Mr. DAWSON. Mr. Speaker, I am opposed to the bill under consideration in all its provisions, and I trust that before I have concluded my remarks I shall have furnished some reasons why it should not become a law. In venturing to claim the attention of the House and speak to the state of the nation, I feel it a circumstance demanding my 1st and most grateful reco nition that we are here once more to legislate or a united country. Next to the overthrow of the Government and the ruin of the country, the greatest of national calamities is a great civilWar. With the legions of miseries which hang around the march of hostile armies 4 years of carnage had made us so familiar that we had begun to grow cab 1866. 539 lous under the repeated exhibition. Death on the most extended scale, numbering its victims by 1,000s, inflicted by the bullet, by disease, and by famine; mutilation in every horrid form; households stricken by the loss of friends, and under the dark shadow of inconsolate grief these are but a few of the sad incidents to war, and most of all to war between brethren. For this propitions result. I deem it proper to render, with prompt and unfaltering heartiuess, my tribute of praise to that valor, skill, and endurance of our armies which have been exhibited since the outbreak of the rebellion. It is a matter of common pride, and not of party triumph, that through all the trials of the war order in general prevailed in the North. Supported by the love of country, the people of the glorth have patiently borne, in the invasion of their rights of person and property, and in new 7 modes of trial, flagrant abuses of power. In common with the great party to which I belong, I have differed from the directors of our national councils as to the original necessity for the war; as to its purposes when undertaken; as to the measures adopted for securing the proposed results; and to the necessity of protracting the struggle, at such frightful expenditure of blood and treasure, to its recent close. I have heretofore declared my faith in the etii cacy of a different policy, in securing, at an early day, every legitimate and properresult; and I am still of opinion that, it the policy of peace upon the constitutional basis had been assente to, peace might have been had 2 years earlier, witll asaving of the horrible blood shed which we have witnessed since, involving a uarter of a million lives; with asaving ofonc hailf the war debt, and of that terrible and almost irreparable destruction of property, and thatpoliticaland social disorganizationwhichare the legacies entailed by the war upon the states men of today. But peace, though gained even at such tremendous sacrifices, is yet not the less precious, not the less grateful. But now that the war has reached its close, it a pears to me that the country, with a view to the preservation of everything valuable in our institutions, had never more need of calm and enlightened action on the part of its rulers. In returning to that normal condition from which we were so rudely jostled by late occurrences, it is incumbent on us to meet the new condition of things with a spirit alike tenacious of established principles, and averse to precipitate change under the imputed character of reform. We must see to it that the rand features of our political system, conceive in such wisdom by the fathers, and the liberties of the American citizen, inherited mainly from our ancestors, may be preserved in their purity and vigor, without any taint of feebleness or stain upon their luster. I do not say that it is entirely practicable to rid ourselves of artisan prejudice, but we must do so if we wou d see our conclusions verified by time. The petty passions of the hour must be discarded, when our deliberations are to affect not only the present, but unborn generations. We may allpeoucede to our extremest opponents the merit of upright intentions; but we are equally to remember, that wellintentioned ignorance has filled the world with suffering. This is a truth emblazoned, in melan choly characters, upon every page of history. Hence the necessity, in a greatyuncture like the present, of obtaining full and correct information upon the issues which we have to settle; of contemplating with such breadth of vision, the material facts of the situation, as shall enable us truly to apprehend their bearings and rIelations. For the views which I now a vance assume no other merit than that of a careful, earnest, and, so far as I am conscious, of a disinterested examination of the subjects which are now the center of the common interest. The close of the war, then, finds us surrounded with a set of questions of the highest importance. The true theory of our Government often announced, and often, alas! lost gight of, must be perseveringly reasserted and maintained. A solution must be found for the problem of our national debt and finances, so that the country may be relieved of its burdens, and again enjoy a currency of intrinsic value, as contemplated by the constitution. Our do mestic an foreign trade must be settled upon the basis of sound economical principles, and restored to those harmonizing and fructifying channels from which unhappy events have diverted them. The privileges and immunities of the American citizen must be so clearly defined that. they may be secure from usurpation in war as well as in peace. The limits of martial law must be settled with such distinctness that it may not be permitted to supplant the civil, and that it may not be stretched by the hand of power to partisan purposes and individual oppression. The Union must be restored upon the constitutional basis of absolute and perfect e utility of the States. The restoration should e immediate and the reunion cordial. The dignity of the country, as well as its safet, must further be an orted by the unqualifie reassertion of the onroe doctrine. lt would be a fatal error to suppose that now that the war has been concluded under a Republican Administration the popular seal has Been set upon the Federal theory of consolidation. Those who entertain this idea must remember that the opular support of the war was prompted by the determination to preserve the integrity of the Union. No sanction was thereby intended of any change in the Constitution, either in letter or by construction. I maintain, sir, and it has ever been maintained by the Democratic party, that the State rights doctrines, properly stated, present the true theory of the Government. lhc question arose in the contest between Jefferson and Adams in 1801, and the election of Mr. Jeffer son was apopular vindication of these doctrines as against the Hamiltonian theory of centralization supported by Mr. Adams. The Federal idea, which it was attempted to realize by a latitudinarian construction of the constitution, was that ofaconsolidated system of government, in which the undelegated powers of the States were to be absorbed, an the spirit of monarchy to be thus infused into our democratic forms. The assumption by the cen tral power of the disposition of those details which the constitution left to the States was to operate, as far as the States were concerned, as