Mr. WILLIAMS. July 1, 1864. I wish to refer now to the vote upon that bill, which will be found on age 8461 of the same volume of the Globe. will read the vote. The yeas&nays upon the passage of that bill in the Senate were as follows: lit“tlYea, m Messrs. Brown, Chandler.Conness.Doo Grimes. Hale. Harlan. Harris Henderson. JDoohungsoanll. MLoarngeano.fPIonmdicarnoa. Lane of kunsas. Mc, Ramsey Riddle. Shor iWnainnk.leS, pra no, Sumner, enEyck. Trumbull, Vanado.Wilkinson and Wilson 26. "NAYS Mcsms. Davis. Powell and Suulsbury 3." The honorable Senfrom Wisconsin and the honorable Senfrom Maryland have made elaborate arguments in the Senate to show that these States have always been in the Union and are entitled to the ri ts and privileges of the States within the niou, an that Congress has no jurisdiction over the subject of reconstruction except to pass upon the qualifications of the persons who propose to represent those States. The record) which I have just exhibited to the Senate shows that these honor able Senators at that time were of opinion, and so declared by their votes, that these States were incapable of choosing electors for President or choosing Senators or Representatives in congress, and that that right did not accrue to them when hostilities had ceased, as is now claimed, but when Congress should decide that the rebellion was at an end. Does not that bill clearl assume that the control of this question is in congress. I humbly submit that so far as the acts of Senators at one time will answer what they say at another, this record, this vote, is a complete refutation of the arguments that have been adduced by them to prove that these States have all the time been in the Union, entitled to the rights and privileges of States within this Union. This is one branch of the argument; another is derived from the policy of President Lincoln and of President Johnson. No man will go further in paying res cat to the memory of Abra ham Lincoln than fwill. I admired him for his greatness and his goodness, for he was great as he was good. But. I am not one of those who give up my opinion because some man who happens to hold a higher office than I do differs from me. I do not believe anything to be true, simply because some man, 50 or 100 years ago, or at any other antecedent time, said it was true, when the blazing light of day around me contradictsitstruthand the trumpet tongued facts of experiencg are pouring their constant refutation into my ears. President Lincoln chaned his opinion while he was POTUS Once he said that to issue an emancipation roclamation would be like issuing a bull against the comet; but when the subsequent developments of the war satisfied him that it was a necessity, he then issued that memorable proclamation which has made his name conspicuous in the history of human freedom and given him a high rank in the company of the immortals. I do not admit that President Lincolns policy proves that the position which I occupy is in correct; but on the contrary I maintain that there is no man, I care not how great hisinge nuity may be, who can reconcile the policy of President Lincoln with a recognition of these States as entitled to all the rights and privileges of States within this Union. hen he made is proclamation authorizing one 10th of the voters of a State to hold a convention and organize a State government, did he not in that proclamation ignore the existence of any prior State organization and even the right O a rebel State to govern itself at that time or to be represented in the congress of the U.S.? suppose that Presient Lincoln had issued a roc amation to the State of NewYork providing that one 10th of the loyal voters of that State might hold a convention and reorganize a State government would not that proclamation have been regarded as the freak of an insane man? It seems to me that if we avoid the play upon words as to whether these States are in or out of the Union, no one can fail to conclude that President Lincoln was of the opinion, judging from the acts of his Administration, that these States, whatever their precise legal status might be, had forfeited their rights as States wi in this Union. President Johnson is said to follow in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor on this question. President Johnson says I acknowl edge that these States are in the Union, and I do not controvert that position;but I say, and defy contradiction, that President Johnson, from the beginning of his Administration to this very day, has recognized these States as having for cited, or in some way lost, the rights and privileges of States within this Union. hen be appointed provisional governors for the rebel States he recognized the want of any government there. e assumed that there was no government in those States; that those States were, to use the language of the honorable Senfrom Massachusetts, a clean State on which he could commence the organization of new governments. Could President Johnson have uppointed a provisional governor for the State of NewYork“! Who will contend that he could? If not, why not? NewYork is a State within this Union, entitled to the rights and privileges of a State; but SCarolina, though