. Wilson (Rep.) of Massachusetts followed Mr. Trumbull in advocacy of the proposed amendment. " The crowning act," he said, " in this series of acts for the restriction and extinction of slavery in America, is this proposed amendment to the Constitution, prohibiting the existence of slavery for evermore In the Republic of the United States. If this amendment shall be incorporated by the will of the nation Into the Constitution of the United States, it will obliterate the last lingering vestiges of the slave system — its chattelizing, degrading, and bloody codes ; its dark, malignant, barbarizing spirit ; all it was and is ; every thing connected with it or pertaining to it — from the face of the nation it has scarred with moral desolation, from the bosom of the country it has reddened with the blood and strewn with the graves of patriotism. The incorporation of this amendment into the organic law of the nation will make impossible for evermore the re-appearing of the discarded slave system, and the re turning of the despotism of the slave-master's domination. Then, sir, when this amendment to the Constitution shall be consummated, the shackle will fall from the limbs of the hapless bondman, and the last drop from the weary hand of the task-master. Then the sharp cry of the agonizing hearts of severed families will cease to vex the weary ear of the nation, and to pierce the ear of Him whose judgments are now avenging the wrongs of centuries. Then the slave mart, pen, and auction-block, with their clanking fetters for human limbs, will disappear from the land they have brutalized ; and the schoolhouse will rise to enlighten the darkened intellect of a race imbruted by long years Page 255 of enforced ignorance. Then the sacred rights of human nature, the hallowed family relations of husband and wife, parent and child, will be protected by the guardian spirit of that law which makes sacred alike the proud homes and lowly cabins of freedom. Then the scarred earth, blighted by the sweat and tears of bondage, will bloom again under the quickening culture of rewarded toil. Then the wronged victim of the slave system, the poor white man, the aand-hUler, the clay-eater, of the wasted fields of Carolina, impoverished, debased, dishonored by the system that makes toil a badge of disgrace, and the instruction of the brain and soul of man a crime, will lift his abaahed forehead to the skies, and begin to run the race of improvement, progress, and elevation. Then the nation, 'regenerated and disenthralled by the genius of universal emancipation,' will run the career of development, power, and glory, quickened, animated, and guided by the spirit of the Christian democracy, that ' pulls not the highest down, but lifts the lowest up.'"

On the 30th, Mr. Davis of Kentucky addressed the Senate In opposition to the amendment, in a lengthy and discursive speech, in which he vehemently assaulted the Administration. " The most effective single cause of the pending war," he avowed, " was the intermeddling of Massachusetts with the Institution of slavery." He declared it to be an " objection of overruling weight, that no revision of the Constitution, in any form, ought to be undertaken under the auspices of the party in power." Mr. Davis closed his speech by the emphatic declaration, that "if the dominant party can continue their power and rule, either by the will or acquiescence Page 256 of the people, or the exercise of the formidable powers which it has usurped, I am not able to see any termination of the present and still growing ills short of the ordeal of general and bloody anarchy." On the 3d of March, Mr. Davis had presented an amendment, in which he proposed that the States of Maine and Massachusetts should form and constitute one State of the United States, to be called East New England ; and the States of New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Vermont, should form and constitute one State of the United States, to be called West New England. This division of New England into two States — Maine and Massachusetts, separated by New Hampshire, constituting East New England ; and New Hampshire and Vermont, Connecticut and Rhode Island, separated by Massachusetts, constituting West New England — seemed, to those familiar with the map of the country, to be rather an awkward geographical division. But, at the close of his speech, the senator from Kentucky, having doubtless extended his geographical researches, proposed a new arrangement, — that "the States of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, are formed into and shall constitute one State of the United States, to be called North New England ; and the States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, are formed into and constitute one State of the United States, to be called South New England." But this new geographical and political division of New England was not brought by its originator to the test of a vote of the Senate.

