Mr. VOORHEES. Mr. Speaker, I arise today to discuss the annual message of the president. In (IOlllo so, I am aware that to the majority on this floor I may appear as a meddler in a family concern. It would seem from the remarks of members here, and the comments of the press in various quarters. that the right to approve or disapprove the policy of the Executive is the exclusive monopoly of the 2 now belligerent wings of the dominnnt party. Indeed, F.) I believe it is a new and very dangerous phase of disloyalty for one of the minority to have an], opinion at all on the subject. I cannot, however, accept this position of silence and mac tivity. Not that wish to bring any reciiforce merits which are not sought to the aid of either of the jarring factions on the opposite side of the Chamber, but as a citizen lovsng my conn tiy, and as the Representative of a large and enlightened constituency, it is my duty and my right here to advocate what in my sight seems best as a remedy for the evils which surround us and if this sense of ublic duty leads me to adopt and defend the policy of the Executive what offense can it be to his real or pretended friends in this body? How indignant we were in the days of our childhood over that dog in the manger, who would neither enjoy the comforts and blessings of life himself, nor let anybody else do sol and hero in our mature manhood we behold the same principle of action ado ited by a great party. It refuses to indorse the President of its own election, and, growls and fiercely shows its teeth if anyone else proposes to perform that neglected duty. ow me, sir, another preliminary observation. I have no design on this occasion to violate the divine injunction which says, “Thou shalt not steal.” A few days ago, when I introduced the very brief and very plain resolutions now under consideration, it was instantly heralded over the country, and especially iu the yarnal conducted by the Gentfrom NewYork e, al [then PResident.; that I had attempted to Sir, these hungry and sordid spirits pay a poorer compliment to the President than even they do to me, and I will hasten to quiet their miserable apprehensions. it is no part of my purpose to attempt to step between them and the ffeslipitls. For public patronage. I have no eye on the public crib at which they have fed so long an grown so fat. I do not covet their offices, their rich commissions, their unfathomable contracts, nor anything that is theirs. We i of theminority have lived through storm and, darkness and fiery persecutions without such assistance to our patriotism, and at this late day. we shall not bent our knees because thrift may follow fawning. Our action will be inde end eat, with no desire, like the adroit animal In the fable, to take advantage of the quarrel which now rages among the victors to snatch away the feast over which they are contending. For my part, as in the past, so in the future, I shall pursue what I conceive to be the right, indifferent alike to the allurements of reward or the terrors of reroach and now, Mr. Speaker, what are the issues which are submitted to the country by the policy of the Executive as declared in his an nual message? Are they new, strange, or sin ister, that they should be received with indig nation and alarm? Is it a document bristling with dangerous dogmas hitherto unheard of in the administration of the Government? Does it read like a wide and violent departure from the teachin s of our earlier and happier days? Sir, it has conassailed in both ends of the Capitol by the ablest and oldest veterans of the republican party, as if every line was lecherous and ) every word filled with contagion and death. Indeed, prior to the meeting of Congress as the policy of the President was develope in his treatment of the southern States, we behold the indications of an organized conspiracy to assail him with the masked face of friendship but with the treacherous sword of Joab. The insidious kiss that betrays is neither new nor respectable in strategic warfare; and men and parties have often heretofore made kindly salutation, “How is it with thee, my brother?” when their poniards point was seeking a vital spot under the 5th rig. We heard during all the summer and fall the murmurs and mutterings of angry dissent, as each new development of n the Presidentsion to restore the Government on its ancient oundations, as llCZlll as now POSSibIOLCt lmObefore i“ the Speaker. oAfnthiwshbeond my friend and colleague, I entertain none but feelin s of personal kindness, came to this city as the acknowledged heir a parent to the position which he now fills so we I, what was his language to the public? Did he give the weight of his voice to. The Admiuistration? His words were carefully studied, and yet it would be hard to discover from that famous serenade speech that the Executive had done anything at all toward the pacification of the country. He laid down apolire for Congress but as nearly as possiblei Ynoied the policyAand even the emstence of the resident. His position was the sign and the forerunner of the cel ebrated select committee, created by the magic wand of the consciencekeeperof the majority, the able, and flveteran leader; fromlennsyLvania, M}. SFfitENS];thut potent wand which has evoked from the vasty deep of political agitation more spirits of evil and