a consolidated despotism. It was the favor ite tenet of the Federal faith that force or interest were the only successful means of governing men. Force being excluded by the na ture of the case, the resort was necessarily to the influences of corrution; and Government patronage, in its multi arious branches and details, wasto crown the execution of the plan. As far as Hamiltons influence extended, and it was very potent, this turn had been given to the policy of the 1st Administration under Washington. Hence the bitterness with which they contested every inch of debatable round. Historically, and in the light of the simp o facts, there could be no doubt of the correctness of the Democratic view. The States or colonies had been independent Ofench other before the Revolution, each owing allegiance only to the British Crown. When by the success of the Revolution that allegiance became severed, the sovereignty, which before resided in the monarch, reverted to each independent community or State. In acceding to the new Government, the States acted upon their own separate responsibilities as sovereign ties, and not by a simultaneous act of the people of all the States as individuals. When, t. en, we seek to ascertain the kind of Government which they adapted, we have only to turn to the provisions of the charter by which they agreed to be bound. We there find that they surren dered the control, as separate communkties, over certain subjects, the disposition of which they determined to be more wisely vested nacen tral Government. In so doing, the sovereignty of the peoples of the several States and their allegiance became a divided one. The sovereignty, Within the sphere of the granted powers, was in the central Government, and allegiance due to it within that sphere. As to the powers not specifically granted in the charter, the remainedwith the States, in which they had a ways been, constituting the State sovereignty, which rightfully claims, within the sphere of the reserved or ungranted powers, the allegiance and rightful obedience of every citizen within their respective territories. This was the true Democratic doctrine in the days of Jefferson and it is the true Democratic doctrine now. Extreme men of the Federal school, from that day to this, have ignored State rights, while extreme men of the o posite view have repudiated the authority of the central Government in cases where it properly exists. Jefferson assumed his position between these 2 extremes of conso idation and secession. In that “golden mean” he planted the party of which he was the illustrious founder, and there it has ever since remained. His policy was conservative alike of the constitutional powers of the central Government and of those of the States and opposed to the extreme Federalists and extreme State sovereignty men. The Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 1798, which embody the doctrineof State rights, were commented upon by President Johnson in his able speech in the Senate in 1861. He stated with hdelity their true history and mean in single views of the extreme Statesovereignty men, as reduced to practice in the act of secession, have been suppressed by physical force, and the just authority of the Government has been successfully and rightfully ree stablished. But the doctrine of State rights is in no wise affected by the result. It. remains the only true and stable foundation of our republican system. State rights comprehend that portion of the State sovereignty not delegated by the constitution to the Federal Government, and the 2 expressions are of coextensive and identical import. T hatthe States are sovereign in this sense; that is as possessing all the undelegated powers of sovereignty, it is late in the day to question. The Union was thus the result of mutual concession; and from the testimony of its founders could not have been formed in any other way. The country although relieved by the war is without a reliable currency. Gold, as the constitutional standard of value, has been departed from, and a currency immensely inflated based on the national debt has taken its place. It has further to struggle with the great and galling evils induced by the contraction of a war debt so vast that the mind sinks in the effort to grasp its may nitude. Instead of adhering to a currency of the constitutional standard, the precious metals or paperconvertible into them utthe will of the holder, resort was had to paperwhich represented no value in the possession of the Government, which was inconvertible, and represented only so much public indebted ness. It could not have been through ignorance that Mr. Chase the financialminister, inaugurated this expedient at the sacrifice of the constitutional currency by theintroduction of the legal tender. It was not only a violation of the constitution, but confiscation of private estates, an unsettling of all values, and a fatal stab at the foundation of financial integrity. Our own rev. olutionary exerience must have been present to his mind. The disastrous experience of France under Laid, Necker, Target, and Colonne. was uttering through the voice of history its decisive condemnation of the lan. He has then in defiance of such experience and constitutional obligation committed the country to a scheme calculated long to embarrass his successors, and from which the present generation will in vain look for relief. In January 1861, the circulation of all the banks in the U.S. wh$202, 005,000. The amount of specie in the banks was $87, 674,000. The currency was gold or cpnvert ible paper, at the will of the holder. lhe ex540 January 31, penditures of the Government were at the same, time about $83,000,000 perannum, which was fully met by the revenue, and there was but about $76,000,000 of public debt. At the present time the Government debt, on the 81st Oc tober, 1865, is stated at $2, 740, 854, 750. Add to this $600,000,000 which it will take to equal ine bounties, together with the millions that will be required to pay damages to the property of 10al men occasioned by the armies, with the additional millionsto pay nsions, and we have a debt equaled only byt at of GreatBritain, contracted in centuries of foreign wars. The estimated excrises for the present fiscal year, as stated in the report of the SecyTreasury, are $857, 921, 717 47. To meet these and discharge the interest on the public debt, we have only the receipts, actual and estimated, the current fiscul ycar, from customs, of $147, 009, 583 03. the inconsiderahle receipts from the public lands amounting to $632, 8963, from direct tax $31, 111 80, and those from internalrevenue amounting to $271, 618, 885 65, and from miscellaneous sources to $48, 393, 729 94. The balance, amounting to $389, 377, 207 77, is reduced, by the application of $277, 182. 