Mr. Saulsbury of Delaware followed on the 31st in opposition to the amendment, and in vindication of Page 257 slavery on principle. " The Almighty " he said, " imediately after the Flood, condemned a whole race to servitude. He said, 'Cursed be Canaan.' Slavery continued among all people until the advent of the Christian era. It was recognized in the new dispensation which was to supersede the old. It has the sanction of God's own apostles ; for, when Paul sent back Onesiraus to Philemon, he sent his doulos, a slave born as such." Mr. Clark of New Hampshire followed Mr. Saulsbury, in a speech of much clear ness and force, in favor of the amendment. " I am told," he said, "that this is not the time for such an amendment of the Constitution. Pray when, sir, will it come? Will it be when the President has issued more and more calls for two or three hundred thousand men of the country’s bravest and best? Will it be when more fathers and husbands and sons have fallen, and their graves are thicker by the banks of the rivers and streamlets and hillsides? it be when there are more scenes like this I hold in my hand, — an artist's picture, a photograph of an actuality, — a quiet spot by the side of a river, with the moon shining upon the water, and a lonely sentinel keeping guard ; and here, in the open space, the head-boards marking the burial-places of many a soldier-boy, and an open grave to receive another inmate ; and, underneath, the words, All quiet on the Potomac ' ? Will it be when such scenes of quiet are more numerous,. not only along the Potomac, but by the Rapidan, the Chickahominy, the Stone, the Tennessee, the Cumberland, the Big Black, and the Red? Sir, now, in my judgment, is the time, and the fitting time. Never until now could Page 258 this amendment have been carried ; and now I hope and believe it can."

On the 4th of April, Mr. Howe of Wisconsin made a quaint and earnest speech for the amendment. " What," he asked, " are the apologies for this Institution ? I have heard them. We hear them daily. That which we hear the oftenest, that which is insisted upon the loudest, is, that slaves are only made of negros, or of the descendants of negroes, and that they, as a race, are inferior to the whites. Whether the fact is as or not, I shall not spend a moment in arguing ; but I affirm this, that if, in the whole catalogue of excuses that are offered for crimes and offences, one single excuse could be found more odious than the crime itself, it is this one excuse for slavery. Admit that, as a race, they are inferior to the race of the whites : I ask senators, I ask men, if that is a fact which authorizes you or me to enslave them. Sir, the excuse not only shames what sense of manhood there is in us who are grown up, but it shames all the manliness of the boys of the country." Mr. Johnson, on the 5th of April, addressed the Senate In support of the amendment. The representative of a slave State just casting aside its burden, a lawyer of acknowledged eminence, and a statesman of large experience, his speech com manded the marked attention of the Senate. In the outset of his remarks, he moat emphatically avowed, "I am satisfied now, and I was satisfied throughout all the contests in which that question has been presented, that, sooner or later, the present condition of things was in evitable, or something nearly like them. If," said he, "there be justice in God's providence. If we are at liberty to suppose that he will not abandon man and Page 259 his rights to their own fate, and suffer their destiny to be worked out by their own means and with their own lights, I never doubted that the day must come when human slavery would be exterminated by a convulsive effort on the part of the bondmen, unless that other and better reason and influence which might bring it about should be successful, — the mild though powerful influences of that higher and elevated morality which the Christian religion teaches."