malignant mischief than generations, I fear, will be able to exorcise and put down. By this movement the whole question of restoration, with entire forgetfulness of the laborsand achievements of the Executive, was placed in commission, and intrusted to the keeping of a board of political trade at whose head stands one who asserts that themllnion was destfr edby the war, and that it remains so to this ay. By this movement we are called upon to transport ourselves back to the chaotic days of lastA ril, and to take no note of time or events since tion. We are asked to ravel to pieces all that the President has done and to commence the knitting process of reunion for ourselves. The healing principles of the constitution are, in my judgment, rapidly doing the needed work of restoration, an yet we are at this stage of the process asked to break again the once fractured limbs, to tear ape the half closed wounds, and to cause the whole land to bleed afresh. Sir, I shall stand by the physician who is working the cure, as against that blind and fatal empiricism which 1st pronounces the patient dead and then commences giving medicine. Let usindu ge ourselves in aretrospect. Let us lift ourselves to a position which history will occupy some generations hence, and then ask and answer the question which is involved in the issue now made against the President because of his conduct and his policy. I min no sense his partisan. 1 did not support him for the office which led to his present position. I dreaded the use he would make of power when he attained it. I feared the operations of a character which I had heard represented as strongly tenacious of a sense of personal in jury which I knew he had suffered. But. since i the day on which he took the oath of Office I have beheld the public magistrate, not. the private man. An who ever, in all the tide of time, became the head of a great nation under circumstances more appalling to the stoutest heart and the most commanding intellect than those which surrounded him? A war whose tremendous blows had shaken both hemispheres hadjust closed, and night and chaos hovered over the face of the deep. Battles between brethren had been fought which dwarf and be little the warlike exploits of all ages, and which startled the invisible world by the flight of disembodied spirits. The peole and the States of the whole country, weary, icedstained, and almost blind from the fury of the conflict, had gaused upon an agreement to fight no more. but in that disastrous contest what ancient principles of the Government had escaped protanation? Who had stopped to count how much the objectcost for which the wager of battle was joined? Laws, liberties, and constitutions had asserted themselves in vain and I confess that, as I saw the fierce lightning which civilWar engenders strike and shiver again and again the household gods of fireside liberty, and blast almostevery sacred fane of American worship, I had my hours of absolute despairnot despair over the unity of our territorial bound aries, but thatwhen those boundaries should be restored they would embracc nothing but the dead, clieerless, and cold ashes of the former bright and glowing tires of freedom. I shraflkfrom the contemplation of a ruined republic and a triumphant despotism with more unfeigned horror an I ever shrank from the contemplationvof death and the grave and when the sound of the last cannon died away on the sorrowful and stricken fields of Virginia and the Carolinas he who, at the head of aliairs, would breathe into the expiring form of legal liberty the breath of life, and by his touch revive and erect again in form an substance the ancient body of the Republic, although bruised, maimed, and in parts defaced, an requiring time to renew its strengththat man, whoever he may be, and whatever may be his political views on other questions, is, in my eyes, the savior of his country. Sir, history tells a melancholy story of usur pations at such periods. They are the opportunity of t rants and mad, impracticable inno vators. e who wishes to mount to imperial power on the ruins of civil liberty, or by a change in the form of the Government to, oagry out schemes of private hate or Utopian speculation, wpuld cm race the month ofApiil, 1865, in American history as the point from which to deal destruction. But starting from that point, what direction did the President pursue I here are many matters of mine r detail for which subordiriate ofhcials are mainly responsible, which I might Wish widely different, but I am now dealin with the main question of restoration. Upon is 1st utterance he gave notice of the doctrine, then as now, that the American Union had never been broken, and that its States had never ceased to exist. This gave assurance to the country at once that he was a conservative and not a destructive, a restorer of an ancient order of things and not adestroyer in the name of progress and reform: How can I fail to support him in this position, when my own language, March 9, 1864, in the midst: of the sound of arms, was as follows? I quote from aspeech delivered by me in this House: “Tho great leader of the Administration on this floor. the Gentfrom Pennsylvania. [Mr. STEVENS.) has deliberately hero announced, atierall our sacrifices. sorrows, and loss. that the union of our fathers is dead, and that