260 57 of borrowed money, to the sum, as stated by the SecyTreasury, of $112, 194, 947 20, which is still to be provided for in the method adopted by Mr. Chase of Government loans or inconvertible promises to pay. It is the evrl of paper. currency, that while i the debt of the country represented by bonds and bills is but a substitute for capital, in the absence of any check arising from the necessity of redemption in specie, it is continually tendingto augmentation. This is because inflation1st raises rices, and more inflation is demanded at each step of the progress. With a ven amount of circulation, prices at once adust themselves to that amount; but when this is once done, the increase of the circulation goes no further than the circulation before the inflation. Hence the same reason which begat the 1st inflation begets a 2nd. It is obvious that under the system which has thus been fastened on the country there must be a deficit, not only the present year, but for ears to come. A regardito sound principles imperatively requires, that, unless we are content to run along the highroad to bankruptcy and ruin and practical repudiation, adequate provision should be made for discharging with certainty and promptness the annual interest upon every addition to the public indebtedness. It is equally necessary that a rigid system of retrenchment and economy should be adopted in every branch of the public service, that the Government expenditures should be reduced to the minimum consistent with the interests of the country. A sinking fund should also be provided for the gradual extinguishment of the principal of the ebt, that the people may have some assurance that; though the recess may be slow and the end remote, the yo e of this terrible burden may not press upon the necks of themselves an descendants forever; and yet the agents of the Government, the especial pets of Mr. Chase, appeal to the people for increased loans upon the distinct assertion that the national debt is a “national blessing.” That public loans should be asked on such a plea as this is a marvel. The audacity of the reposition is without a parallel. In support oi)" this reckless maxim the overzealous agent refers his countrymen to the example of England. Instead of being an example of a national debt being a national blessing she has been the victim of a national debt. With vast advantage in geo graphical position, girt with oceans and chan nels, she has heretofore controlled the commerce of the world. With a sturdy and skillful population, with hills and mines of develOped minerals, and a Governmentthathas stood defiantly the slow evolution of 1,000years, yet her lands are monopolized by a population not exceeding 30,000 in number. The great mass of the population of 27 millions are but tenantry and operatives. Mr. Gladstone, in May, 1864, declared in a speech in the British Parliament that less than one 50th part of the working men in England are in the enjoyment of the franchise. The Chairman of the Ways&Means, and now of Appropriations, has boldly stated that the present taxes must be doubled or the debt repudiated. A wise statesmanship, while encouraging, by adjusting oppressive taxes and inconsiderate restrictions upon our variegated industry, and developing our resources, agricultural as well as manufacturing, may yet lighten, in a very great degree, the burdens of the people; but to double the present tax will be more than the straw that breaks the camels back. As a lie Representative of Pennsylvania the greatest of t ie States in the material from which wealth is created and whose industry is largely engaged in manufactures I confess to a just pride in her position. I am proud of her sturd, intelligent, and enterprising po nlation, an earnestly seek the promotion ot a1her great interests. We can not, however, shut our eyes to the new condition of things which has been forced upon us by recent events and by the general progress of the world. Slavery having cen extinguished in the South, she Will demand more strenuously than ever the abolishment of commercial restrictions by the North. The West, an empire within herself, with a voice which it will be impossible to deny, will join in the same demand. It is therefore our policy to appreciate our natural advantages, and to moderate our demands to the realities which are before us. The recent experience of other countries appears to be decisive in favor of a liberal commerce. It was lately shown by Mr. Gladstone, the enlightened Chancellor of the English exchequer, that a wonderful development of the commercial energies of that country has taken place since the relaxation of the Government restrictions. The masses of England, under the lead of Peel and Cobden, demanded cheap bread. The masses of this country demand cheap fabrics as well as cheap bread. Similar financial and commercial prosperity have been presented in France by the policy, carefully modeled after the English system, which has been adopted since the accession of the present Emperor; her commercial devel opment has outstripped the expectations of even the most sanguine; and while yielding a revenue greater than ever before, the people have been materially relieved of the bur ens of taxation. Commerce, it must be remembered, has given life and prosperity to every nation to the exact extent in which each has enjoyed it. The ships of all civilized nations now meet, more than ever, in friendly rivalry upon everysea. The share of trade, however, which will fall to each nation will be determined by the natural resources, the development, an enlightened and liberal policy of each. England has grown preeminent greatby hercommerce. The commerce of In ia, probably the oldest of all countries in civilization, the most numerous in population, and the greatest in the value of its products for exchange, has enriched, successively, Tyre and Sidon and Alexandria, Byzantium and earthagc, and in modern times has poured its rich streams into Portugal, Holland and Venice, London and Paris and NewYork. England, we shall not soon forget, sowed the seeds of our discontent, with the view of anni hilating our republican example and our commercial importance. She pursued her object with such zeal and energy that slavery, the apple of discord, has disappeared from our political centests and left us a great and power ful nation. In the future our progress will be steady and advancing. NewYork is ra idly attracting to herself the importance of on (ion, must soon become the great distributing commercial center of the world, and the British Government will yet be revolutionized by the force of our republican example. Now that the rebellion has been suppressed, we are to look with careful solicitude that the genius of our Government is not changed in l the operation. The owth of the war power under the despotic p ea of “necessity, ” had come to overshadow the liberty of the citizen to such an extent that we seemed rather the subjects of imperial sway than members of a democratic Republic, whose rights and privileges are defined and guarantied by a written charter in the most solemn form known among men. But what avail written charters or established rights when they may be set aside by the stroke of a cabinet minister or a President tial pen? What is this but the exercise of the principle of imperialism (For that principle, a“s laiifdown by Justinian in his Institutes, is Quad placuit prinmpi habet legis vigorem, ” what pleases the prince has the force of law. If this kind of administration