At the close of Mr. Johnson's speech, Mr. Davis moved to strike out all after the word "namely" in the amendment reported by the committee, and insert, "No negro, or person whose mother or grandmother is or was a negro, shall be a citizen of the United States, and be eligible to any civil or military office,. or to any place of trust or profit, under the United States." The question, being taken by yeas and nays, resulted — yeas 5, nays 32. Mr. Davis then proposed to amend the amendment reported by the committee by adding these words to the first action of the proposed article : " But no slave shall be entitled to his or her freedom under this amendment, if resident, at the time it taken effect, in any State the laws of which forbid free negroes to reside therein, until removed from such State by the Government of the United States." Upon this amendment he asked the yeas and nays ; but only four senators sustained his call, and his amendment was rejected without a division. Mr. Davis further proposed to amend the amendment by adding at the end of the second section, that Congress shall distribute the emancipated slaves among the free States. This amendment was rejected without a division. Mr. Powell now Page 260 moved to amend the amendment of the committee by adding at the end of the first section, "No slaves shall be emancipated by this article, unless the owner thereof shall be first paid the value of the slave or slaves so emancipated," — yeas 2, nays 34. On the fifth of April, Mr. Harlan of Iowa addressed the Senate in an exhaustive speech in favor of the amendment of the Constitution. He emphatically denied any just title to the services of the adult offspring of the slave mother, and pronounced it "a mere usurpation, without any known mode of justification under any existing code of laws human or divine. . . . The justice of this claim," he declared, "cannot be found either in reason, natural justice, or the principles of the common law, or in any positive municipal or statute regulation of any State, or in the Hebrew code written by the finger of God protruded from the flame of fire on the summit. of Sinai." Mr. Harlan was followed by Mr. Saulsbury in a labored defence of slavery, and in denunciation of the proposed amendment of the Constitution, as a "fraud" upon the nation. He pronounced " such an amendment to be the clearest cause of secession that could possibly be furnished or that ever has been furnished to any State." Mr. Hale made an earnest, eloquent, and effective appeal in favor of placing the nation in harmony with the laws of God. He closed his speech by saying, " Sir, when the great founder of the Dutch Republic (William the Silent, I think he was called), after losing his armies, his treasure, his finances, and every thing but his own indomitable courage and his Christian faith, counselled his followers again to rally, and again to strike for freedom, they asked him, ' Have you secured Page 261 any alliances? are there any of the potentates and powers of the earth that you could associate with, that will aid you in the struggle in which you propose to en gage?' his answer was, 'Yes: I have allied myself to the King of kings, and in his strength I invite you to go to battle.' Sir, that is the position, and the only position, this nation can occupy. If we cannot do that ; if we cannot put away from us the great sin and the great crime which has separated us, not only from the sympathies of the Christian world, but from the blessings of the God of the Christian world, — then indeed is our cause hopeless and our struggle desperate." Mr. M'Dougall of California, in a brief, clear, and emphatic speech, denounced the proposed amendment of the Constitution, and the entire antislavery policy of the Government. He would vote against the amendment of the Constitution if he stood alone in the Senate. The adoption of the amendment "would add twenty -five or fifty per cent to the vital forces of the Southern Confederacy." He had opposed the antislavery policy. "It achieves," he declared, "nothing that tends toward victory : it only arouses the fiercer animosity of an already violent foe." Mr. Powell was opposed to any amendment ; but, if we are to enter upon that work, let us exhibit to the world that our ideas are not restricted to one, — the subject of African slavery ; and he proposed several amendments, which were voted down, without reference to their merits, by the friends of the amendment to the Constitution for the extinction of slavery. Mr. Davis proposed an amendment concerning the election of President, which was rejected without a division. The amendment of the Judiciary Committee Page 262 was then adopted, and the joint resolution reported to the Senate as amended.

On the 7th, Mr. Hendricks of Indiana spoke in op position to the amendment of the Constitution. He had never, he said, discussed the moral question of slavery before the people. " I do not," he said, " intend to dis cuss it here, because with the moral questions of slavery the Federal Government has nothing to do. Are the negroes," he asked, "to remain among us? I can say to the senator, that they never will associate with the white people of this country upon terms of equality." Mr. Henderson of Missouri, the mover of the original proposition, followed Mr. Hendricks in a lengthy, thorough, and effective speech in advocacy of the extinction of slavery by a constitutional amendment. "Our ancestors," he said, "acknowledged the truth, when they proclaimed the inalienable right of liberty unto all men. That declaration gave them liberty. It fired the world, and enlisted the sympathies of civilization. So soon as they obtained it for themselves, however, the false counsels of expediency came te refuse it to others."