he who attemptsits resurrection is a criminal insteadof a patriot. He goes further and admits all the seceded States have ever claimed their nntionality. They huve soughtjn vain in all the 4 quarters of the carth for ieedgnition. They find it ntlast at the hands of thosewho speak for the administration on this fluof. “Sir. I deny this doctrine. I plant myself on the constitution, which recognizes an unbroken Union. I ifsIhall stand there in everyvicissitudeof fortune and fall it will be when the people themselves abandon theirown constitution. By the principles of this mighty instrument I expect finally a restoration of the union of the States. Every hour which the party in power prolongs its control of affairs postpones the auspicious day: but as I behold the tuture it will as suredly come. Material and indestructible interests unite every section except that which piosperson fa naticism and I hero today, in the:1 iirit of one who expects and desires his posterity and theirs i0 ll6 together in the ancient and honorable friendship of their fathers. warn the southern people not to look forward to separation and indopendence but to embrace every opportunity for cooperation With the conservative men of the North. who will aid with their lives. if need be. to secure them all their rights and institutions as free and equal citizens of the U.S. ” This doctrine is the chief comerstone of the message, and has invited the attack of theoretical reform, but practical disunron. Shall I stop at this day and our of American history to discuss the right or power of a State to secede? I never entertairie such aprinciple, nor did even many of the principal leaers ot the late attempt to establish the confederacy of the South. They asserted the right of revolution and used the organizations of State governments in aid of that movement. But wh10 now requires an argument on this point? Do we not all understand and know that this theory of dead States is now proclaimed simply because its adoption would give better scope to ulterior de5igns of vengeance and revolutionary destruction? It is true that the Gentfrom Pennsylvania [Mr. STEVENS] has been consistent in his devotion to it when he stood almost if not quite alone; but that simply proves that he could foresee at a greater distance than his fellow laborers the means which would be required to acco hsh their party ends when the war ceased. Ic knows t int “ dead CILXCW his own striking language, are more easiy carved to pieces, torn llimIi from limb, and devoured by the hungry maw of confiscation than living States. The dead can make no retest when the mutilating knife is aplied. certain beasts of prey, we are told, preor to find their quarry read slain, in order to feast upon it in comfort an repose and so the radical party of the country would find it easier far to make its unnatural banquet on the rights, privileges, laws, liberties, and property of the South by declaring at once that there is no living political community in all that wide region to exclaim against the enormity. Its reasoning on this point is that it is safer and less troublesome to rob a corpse than it is to pick the pockets of the living. This is the highwaymans doctrine of convenience, introduced here now as a party platform. It is more and worse. It is an assertion that the American Union itself is dead. nut and restored? Willa it claims that the southern States have destroyed themselves, yet it admits that, like blind Samson of old, in their dying agonies they seized hold of the pillars and tore the temple in ruins to its very foundations, and that they in their desolation today are only a portion of the general wreck. It is notice to the world that the war to restore the Union was an utter failurethat the war is over and yet the Union is rent in twain. We have incurred a debt which would absorb for its payment now one 4th of all the taxable property in the U.S. Blood has flown li e the torrents of the mountains, and lives have been swept away like autumn leaves in a storm, and ct neither people nor States, according to the logic which assails the president, have been brought back into the Union to repay these stupen ous sacrifices. But still further. In what attitude before the civilized nations does this pernicious heresy place the Federal Government? If we were waging war on an independent Power, a separate existing nation, how was it that we refused all negotiations for peace except upon the basis of its utter annihilation? Wars between different civilized Powersare made to repair inuries to present insults, or to reclaim rights which have been denied; but there is no law of nations which justifies one Government, because of its supe prior strength, in inflicting obliteration and mur der upon its inferior neighbor. This doctrine is one of barbarism, in which the law of force is the law of right. Much pathetic eloquence and many bitter tears have attested the worlds sympathy with Poland, with Hungary, and with poor, poor Ireland, and maledictions attend upon their destro era; but with what curses of indignation would an enlightened osterily and an impartial history assail us for biiitting out by sheci force ofarms a nation of our own kindred, who simply desired to possess their own in peace and leave us to do the samel Sir, in every as pect the theory which now