is sanctioned, our written charters will become obsolete. They will remain a dead letter in the volume of the fundamental law. They willhave become out, grown and superseded by a new system of extra constitutional iracticcs. Our people have, therefore, to wate i narrowly, that in conquering the South we have not conquered our liberties. The constitutional provisions guarantying the liberties of the American citizen are those contained in the 4th, 5th, and 6th articles of the amendments. They secure him in the possession of personal liberty and property, against unwarrantable search and seizure, and in the right to a trial by jury. These are the Americans birthright and the pillars which support our democratic government. They are of such transcendent importance that their violation is not to be tolerated for a moment, under whatever circumstances of popular excitement, or upon whatever pretext. In the night and storm of civil faction and ferment they are to the citizen what the constellations are to the mariner. However the tempest may rage, and the clouds obscure the face of the heavens, he knows that, so long as his guiding stars are visible, he is sure of his reckoning, and can steer safely for “the haven where he would be.” There are a few points which, if we are to remain a free people, must be understood by the humblest citizen. He should understand that the constitution, and the laws made under it, are the only low of the land forall who have not voluntarily subjected themselves to another code. There is no other code except for the military and naval service, and, under certain circumstances, martial law. Military law is the code established under the authority of the constitution for the government of the land and naval forces; and martial law is that which is exercised by the commander of an army, in a state of war, over the territory which it occu ics. It is the law of arbitrary discretion, of gespotic power, and is, from the necessity of the caSc, the only law which can be exercised in conquered countries, in rebellious districts, in the camp, and in the field. Military law, administered upon its proper subjects, is a part of the law of the land. Vi here aparty is properly subject to be tried by military or by martial law, the tribunal and modeof procedure are those known to those species of law respectively. In all other cases the constitution declares that no person shall be held to answer for an infamous crime unless upon presentment of a grand jury, nor tried unless by a jury except in certain cases specified. This clause of the constitution prevails at all times, npd in all places, unless. force or armed occupation set it aside, or unless the party to be tried has resigned his civil rights by becoming a soldier or a sailor. The state of martial law is incident to the locality in which armed forces are present in conflict, or on the march, or in preparation for conflict and the eticct is the suspension of civil law in that locality. The mere existence of a state of war does not supersede the constitution and civil law anywhere else. Wherever the civil courts are open and justice regularly administered, the civil procedure is that alone which is applicable to anyone charged with an 18. 66 541 infamous crime. The civil law cannot be superseded or suspended throughout the country not even by the President, as Commanderin Cthefof the Army and Navy, nor by Congress. Another of the great palladia of liberty, the habeascorpus writ, was indeed authorized by Congress to be suspended by the President7 But this did not change the common law in regard to illegal arrests. Whoever holding whatever executive position, shall order the arrest of a citizen upon a general warrantthat is, a war rant not assi ning the cause of arrest, and not upon probab o cause supported by oath or affirmationis a trespasser; and no official character and no imagined necessity, or expediency, can is ield him from responsibility to the party injured. The tendency to abuse, which ever attends the possession of power, was the very cause why the great persona guarantees of which i have spoken were placed in the constitution. it is trueand I would that every citizen of the land were duly impressed with the factthat the charter of our liberties is amply full and clear. But it is in vain that this is so, if we, for whose benefitit was intended, fail in the trying hour to in sist on its observance. The existence of these abuses is furnishing the newest and strongest arguments to despotism. We seem to have for otten the lessons of historyof that english history with which our fathers were so fa iar. When they inserted those priceless provisions in the constitution, they had a vivid memory of the glorious utterances of Magna Chart a, sounding through centuries a voice to which every British descendant listens with an enchanted car. They had a vivid memory of those engines ofop ression which brought the head of Charles I to the block. I believe, sir, that at no time during the war has there been an occasion for a resort to instruments of that kin, iind that the success of the war has not been in any measure due to their employment. whhatever advantage, for a particular purpose, these methods may possess over the constitutional ones, they are against the spirit of our people and the nature of their institutions. t was, therefore, that the authors of our system made patriotic sacrifices for the sake of the greater good of preserving American freedom and manhood. So great have been the changes in the working of our institutions under the late Adminis tration, so strongvthe tendencies to imperial ism, that they have been commented upon by English statesmen, and regarded as conclusive proof that our Republic has already faded awn as a thing of the ast, and that we are hencefort to be control] by an absolute Government. Now, sir, it will be the fault and foll of our people, if they permit the flagrant a use of e ritimate powers, which characterized the last A ministration, to settle into established pradtice and permanent change of Government. Yet are the facts upon which I have commented sufficient to excite the deep concern of every one who loves his country and desires the perpetuity of her institutions. The war between sections in this country having closed, let us hope forever, it is our part now to maintain our national traditions, and seek the unmolested fulfillment of our mission. there is greater unanimity, perhaps, npon no one subject among our people than upon that which claimed this continent for republicanism, free from Euro can interposition. It needs no prophet to lpreict at no distant day voluntary aid to the iberal cause from multitudes of disbanded soldiers, both Federal and confederate. This must bring the questionof Maximilinns empire to a s eedy solution, either by the abandonment by Yapolcon of his support, and the retirement of the Austrian prince, or to a declaration of war by France tomaintnin his position. Mr. Jefferson was the father of our policy of expansion. Ever since the publication of his views in 1808, and afterward in his letter to Mr. Monroe, it has been the end of Englishmen to