Mr. Sumner, on the 8th, spoke in favor of the extinction of slavery by constitutional amendments and by other modes of legislation. " There is nothing," he declared, "in the Constitution, on which slavery can rest, or find even the least support. Even on the face of that instrument, it is an outlaw; but. If we look further at its provisions, we find at least four distinct sources of power, which, if executed, must render slavery impossible, while the preamble makes them all vital for freedom : first, the power to provide for the common defence Page 263 and general welfare ; secondly, the power to raise armies and maintain navies ; thirdly, the power to guarantee to every State a republican form of government ; and, fourthly, the power to secure liberty to every person restrained without due process of law. But all these provisions are something more than powers : they are duties also. And yet we are constantly and painfully reminded in this Chamber that pending measures against slavery are unconstitutional. Sir, this is an immense mistake. Nothing against slavery can be unconstitutional. It is only hesitation which is unconstitutional." Mr. Sumner closed by moving to amend the bill by striking out the words of the proposed article, and inserting the following : " All persons are equal before the law, so that no person can hold another as a slave ; and Congress may make all laws necessary and proper to carry this article into effect everywhere within the United States and the jurisdiction thereof."

Mr. Powell did not believe, with Mr. Clark, that " slavery was the cause of all our woes. The bad faith of the abolitionists had done more to bring this war about than all the efforts of the fire-eaters of the South." At the close of Mr. Powell’s speech, the Vice-President stated the question to be on the amendment moved by Mr. Sumner. " In placing," said Mr. Sumner, " a new and important text into the Constitution, it seems to me we cannot be too careful in the language we adopt." The amendment proposed by the committee, he thought, started with the attempt to reproduce the Jefferson Ordinance ; and he doubted the expediency of reproducing that ordinance : for he objected " to the Jefferson Ordinance, even if it were presented in its Page 264 original text. He should prefer the form sent to the Chair, which he offered as a suggestion ; but, if senators did not incline to it, he had no desire to press it." — " At an early stage of the session," said Mr. Trumbull, " the senator from Missouri introduced a proposition to amend the Constitution of the United States so as for ever to prohibit slavery. That resolution was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. At a later day, a month or two afterwards, the senator from Massachusetts also introduced a proposition to prohibit slavery. The committee had both those propositions before them. . . I do not know that I should have adopted these precise words ; but a majority of the committee thought they were the best words : they accomplish the object ; and I cannot see why the senator from Massachusetts should be so pertinacious about particular words," — "I wish, as much as the senator from Massachusetts," said Mr. Howard of Michigan, " in malting this amendment, to use significant language, — language that can not be mistaken or misunderstood : but I prefer to dismiss all reference to French constitutions or French codes, and go back to the good old Anglo-Saxon language employed by our fathers in the Ordinance of 1787 ; an expression which has been adjudicated upon repeatedly, which is perfectly well understood both by the public and by judicial tribunals ; a phrase, I may say further, which is peculiarly near and dear to the people of the North-western Territory, from whose soil slavery was excluded by it." Mr. Sumner withdrew his proposition. Mr. Saulsbury offered an amendment embodied in twenty sections ; but, on a division, only two votes were given for it. Mr. M'Dougall thought, before the final Page 265 vote was taken, it was due to himself to make a few remarks. " I look upon this policy," he said, " as being a policy for sacrificing the whole of the colored people now occupying parts of this Republic. This policy will Ingulf them. They can never commingle with us." The yeas and nays were then taken on the passage of the joint resolution, submitting to the legislatures of the several States a proposition to amend the Constitution of the United States ; and 38 senators voted yea, and 6 senators voted nay, as follows : —

Yeas, — Messrs. Anthony, Brown, Chandler, Clark, Collamer, Conness, Cowan, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Foot, Foster, Grimes, Hale, Harding, Harlan, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Johnson, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nesmith, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Ten Eyck, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Wilkinson, Willey, and Wilson, — 38,

Nays, — Messrs. Davis, Hendricks, M'Dougall, Powell, Riddle, and Saulsbury, — 8,

In the House of 'Representatives, on the 31st of May, the joint resolution, submitting to the legislatures of the several States a proposition to amend the Constitution of the United States, was taken up. Mr. Holman (Dem.) of Indiana objected to its second reading ; and the Speaker stated the question to be, " Shall the joint resolution be rejected?" Mr. Wilson (Rep.) of Iowa demanded the previous question, and Mr. Schenck (Rep.) of Ohio demanded the yeas and nays, — yeas 55, nays 76.