controls the majority of this House is fraught with death an disgrace to the Republic. I turn from its contem plation to a more cheerful theme. I will contrast against it the conduct and principles of the Executive, for which, I think, e deserves well at the hands of his countrymen. i What was the wish, the hope, the prayer of every heart not fatally cut on mischief, not an enemy to the human race, when the last of the southern forces laid down their arms? Was it that this bitter period of strife should be relonged and the tires of hate and malice ept alive forever? Was it that at the close of such a hurricane, with the billows yet swelling in angry commotion around us, we were to start afresh upon the long voyage of litieal discov cry and legislative piracy which t ie bold mariner from Pennsylvania mr STEVENS] and his radical followers now, like Viking robbers of the ancient seas, point out to us? Was it not rather that the vesse should be brought back and ui etly and firmly anchored as nearly as ossi Is at her old moorings? Was it not rather that the comerstones, bounda lines, and land marks of the fathers of the e public should be ere assert that when the President closed the temple of Janus, refused to go in search of new principles by which to administer the Government, and extended the hand of friendship and assistance to the crippled and bleedingthough living, yes, living States of the South, he met the demands of the popular will and laid claims to the grat itude of the present and the future. The Gentfrom Pennsylvania [Mr. STEVENS] says such a recognition of their existence coming from “ a man of res)ectable standing is something worse than ridiculous.” The American people today do not think so, nor will their posterity. It is contended, however, that the Executiize had no power to appoint proviaonal governors. There are those in my own party as well as in the other who assert that this was a usurpation. 1st allow me to observe that a usurpation, even if it be such, to restore, to build up, to give health and strength to the sick and pros trate, is far easier to be home than n usurpation to crush and destroy. But I do not view the conduct of the President as a usurpation at all. By hisoath he must enforce the laws. He found States without legal officers and unable to move foward in the channel of the ir duties. A State of this Union when the Federal laws are no longer obstructed cannot bein assive abeyance. It is an integral part of the federal body, and if the body be sound there can be no paralysis among its membersthey must have vitality; and in the performance of his duty the President used the est means in his power to revive and restore their lawful functions and much more was I reconciled to the use of this power when I saw on whom the selections of the President fell and I think, too, that with what I was pleased on this point in radical friends were ergually displeased. I ailed such names as S arkey, Perry, Johnson, and Parsons, and in deed, all the provisional governors, as bright omens of a good administration, as harbingers of (peace on happiness to the southern people, an of union, peace, and prosperity to the whole country. But then what a militar governor, of SCarolina for instance, that idol of the radicals,GenlButler, would have made! Ay, there is the rub. What fut, unctuous, juicy pickim havabeen lost to the faithful by this;cruge policy of the PreSidentl What shoals of lay, hungry sharks swimming around in these northern Waters have been cheated out of their anticipated prey "All the wolves and jackals that wait till the battle is over in order to mangle the dead and the wounded snarled their disappointment and rage at the President, but Will now open in a full chorus of joy over the delight ful vision which arises before them from the formation of the committee of 15. The Gentfrom Pennsylvania [Mr. SrsVENS] saw fit to announce that the position of the President in regard to the southern States was “ not an argument, but a mockery.” I partly dissent. 1 think it is both. It is an untrue principles of the Government, and it is also an overwhelming and consuming mockery of the bloody designs, avaricious hopes, and greedy expectations of all those who desired when the war was over to rule the people of the South without the restraint of law; to humiliate them with an iron rod; to confiscate their lands and buy them in at nominal prices; to change the proprietorship of the soil and drive into exile and destitution its present owners until a new population should take control and, by the aid of the enfranchised negro, eeudenc allmenthLSmit who here now unfurl Ce banner of “tenitdfial condition, ” because all these consequences follow its triumph. Sir, this class has been mocked, and (10 and angels and all good men reoice in their confusion. Their aseendency in this land would create a pandemonium of discord and a carnival of all the dark and cruel spirits of hate and revenge for generations to come. The President had them in his mind when in combating the reposition of military governors for the South he says: “The chief personswho would have followed in the train of the Army would have been dependents on the General Government, or men who expected profit from the miseriesof their erring fellow citizens.” But, Mr. Speaker, allow me to inquire whether