bafile the object. It is an undeniable fact that during the administration of Mr. Lincoln, in our diplomatic intercourse with foreign Powers, the American eagle has been made to bow his head and droop his lumes in humiliation and shame. “i hen the HoRep assumed the independence to reassert the Monroe doctrine, was not the full expression of congressional opinion upon the subject stifled in the Senate, and an apology forthwith sent to Louis Napoleon? Later still, when Mr. Lincoln was renominated at Baltimore, was not the nomination accepted by him, with the exclusion of the resolution affirming the Monroe doctrine? What is all this but a renunciation of the favorite pol icy of expansion? But what is there in our history which makes the assertion of that principle less necessary now than at any former day? The Monroe doe triiie declared that this continent must be secure for the free development of republican iu stitutionswithout European interposition. This doctrine, so eminently reasonable and just, had 1 been aflirmed by our most prominent statesmen, without distinction of party, prior to 1861. Nor was there any imperative necessit for renouncing, or even waiving it; for the e oments have all the time been in existence for checkmating the pretensions ofEngland and France. These were to be found in the friendship of Russia and in the South American republics. Russia has long been the terror of western Europe; and a league of the republics of the western continent would have rendered French tenure of Mexico a thing of the past. But the administration of Mr. Lincoln conceded the doctrinc; and the incipient step to ward crippling, and if events should favor, of annihilating, American democracy by the establishment of absolutism in Mexico, was permitted to become a Gallic success. While such are the facts in regard to the Monroe doctrine, as presented by recent events, I am gratified to see that the President, true to his early teachings, has shown a determination to maintain the national dignity and ourancient policy. It was not long since urged, with his peculiar force and eloquence, by M. Thiers, in the French Chambers, that it was unwise in France to favor the erection of a great independent Power on her own borders. He had allusion to the unification of Italy, but the remark has an application of strong significance for this country in reference to Mexico and Canada, which the Powers interested may do well to heed. The existence of a monarchy in Mexico on the south and of a monarchy in Canada upon the north, thus girdling and hampering our republican energies, is a restraint and a danger which cannot much longer be tolerated. I adhere, Mr. Speaker, to the declaration which I have made here before, that the late terrible war could have been avoided. But a President had been elected upon a revolution ary platform and the radical element in the North, stimulated by an unchristinn tirade or appeal from the pulpit, united with an unbridled and arrogant element from the South, did the work of csolation and death; and over the and struggle the tears of humanity must continually flow. Perhaps it is charity to say that the bloody drama, in its progress and results, finds corre: sponding ana ogy in the storms of the physical world, which, With divine mystery, purifywhile scattering destruction and death. The meddling of oneidea politicians with State institutions and property brought on the war; and now that it is concluded, they continue their agitations in the same misclncvous s“pirit. In obedience to the teachings of the higherlaw”doctrines, they postpone all considerations to the realization ot a legalized equality of races. Time was when the highest law which the good citizen could recognize involved obedience to the paramount law of his country. But with the class of politicians under notice that. notion has long been discarded as an antiquated error. It matters not that their principles were repudiated by all statesmen of both parties in the country. It matters not that this Government was made by and for the white race; that the States reserved the right of making their local laws; and that the Union could not otherwise have been formed. it matters not that a million of lives have been sacrificed in the effort to reduce their pernicious theories to practice. Still they falter not in the contest; still they huguo their bosoms the phantom of negro equality; still they claim for one section the right to control the local affairs of others. They hold that the white and black race are equal. This they maintain involves and demands social equality; that negroes should be received on an equality in white families, should be admitted to the some tables at hotels, should be permitted to occupy the same seats in railroad cars and the same pews in churches; that they should be allowed to hold offices, to sit on juries, to vote to be eligible to seats in the State and national Legislatures, and to be"judges, or to make and expound laws for the government ofwhite men. Their children are to attend the some schools with white children, and to sit side by side with them. Following close upon this will, of course, be marriages between the races, when, according to these philanthropic theorists, the prejudices of caste will at length have been overcome, and the negro, with the privilege of free miscegenation accorded him, will be in the enjoy.ment of his true status. To future generations it will be a marvel in the history of our times, that a party whose tenets were such wild ravings and frightful dreams as these should be permitted, in their support, to urge the country into the hugest and most destructive of civilWars, and should, when war was inaugurated, be permitted to shape its policy in furtherance of their peculiar ends. “or the full realization of their plans, they are ready to sacritice not only our priceless system of government, but even our social superiority itse. We have to remember, on the other hand, that negro equality does not exist in nature. The African is without a history. He has never shown himself capable of self government by the creation of a single independent State possessing the attributes which challenge the respect of others. The pastis silent of any negro eo 10who possessed military and civil organization, who cultivated the arts at home, or conducted a regular commerce with their neigh bors. No African general has marched south of the desert, from the waters of the Nile to the Niger and Sene l, to unite by conquest the scattered territories of barbarous tribes into one great and homogeneous kingdom. No Moses, Solon, Lycuigus, or Alfred, has left them a code of wise and salutary laws. They have had no builder of cities; they have no representatives in the arts, in science, or in literature; the have been without even a monument, an alp abet, or a hieroglyphic. Civilization among the whites has, indeed, been a thing of progress; butthat progress has been steady and sure. When Julius Caesar landed in Britain he found the Britons savnfles, ainted warriors. 