Mr. Wilson, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, having, at an early day before the proposed amendment was discussed in either House, made an elaborate speech in favor of the extinction of slavery by the adoption of a constitutional amendment, yielded the floor to Mr. Page 266 Morris of New York, a member of the Judiciary Committee. "I aver," declared Mr. Morris, in opening the debate, " that no nation can violate any moral law, with out incurring a penalty. No member of society, no matter how weak or humble, can be oppressed, without injury to the whole. It is an inexorable law. There is a system of compensation in the economy of God, and applicable to nations and individuals, as inevitable as that fire will burn. We may not admit it ; but time will realize the fact. We may not recognize the hand ; but the chastening will come as certainly as that God is just. Legislators as well as divines should remember these truths."

Mr. Herrick (Dem.) of New York followed Mr. Morris in opposition to the amendment. He declared that " the adoption of this measure could have no other effect than to seal for ever the dissolution of the Union : it meant nothing else than eternal disunion, continuous war." Mr. Kellogg (Rep.) of New York followed in support of the amendment, and for the suppression of the Rebellion. " No expense," he said, " no sacrifice, no allurement, must deter or divert us ; but rising with the emergency, and equal to every fate, we must meet and master every obstacle that stands in the way of the complete supremacy of the Constitution and the laws."

The consideration of the question was resumed on the 14th of June; and Mr. Pruyn (Dem.) of New York addressed the House In opposition to the amendment. Mr. Fernando Wood (Dem.) of New York said that " the bloody and brutal policy of the Administration party had well-nigh destroyed all hope of reconstruction. This proposed alteration of the Page 267 Constitution was beyond the power of the Government. It involves the extermination of the white men of the South em States, and the forfeiture of all the land and other property belonging to them. Necroes and military colonists will take the place of the race thus blotted out of existence. Is this intended as the last scene of the bloody drama of carnage and civil war now being prosecuted ? The world looks on with horror, and it will leave to future ages a fearful warning to avoid similar acts of perfidious atrocity." Mr. Higby (Rep.) of California said, " The Constitution should be adapted to the condition of the country where the noble men of the loyal States are giving up their lives and where they have given them up by thousands. Their bones are bleaching upon hundreds of battle-fields. They are drenching with their blood the soil over which they are moving, with Victory perching on their banners, and killing out the roots of slavery so that it cannot exist." "It is an attempt," said Mr. Kalbfleisch (Dem.) of New York, " to replenish their almost exhausted stock of political capital by creating a new issue based upon the slavery question before the people, in the hope of renewing that agitation upon the turbulent waves of which they were swept into the power which they have so deplorably abused." Mr. Wheeler (Dem.) of Wisconsin presented an amendment to add to the resolution, — " that this article shall not apply to the States of Kentucky, Missouri, Delaware, and Maryland, until after the expiration .of ten years from the time the same shall be ratified." " Slavery," said Mr. Shannon (Rep.) of California, " is paganism refined, brutality vitiated, dishonesty corrupted ; and, sir, we are asked Page 268 to retain this curse, to protect it, after it has corrupted our sons, dishonored our daughters, subverted our institutions, and shed rivers of the best blood of our country men." Mr. Marcy (Dem.) of New Hampshire assured the supporters of the Administration that their " career was fast drawing to a close." Mr. Coffroth (Dem.) of Pennsylvania opposed the bill, and bitterly assailed the policy of the Administration. " Slavery," he exclaimed, " is denounced as the cause of the Rebellion. I deny this, though it may be the occasion, as money Is the occasion of larceny, robbery, or burglary." — "I was here," said Mr. Kellogg (Rep.) of Michigan, " when the Rebellion broke out ; and I do not believe the adoption of the Crittenden Compromise would have postponed the war a single week. Southern senators laughed at the idea of being satisfied in such a way. They were determined, to dissolve the Union, and establish a separate government in conformity with their ideas ; and they firmly believed that we would allow them to do so. They had a supreme contempt for the people of the North, and never dreamed of the difficulties in the way, or the opposition they were to encounter. They had made up their minds to do as they pleased, and set the Government of the United States at defiance." Mr. Ross (Dem.) of Illinois advocated peace. He suggested that " we first agree upon an armistice, and then send commissioners, to meet, on the 4th of July, at Mount Vernon, around the grave of Washing ton." He declared that "suggestions in favor of an amicable adjustment" would not meet the approbation of the adherents of the Administration. Mr. Holman (Dem.) of Indiana said, "This bill, having Page 269 passed the Senate, only awaits the approval of the House. Of all the measures of this disastrous Administration, each in Its turn producing new calamities, this attempt to tamper with the Constitution threatens the moat permanent injury."