this opposition to the Executive is not a new discOvery, an afterthought, manufactured for a special purpose on the part of those who adhere to and ) upheld the late Administration of Mr. Lincoln in regard to the continued existence and vitality of the southern States during the late rebellion. Are they not estopped from this assault, as the Gentfrom Pennsylvania [Mia Srsvniis] says, “both by matter of record and matter in pats?" In more than 100 ways and forms, by military orders, in his annual messages, instructions to our foreign ministers, in letters and speeches to his own countrymen, and especially by his numerous proclamations, the late Er“ answerable argument in behalf of the early and and a Puritan as; ecutive always and at all times rewgnindlih! enduring existence of all the States over which the American flag had ever floated. I quote a single passage from the proclamation of emancipation, which, in my judment, was a usurpation of power, but had at east the merit of not attempting to abolish Statesr 4; 1” That on the 1stdayof January jn the year ofoiii Lord 1863, all persons held as slavesWithin any State or designated part of a State, the people whereo shall then be in rebellion against the U.S shall be then thence forward and forever free: and the Executive Government of the U.S., including the military and naval authority thereof. will recognize and maintain the freedomof such persons, and will do no act or actsto represssuch persons, or any of the m, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom. 4 That the Exceutivewill. on the 1stday of drunk ary aforesaid. by proclamation, designate the States and parts of States. if any. in which the peoplethere of. respectively shall then be in rebellion againstthe U.S.; and the fact that any State, or the peoplethereof, shall on that day be in good faith Representedin the Congressof the U.S. by mcml berschosen thereto at electionswherein a majority of the qualified voters of such States shall have participated shall in the absenceofstrong countervail inir testimonialbe deemed conclusive evidence that such State and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the U.S. ” a This was written and promulgated afier this passage of every ordinance of secession; when the party in rebellion occupied and held in a hostile manner a certain portion of territory had declared their independence; had casl. of their allegiance; had organized armies; had commenced hostilities against their former sovereign; and yet the Gentfrom Pennsylvania and his present followers uttered no dissent to its doctrines. It was the subject of indiscriminate praise from those very organs which now seek to blast and ruin the same pol icy in the hands ofhis successor. There is no esca o here. ThQliltecliwf. ea rty Of cliorth. dealt With American. ales, the people whercof were in rebellion, and not with a foreign Power subject to conquest" and ifliis memory is sacred to his followers, they should not insult it by lpronouncing his policy a delusion and a moc ery ere his untimely tomb is fairly closed. Sir, I am aware that many on than osita side of the Chamber do not indorseiv destructive theOry of the Gentfrom Pennsylvania, but who Tare nevertheless assisting to carry its results into practice. The deny his premises that the States are dead, iut concur in his conclusion that they shall not be represented on this floor. To my mind their positionis the worst of all. They embrace a consequence without a cause. They have reached an end which has no beginning. They are “Mnding on a structure which has no foundation. While the premises of the Gentfrom Pennsylvania are unsound, yet his logic is true. But those who refuse to follow him and yet deny representation, have neither premises nor logic. If the States are out of the Union of course their Representatives are strangers to us, but if they are in the Union what power cap close these doors against them except the power of lawless. revolutionary force? “Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be include Within this Union according to their respective numbers.” This is the language of the Federal constitution. It also declares that “each State shall have at least one He Representative.” Are these States then “include within this Union?" If they are, how can we deny, in the very teeth of the constitution, to receive their Representatives? What madness is this which proposes to govern the people of 11 American States, States “included within this Union, ” without representation? Where on this side of the ocean has been found such a monstrous principle of government? Its adoption would carry us back to the days of King George, and as fatally subvert liberty as if Corn wallis had triumphed on the plains of Yorktown. But the advocates of this doctrine say that this phase of absolute despotism is only to last for a season; that these States are only to go unrepresented for a few years until guarantees, guarantee for the future are obtained. Guarantees for the future! This vague term is another political convenience like that of “ dead States.” Under it each innovator, dreamer, and revolutionist throughout the land can demand and require the fulfillment of all his farmtastic desires against the South before he is willing to admit her Representatives. It is the cloak for everyhi herlaw purpose