400 years after, engist and Horsa made a lodgment upon the island, and their Saxon followers laid the foundation of English civilization and let it be remembered that this was by no means the commencement of civilization. Before this, Ciccro, in the midst ofan intelligence transmitted from northern Africa to Greece and from Greece to Romo, had electrified the Roman Senate with his eloquence and Cato had dignified it with his justice. Long before this llato had taught his divine philosophy, and Homer had. published his immortal son". in that immortal language, too, in which StPaul gave his religion to the world. The African was yet not so far away in his Libyan home but he might, have heard the clinking of the hammers upon the walls of Alexandria, us they rose in architectural beauty and commercial grandeur at the mouth of the Nile, or of the bes, With her hundred gates, higher up. He might have heard 542 January 31, In of the pyramids, those vast structures which have excited the wonder of the centuries which have rolled over them since their erection by the Ptolemies. Butthe negro is to this day, in Africa, a savage and a cannibal. It is impossible that 2 distinct races should exist harmoniously in the same country. on the same footing of equality by the law. The result must be a disgusting and deteriorating admixture of races such as is presented in the Spanish States of1 America by the crossing of the Castilian with the Aztec and the negro. The prejudice of color is one of those facts implanted by Providence for wise purposes. Among others it is doubtless for the purpose of preserving a race home eneous, which is the source of its true strengt and permanent improvement. Physiologists instruct us that a race may be improved by the union of valuable qualities among the same race or others of sim i ar characteristics, but not by the indiscriminate amalgamation of superior with greatly inferior races. It is the homogeneous races which have controlled the world. The Jew, though without a country and everywhere the object of prejudice, yet maintains his physical and mental excellence even to the present da; and it is because he intermarries chietly with his own race. The AngloSaxon, the dominant and most advanced in civilization upon the globe, owes its superiority to its homogeneity or alliance with others of kindred excellence. We have, then, to insist upon it that this Government was made for the white race. It is our mission to maintain it. negrosuffrage and equality are incompatible win that mission. We must make our own laws and she e our own destiny. Negro suffrage will, in its tendency, force down the AngloSaxon to the negro level, and result inevitably in amalgamation and deterioration of our race. The proud spirit of our people will revolt at such certain egradation, while American women, the models of beauty and superiority, will in dignantl execrate the men who advise and dictate the policy. The pictures of negro suffering in the South, as a consequence of the disorganization of society, are calculated to touch the hearts of all not utterly callous to human aflliction. these cannot be fairly charged upon the former masters of the blacks, because the latter are mostly as destitute, have in the naked proprietorship of the soil, as their former slaves. The condition of the southern negro is indeed such as strongly to appeal to our sympathies. What, with deep concern we may inquire, is to become of him? It is certain that no scheme of philanthropy can be considered successful, or even justifiable, that, under pretense of bettering the condition of a race, removes the same from a competence to a state of destitution and death. It requires no great prescience to predict what, as a result of the destruction of the labor system of the South, must be the fate of the negro. This is already foreshadowed in certain facts gathered from the statistics of northern cities. It thus appears that, with every advantage of procuring a livelihood possessed by the white inhabitants of NewYork and Bos ton, and with laws which, in the scuseof his peculiar friends, eminently favor him, his numbers have not increased in those localities, but show a remarkable diminution. It is also a fact equally well established, that the mortality among this peeple in the South during the war has been beyond example, even in those districts from which slavery has been expelled by the advance of our armies. Thus it is demon strated that when left to their own control the colored population lack the unlities requisite to a provision for their own an sistenee and the raising of families. The history of sandomingo and Jamaica, after their emancipation, teaches a fruitful et melancholy lesson of this truth. Thus the doom of the negro is written with that of the American Indian. in reid and sure extinction; and when the future historiah shall inquire into the cause of his decay, and shall find it in the misguided efforts of his friends, he will ask the significant question, whether it would not have been true benevo lence to permit him to continue to live under a gradual emancipation than not to live at all. The southern people as a result of the war have lost their property in slaves. Their rights as political comi nunities are, however, in other respects unimpaired. They are entitled to continue State governmentshave the exclusive right to determine what classes of their population shall be entitled to vote, and their Representatives have the same right as others to seats upon this floor. Their admission as such cannot rightfully be denied them. Mr. Lincoln, in April, 1861, an afterward in February, 1863, speaking throng Mr. Sew ard, the present as well as the then SecyState, to the Government of France and to the world, declared: “That there is not even a pretextfor the complaint that the disi U.S. are to be conquered by the U.S. if the revolutionfnil. for the rightsof the Statesand the condition of every humanbeingin them willremain subjecttoexactly the same laws and forms of administration. whetherthe revolution shall succeedor fail. In the one case the States would be fede rally connce ted with the new confrderavy; in theother they would as now bemembersof the U.S. but their constitution sand laws, customs, habiti. an, institutions in either will remain the some.” That the Congress of the U.S. furnishe a constitutional forum for debates between the alienated parties. Sens&Reps from the loyal portion of the people are therealready, fully empowered to confer and seatsalso are vacant and inviting Sens&Reps of the discontente party who may be constitution ally sent there from the Statesinvolved in the insurrection.” President Johnson in his message maintains without reserve that “Theamendment to the constitution beingadopted, it would remain for the States whose powers have beenso long in abeyance to resnmetheir placcsin the 2 branchesof the national Legislature, and thereby complete the work of restoration. ". The Democracy stand by the President in his effort to “complete the work of restoration, ” and congratulate the country that there is a firm, stron" hand upon the helm, and a clear eye which lodks out upon the darkness, and which no order ofany caucus can turn from the polar star that guides his course. We have subdued the rebel