The debate was continued, on the 15th of June, by Mr. Farnsworth (Rep.) of Illinois. "When," said he, "we stood in the breach, and declared that slavery should go no further ; that it should not spread over the land ; that they should not ' call the roll of their slaves under the shadow of Bunker Hill,' nor ' flog them in the corn-fields of Illinois,' — then the slaveholders brought on the Rebellion." Mr. Thayer (Rep.) of Pennsylvania declared that " humanity and civilization revolt against a sentiment so inhuman in itself, and so debasing to the mind that holds it, as the sentiment which we listened to yesterday, — that slavery is the best possible condition of the negro race." — "I re-affirm it," said Mr. Fernando Wood. "I am willing," replied Mr. Thayer, " that he should re affirm it. ... I can only say, that, for myself, I would not hold or avow a sentiment so barbarous, so cruel, and so inhuman in Its character, as that, for all the wealth and honor that are embraced within the four quarters of the world."

Mr. Mallory (Dem.) of Kentucky denounced the proposed amendment of the Constitution as a palpable violation of the reserved rights of the States." — "Madness and despair rule," said Mr. Kelley (Rep.) of Pennsylvania ; " and I shall consume none of the brief time allotted to me by following the gentleman from Kentucky. . . . But, sir, the privilege is not often Page 270 given to men to perform an act, the influence of which will be felt beneficently by the poor, the oppressed, the ignorant, and the degraded of all lands, and which will endure until terminated by the wreck of matter and the crush of worlds. I rise that I may thus publicly thank God, and the good people by whose suffrages I am here to-day, for the golden opportunity afforded me of doing such an act."

Mr. Edgerton (Dem.) of Indiana avowed that it was " better for our country, better for man, that negro exist a thousand years, than that American white men lose their constitutional liberty in the extinction of the constitutional sovereignty of the Federal States of this Union." — "Never," said Mr. Arnold (Rep.) of Illinois, "since the day when John Adams pleaded for the Declaration of Independence, has so important a question been submitted to an American Congress as that upon which you are now about to vote. The aligning of the immortal Declaration is a familiar picture in every log-cabin and residence all over the land. Pass this resolution, and the grand spectacle of this vote, which knocks off the fetters of a whole race, will make this scene immortal." Mr. Ingersoll (Rep.) of Illinois, the successor of Owen Lovejoy, followed Mr. Arnold in an earnest and eloquent appeal for the amendment. " I know full well," he said, "if the lamented Lovejoy, my honored and noble predecessor, could come to-day from the unseen world, and take his place among us, his manly and eloquent voice would be heard in this hall, as in days past, with all the earnestness of his great soul, pronouncing in favor of the adoption of this resolution Page 271 in favor of universal liberty and the rights of man kind."

Mr. Randall (Dem.) of Pennsylvania maintained that " the only made in which the Union can be restored, and put on the march of a newer and more glorious progress, is by having due regard to the mutual advantages and interests of the States." Mr. Rollins of Missouri opposed the amendment in an earnest speech. Mr. Pendleton (Dem.) of Ohio moved, as a substitute for the joint resolution, a provision submitting it to the conventions of the several-States, so that the ratification, if at all, shall be by conventions of three-fourths of the States. Mr. Pendleton made an elaborate speech in opposition to the amendment of the Constitution. "We must," he said, "retrace our steps ; we must return to State rights." At the close of Mr. Pendleton's speech, the House proceeded to vote. The amendments proposed by Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Pendleton were rejected. Mr. Holman de manded the yeas and nays on the passage of the joint resolution, and they were ordered.