now abroad in the public min. It is a wellfilled arsenal from which to shower confiscation, negro suffrage, reapportionment, proscrition of persons, and every other missile o torture that was ever leveled at an unfortunate people. Sir, I deny that a State can be refused her representation for a single moment on such grounds. Peace and o edience to law are the only guarantees for the future which any GoVerument can justly require of its citizens. Where is the power in the constitution whereby anything more can he demanded? Or has that instrument become a dead letter to us because we have been 4 years in forcing others to obey it? If weare not released from it, let me see the section on the subject of guarantees which authorizes Congress to close its doors in the face of the representatives of the people until they sign deeds of political capituation. It may be said that the resident himself has required guarantees in this polic of restoration. Even ifhe did so, I do not anderstand that he proposed to make their refusal a retext for violating the constitution himself. at I have not regarded his advice to the South in the nature of this movement in Congress. On the great question of slave I hold that the action of the southern States in adopting the constitutional amendment has been wise and beneficcrRTThrsyswfr f was destroyed already by the force of arms and the operations of war, but it is better for the future dignity and history of the nation that a fact accomplished of the utmost magnitude should have the sanction of fundamental law. It was a vast step, too, toward a speedy restoration, and that alone is a powerful appeal in favor of the counsel of the Executive and the action of the South. One other subject has been much canvassed under this newcoined phrase of garautecs for; the future. The war detincurr y the southern States in their attempt to establish a confederacy has been shaken 1n the face of the northern people to incite them to a policy of distrust and severity. Everybod well knows, Of course, that it will never be paid. All history tells us that the debt of a defeated revolution is always lost. The government that contracted it is no. more, and the mined and exhausted people lad ly turn their backs on the dead and me one oly eat and look forward to the future with new hopes, new ties, and anew destiny. As to the victor in arms ever assuming such a debt, no in stance is known in the annals of mankind, and such an idea is not respectable outside of an asylum for the insane. I regarded, therefore, the war. debt of the South as fit only for one usethe declamation of demagognes and the malign purposes of political agitators. Hence I voted a few days ago that it shouldbe buried out of sight and out of mind in the most effective and conclusive manner. I did not do so because I wanted a iarantee on that subject, but simply because wished to remove it as an obstacle in the pathway of reunion, and as a means of useless and pernicious discord in the future. go But again, as to the right of representation, immediate and without any other guarantee than obedience to the constitution. I shall now prove that the refusal to admit the southern representatives arises from a sense of power and not of justice; that while the southern people were in arms no position of the kind was assumed by any Dept of the Government, and that harder terms are now tendered to a defeated than were held out to a defiant enemy. In the proclamation of the late Chief Magistrate, from which I have already quoted, he clearly and explicitly asserts the nght of any State, whose me were then in hostility to the General rnment, to be represented in the Federal legislative Dept. Congress, and announces that he will consider such fact as an evidence that neither the State nor its peole are anylongerin rebellion. Where then was the guarantee doctrine? It had not yet been born. e were then wooing and courting representation because it suited our purposes to do so. We are now repelling it for the same reason. The great proclamation was then akin to the gospels of righteousness. Now I challenge the committee of 15 to report in its favor. It is deserted in the house of its friends and I am found defending the only healthy and legal spot in it. But, potent as it was considere, yet it was not the only expression that emanated from the high aces of the last Administration, which confoun s the philosophers of this new faith. On the 6th of ebruary, 1863, Mr. Seward in formed Europe and the civilized world that seats in Congress are also vacant and inviting the Sens&Reps of the discontented party who may be constitution ally sent there from the States involved in insurrection.” Did these vacant seats invite the Representatives and Senators of aforeign nation With which we were wa ng a war for annihilation? Did the SecyState attach any other condition to the representation of the“ people then in arms against the Government than attaches to the representation of every other portion of the American people? He only asked that it might be consntutionally done, and this requirement is of universal application to the whole country. It means no more in Georgia than it does in NewYork; it means no more in Virginia than it does in Massachusetts. It interpolates nothing upon the practice of the Government under the constitution