armies which were the 1st obstacle to the restoration of the Union. But the work is not done. It is natural that disaffection should exist to some extent in the southern mind to the Government of the victors. Unless by timely clemency and the liberal pardon of offenders with a general amnesty at up early day this feeling can be eradicated, the Union will be but nominal, and can only be maintained by standing armies and garrisoned towns. That apparatus, the deprivation of personal liberty and t shi, which are so offensive to free men, and which have distinguished Russia Austria, and Venice, will haveto be maintaine, and if maintained for any great length of time will pass by easy transition into imperialism and over the whole land. Mr. Speaker, I have but a word to add concerning the relation of the General Government to the States, and of the States to one another. I have listened with respect and attention to the principles of international law as they have been discussed with rare ability by the distinished gentlemen on the other side of the House, but I think they have failed to rave out of Grotius and Vattel and Puffendo that America has no laws, no constitution, and no Union among her great sisterhood of States. We must not forget that we are considering a question purely ofinternal administration, which must be settled solely by the municipal laws of our own country, and not by the laws of nations. The question before us is, what are the rights and obligations of our own citizens toward their own Government in time of peace? and not, what are the relative duties of 2 foreign countries in time of open and flagrant war? The law of nations takes no cognizance of that which is done in time of peace by a single Government with its own eo le. It is true that where a people vi e, and the e rights of fu l citizen parties become hostile to one another and take up arms and thus make a civilWar, the common humanity of the world will insist that the contest between them, as long as it continues to be a military r contest, shall be carried on according to the rules and principles which apply to separate belligerent nations. I maintain that when the rebellion was so ressed the law resumed its authority. the law was suspended during the rebellion because it could not eexccuted; but it was notrepealed, destroyed, or abolished. If the sovereign whose power has been opposed by an insurgent force is an absolute despot, he may wreak is vengeance at will, as Russia did upon Poland and Austria upon Hungary. If he is a limited monarch, ie must govem after a rebellion as he did before, according to the laws of the realm. If the armed opposition was made against a constitutional republic, it is absurd to say that the Officers or legislators of the Government have acquired from the rebellion a power which the constitution did not give them. It isequally absurd to say that the laws were abolishedby the very war which was waged for their preservation. We must remember that this Government has not been revolutionized by the southern rebellion, and I deny that it has added one particle to the power of any man who holds Office under the U.S. I believe most devoutly in the constitution framed by the fathers of the Republic, and in that Union which was the result of the Constitution. I have no faith in any other mode of bringing the States together. We must still look to that constitution and the laws for a justification of all we do, and every citizen may still plead that he owes no obedience to mere arbitrary power because there is no arbitrary power in existence. I happen to represent a region of country which was once in rebellion against the U.S. The insurrection was put doWnhy superior military force. In those days, under the lead of Washington and Hamilton. the men strous doctrine that as a coniicred people they and their children had no rig its under the constitution was never thought of. They submitted to the law and the law protected them. The people of the South have submitted to the authority and Government of the U.S. What is that Government? The constitution and laws. But our radical friends say their submission was made to the will of the dominant party in this House and the Senate. Did secession destroy the Union? Certainly not, for secession was a nullity. Did the war which we carried on to enforce the laws destroy the obligation of the laws? A secessionist might say so, but in the eyes of a Union man there can be nothing more absurd or disloyal. Where, then, is the authority to govern without law? It will not be pretended that there is a divine right. We rnustcome back, then, to the fundamental law, which is the true source of all power, and the true standard of duty for allthe people who are under our jurisdiction. T ie ComReconstruction has reosed an amendment to the constitution exc nding from the basis of representation all persons denied the franchise on account ofrace or color. This proposition strikes at the constitution in if; most vital particular, and has many advocates without much consideration. The whole question of representation was settled by our fathers with great difficulty, after a most careful and matured deliberation. It is unwise to disturb it. The policy of amendment onceintroduced will not sto with curtailin the representation of the soutern States. ndert e Constitution all legislative powers consist of a Senate and HoRep, the legislative powers of the Senate being equal to that of the House. In addition to this the Senate is a part of the treatymaking and appointing power. If it is intended that representation shal be based upon numbers, then we must remodel that part of the constitution which gives to NewEngland and several of the new States a voice so largely 1866. 54. 3. disproportionate to their population. The 6 NewEngland States. witha population lessthan NewYork, and but little greater than Pennsylvania, have 12 Senators, while each of the latter have but two. With this disroportionate power NewEngland has shaped) the policy of the Government to her own advantage, in the navigation laws, in the fisheries, and in the protective policy. The great agricultural interests of the country, and especial! of those States situate in the valley of the l ississippi and around the Gulf of Mexico, have been tolled by her for more than 50 years. a The instincts of empire stimulated by the example of amendment will arouse this interest to circumscribe a power so full of exaction and pro hibition. such reform would readily commend itself to the judgment as well as the passions of men, and soon become an element of party warfare. Be careful, then, how you lay the hand of innovation on this part of the Constitution. The idea of a certain class of politicians, of conliscating the lands of the South and parceling them out among negroes and adventurers, has for its object the extermination of the present generation of southern whites, and s ows the barbarous animus of that mostimpracticableparty. They would adopt that same polic ofirritation which was attempted by Elizabet and James in Ireland, and which has been fruitful only of heartburning and discontent to the present hour. It