The question was taken ; and it was decided in the negative, — yeas 93, nays 65, not voting 23, — as follows : —

Yeas. — Messrs. Alley, Allison, Ames, Anderson, Arnold, Baily, John D, Baldwin, Baxter, Beaman, Blaine, Blair, Blow, Boutwell, Boyd,- Brandegee, Broomall, Ambrose W. Clark, Freeman Clarke, Cobb, Cole, Creswell, Dawes, Deming, Dixon, Donnelly, Driggs, Eckley, Eliot, Farnsworth, Fenton, Frank, Garfield, Gooch, Griswold, Hale, Higby, Hooper, Hotchkiss, Asahel W, Hubbard, John H, Hub bard, Hulburd, Ingersoll, Jenckes, Julian, Kasson, Kelley, Francis W, Kellogg, Orlando Kellogg, Littlejohn, Loan, Longyear, Marvin, M'Clurg, M'Indoe, Samuel F. Miller, Moorhead, Morrill, Daniel Morris, Amos Myers, Leonard Myers, Norton, Odell, Charles O'Neill, Page 272 Orth, Patterson, Perham, Pike, Price, Alexander H, Rice, John H, Rice, Schenck, Scofield, Shannon, Sloan, Smith, Sraithers, Spalding, Starr, Stevens, Thayer, Thomas, Tracy, Upson, Van Valkenburgh, Elihu B, Washburne, Webster, Whaley, Wheeler, Williams, Wilder, Wilson, Windom, and Woodbridge, — 93,

Nays, — Messrs. James C, Allen, William J, Allen, Ancona, Ashley, Augustus C, Baldwin, Bliss, Brooks, James S, Brown, Chanler, Coffroth, Cox, Cravens, Dawson, Denison, Eden, Edgerton, Eldridge, English, Finck, Ganson, Grider, Harding, Harrington, Herrick, Holman, Hutchins, Philip Johnson, William .Johnson, KiilbHeisch, Kernan, King, Law, Lazear, Le Blond, Long, Mallory, Marcy, M’Allister, M'Dowell, M'Kinney, William H. Miller, James R. Morris, Morrison, Noble, John O'Neill, Pendleton, Pruyn, Radford, Samuel J, Randall, Robinson, Rogers, James S, Rollins, Ross, Scott, John B, Steele, William G, Steele, Stiles, Strouse, Stuart, Sweat, Wadsworth, Ward, Chilton A, White, Joseph W, White, and Fernando Wood, — 66,

Not Voting, — Messrs. William G, Brown, Clay, Henry Winter Davis, Thomas T, Davis, Dumont, Grinnell, Hall, Benjamin 6, Harris, Charles M, Harris, Knapp, M'Bride, Middleton, Nelson, Perry, Pomeroy, William H, Randall, Edward II, Rollins, Stebbins, Voorhees, William B, Washburn, Winfield, Benjamin Wood, and Yeaman, — 23.

So the joint resolution was not passed; two-thirds not having voted in favor thereof. Mr. Odell (Dem.) of New York, Mr. Griswold (Dem.) of New York, Mr. Bally (Dem.) of Pennsylvania, and Mr. Wheeler (Dem.) of Wisconsin, voted for the joint resolution. Mr. Ashley (Rep.) changed his vote from the affirmative to the negative, for the purpose of submitting, at the proper time, a motion to reconsider. Mr. Ash ley entered his motion to reconsider the vote ; and that motion is now the pending question in the House.

Source: Wilson, Henry. History of the Antislavery Measures of the Thirty-Seventh and Thirty-Eighth United States Congresses, 1861-1865, Boston: Walker, Fuller, & Co., 1865.