from the hour of its birth down to the day on which an inquisition was sued out in this House, in the shape of a committee of 15, in order to discover some means of adopt in the old British system of colonial bondage. ut, sir, it may, in answer tothese citations, be said that it is not within the province of the executive Dept of the government to determine the question of representation in the But has not Congress itself made a record on this subject which it cannot ignore and which the majority dare not face I as it not officially, over and over again, in both branches, assumed the very position which it now seeks with such flagrant assurance to repudiate? The cry is now that we mustlook to Congress for ourpolicy of restoration. This place has suddenly become a citadel ofwisdom, power, and dominion. It is a city of refuge, where all the disa pointed spoliators, insane an archists, bloody acohins, promoters of venge ance, disturbers of the peace, self Constituted saints who imagine themselves in partnership with the Almighty to assist Him in punishin the sins of the world, where lawbreakers an revolutionists of every shade and coloanow flee to escape from the wee, successful, and constitutional) olic of file President. “To your tents, O srae l” was the ancient and legitimate cry of alarm. “Look to congress, lookto Congressl” now rings out on the air as a call to battle in behalf of chaos disorder, and interminable woes. The popuface of France, tossed in a tumultuous delirium of hate, drunken with blood, dethroning Deity and reverencin a har lot, shouted, “Look to the Assembly, look to the Assembly 1” where the Mountain murdered the Girondists, and where Robespicrre, Marat, and Saint Just planned, in the name of public virtue, the destruction of human life and of human society. But, sir, if we must “look to Congress, ” let me show the wistful gazers a picture of congressional action which will fill their hearts with dismay, and which Congress itself cannot today behold without feelings of humiliation and shame over its present position. Did I not serve here in this Ha I during the fury of the rebellion, when the flames o war scorched the very front of the heavens, with Representatives from the State of Louisiana? Were they not admitted to the “vacant seats” which invited their return by the very men who now stand like surly sentrics at these doors and answer their hailingpign of entrance either with, the response of “ sad States” or “Gnarantees 2” Was Tennessee destroyed or were her people entitled to no voice here because of er ordinance of secessionl Sir her name was called here during more than haif the period of the war, and the representatives of her people answered to their names in both ends of the Capitol. The gentleman who in vain sought even a reco itlon of his own existence in t:is body when the present Congress was organized [Mr. Minna] was then here with the full sanction of the same political majority which now spurns him from the door of its caucus room, and drives him from the protection which the escutcheon of his glorious State under the administration of law, affords its If epresentatives in Congress. Shall we now assert that at that time Tennessee was a portion of a foreign Government? Shall we then as the next step of an reme absurdity declare the POTUS himself an unuaturalized foreigner, a captive to our lance and s car, entitled doubtless to kind treatment, but in no sense a citizen of the U.S., inasmuch as he never expatriated himself from the alien and hostile rovince of Tennessee, and never acknowledged himself subdued to the embraces of the Federal flagas the symbol of a separate nationality? I am prepared to hear even this miserable libel on American institutions as serted. Nothing is allowed to stand in the way of fanaticism. Its purposes are inexora ble, and its devotees often deem themselves in truth and honesty the philosophers of their age; but hhederick the Great may e a wise observation when he said, “If I wanted to ruin one of my provinces I would make over its government to the philosophers.” Their theories areal ways in advance of their times; and in practical sense and actual utility they meet neither the requirements of the past, present, or future. The philosophers of Congress at least contradict themselves at very short stages of progress, and give no evidence of either ability or consistency. Why, sir, the records of this body, as well as of the Senate will show that Virginia, tooVirginia, whose fiery and lofty crestshone in the very front of the rebellion, whose plains were its battlefields, and in whose soil so many of its heroes lie buriedwas here as a State when the roar of her hostile cannon could be heard on Capitol hill. Those who claimed to be her representatives came and they were received. They were required to give no pledges then for the future goo behavior of their constituents, nearly all of whom were obeying the orders of General Lee. Then they were to be trusted without guarantees; but now that peace has been restored, and there is not an armed hand in all her borders to disate the Federal authority, her people are muc more dangerous and the presence of their Representatives here would give a fatal blow to the public safety! such is the miserable position to which the engineers of this new movement are reduced!