is not the policy of the Government to keep it pressed upon the minds of the South that they are subject to a galling yoke. Neither is it right. The people of the South when they have once given in their adhesion to the Government are as much free men, as much entitled to protection in the rights of selfgovernment, as any portion of the North. There is a broad distinction between power and right, and while the Government possesses the power she should exercise it in subordination to those great principles of democracy and republican ism which constitute the basis of our system. It is a plain violation of these to force upon the South any modification of hei social condition, any political status not sanctioned by her people through their lawmaking assemblies. such a policy may drive a people to despair, may prepare the fuel for lighting anew the flames 0t insurrection; but will nevergenerate love for the Government which thus seeks to oppress them. True statesmanship will not attempt to succeed by such means. A strict regar for justice, abatement of extreme pretensions; asteady effort to show the South that the war was not waged out of hatred tolier people, but only for the preservation of the national territory unfractured; a careful regard for her interests in common with those of the other States. these, I believe, are the only means which will ever succeed in obliterating the silent but corroding memories of errors, wrongs, and sufferings; of effacing the deep scars of civil bloodshed and warming the estranged hearts ofour countrymen toward a common Government once more. The exressed desire of the South, if conquered, to be ong to a strong Government, and er readiness to present the imagined injury inflicted upon her by the neutrality of the European Powers, should be wisely taken advantage of to revive and rivet the Union feeling. We ask indemnity from England for the raw ages ofanglorebel cruisers. We protest against the establishment of a monarchy on the ruins of the Mexican republic, and we are anxious to preserve the national faith and lessen the evils of a redundant currency. A cordial reunion of the States will do more to settle our foreign complications than “an army with banners.” It would stimulate a revival of our industrial pursuits and divert into new channels a portion of our paperissues. It would encourage a speedy an active cultivation of the lands of the South, add largely to the public revenue, and increase the basis of security for the payment of the public debt. Who can hesitate to coop erate r such a purposeto restore the Union, to reunite a people. to reestablish an empire of free Commonwealths, and make it irresxstible and imperishable? and ct the caucus of the dominant party originated the JtResolution and the committee of 15, to which is committed without debate whatever relates imme diately or remotely to the restoration of the Union. A policy thus struck out in advance of the message has forestalled the action of Congress and virtually notified the President that the “information of the state of the Union” which the constitution requires him to give is immaterial and disregarded. It presumed the States in which insurrection lately prevailed to be no States, and, as a consequence, that all his acts looking to their restoration were simple usurpations. In the rise and progress of this war we have seen a frightful display of the wild and reckless passions ofour nature, manifesting itself in proscrition, confiscation, and an utter disregard of the rights of person and property, of freedom of speech and publication, and of trial by jury. I we look back to the instructive records of that Commonwealth which was the greatest which receded our own, we find that when once:1 action which dominated resorted to proscription and the gratification of malignant passion this was the natural excuse for the opposite faction, on succeeding to power, of retaliating the same abuses. Sylla was the leader in this sanguinary policy. Then it was freely resorted to by Marius and by Cinna. Even Cicero, with all his hightoned principles, descended to this abuse in the punishment, without law, of the Catilinian conspirators. A reaction was the natural consequence. The infliction of punishment contrary to law excited a sympathy with the vicious, and Cicero himself was soon asufferer by the same code. The event proved the wisdom of Julius Caesar, who in the Senate counseled moderation as at all times the true policy. It does not detract from the value of Caesars counsel that he was himself assassinated in turnfor corruption had become too general and deep seated to admit of any but a forcible remedy and that through uch a horrible highway of blood the republic became merged in the empire. May we not ask, do these extra constitutional and unlawful acts upon the part of our rulers mark the steps of a lilie progress on our part toward the repoae of absolutism? Would it not be far better in this condition of things to repeal this sweepin and revolutionary confiscation law? For, what is the end and object of that act? If it is a punishment, then I am fortified by the opinion of Montes quieu, that all such punishments are unwise. The followin is the language which he uses in his Spirit ofiaws:. “As soon as a republic has compassed the destruction of thosewho wanted to subvert it. there should be an end of examples. punishments and even of rewards. "Great punishments, and consequently great changes. cannot take place without investing some citizenswith too great a power. It is advisable in this caseto exceedIn lentithyertehfaonrci nmsoore verity; to banish but few rather than many: and to leave them their estates rather than to make a great number of confiscations. Under pretense of revenging the republics cause. the avengers would establish tyranny. The business is not to destroy the rebel. but the rebellion. They ought to return as quick as ps sible into the usual truck of government, in which every one is protected by the lawsl and no ono oppressed.” We must remember that in the struggle through which we have passed a million of our people have been slain, and among others the YVashingtons Marshalls, and Monroes; and that Virginia has been desolated and dismembered. It was this same Virginia that, in the struggle of 1776, marched tot e relief of Massachusetts. In that eventful conflict she was to Massachusetts as the shield of Achilles to the Greeks. She furnished the author of the Declaration and the leader of the continental army which carried the Revolution to success, and afterward the statesmen who laid the foundation of the Government. The Republican party has accomplished its mission, which was the abolition of slavery. For the rest there is no longer any bond of union a mong its members. The numerous propositions to amend the constitution are out the Signals of distress, while the deslpairing cry is heard from every portal. The cmocracy have no chan cs to make. Their principles are identical With the prosperity of the country, and are as perpetual as the Government itself. They have on y to adhere to those principles, in the breadth and V] or With which they were thus announced in