she may be within the jurisdiction of the federal Government, and so in the Union, is not entitled to the rights and privileges of the loyal State of NewYork. President Johnson not only a pointed provisional governors, but authorize conventions to form constitutions; declared what persons should vote at elections, what should be the qualifications of electors, what the constitutions when formed should contain; and so, from be ginning to end the only law in the reorganization of these States has been the will of the President. I am not complaining of what he has done, but I say that he has assumed from the beginning that these States were without the rights and privileges of States within the Union; that they were disorganized masses of people; and that everything, from the foundation up, was to be do none 0. new dispensation, to be substituted for the old that existed prior to or during the time of the rebellion. I think, therefore, that the argument which is derived from the acts of President Lincoln and of President Johnson does not prove what those Senators claim. They prove, if they prove anything at allI that these States as States he came functi officio, and have not yet become able to resume their rights and privileges as States within the Union. I wish it distinctly understood that I do not refer to these acts to censure or condemn them, although I confess that I have some misgivings as to the power of the President to organize civil governments as Commander in Chief of the Army. I refer to these acts to show that they do not prove what those who use them claim that they 0; but, on the contrary, they prove that these States, whatever may be said abouttheir being in the Union, have not been regarded as entitled to the rights and privileges of other States. Assuming that Congress is equal in power to the Executive, I argue that Congress may do all that the President has done as to these rebel States. Imean to insist that the acts of the Executive have not excluded the jurisdiction of Congress over this question, and that Congress is not any proclamation or any telegrapheicstoiipsppeadteby from the President, or anything done in pursuance thereof, from exercising its power and control over this great question of reconstruction. I insist that Congress is not reduced to the poor and pitiful position of meeting the Representatives of these rebel States at the door of the Capitol with no power butto respectfully inquire i they possess the personalqualifications for a seat in the Senate or in the HoRep. Mr. President, much denunciation has been heaped upon Congress for hesitatin about the immediate recognition of the rebel States, and I must say that in my opinion there is too much impatience everywhereu on thatsubject. Time has a work to do in this usiness which cannot be wrought out by other means. Time has an office to perform which no human expedient or device can perform in its place. Time will cicatrize the wounds that the war has made. Time will assuage the an ish of the broken hearted and the bereavegll Time will soften the asperities and passions that have grown out of the late fearful conflict. Give time a chance to do its work. Give us time. I confess that in this matter I do need time time to look at and consider and determine as to the wisdom, the li expediency, or the justice of any proposed po ic. Leg it be home in mind, Mr. President, that in this business of reconstruction we are not engaged upon any tempora arrangement. This is not the expedient of a This work which we now perform is to ensure. It is to bless or to curse the country for all coming time; and while we discuss the proolamations of Presidents and devise Ways&Means to meet the present emer ency, coming generations beckon to us with their shadowy hands to look at and think of them. Sir, is it surprising that these States have not resumed their former position in less than one year from the time they were engaged in efforts to demolish and destroy this Government? After the last British flag went down in the Revolution, notwithstandin our fathers were bound together by every tie that could bind men who were fighting in a common and a holy cause, more than 7 years expired before the formation of this Union was completed. But now great impatience is displayed and many harsh epithets are hurled at Congress because within less than one year from the time these men were struggling through fields of carnage to put an end to the existence of this nation because before the smoke of the battle has cleared away, and while their hands are et red with the warm blood of our defenders, they are not sitting in these high seats of power and controlling the destinies of a Government whichthey hate and have tried.to destroy. When we consider that it took these conspirators more than 30 yearsto concoct this infernal rebellion, and that they were for 4 years fighting with the desperation of madmen to accomplish their fiend ish work is it to be marveled at that 6 months or a year or more should pass by before these identical men are taken into the national bosom, placerated and torn by their blows, and recog nized as equals in a political brotherhood? I have spoken, Mr. President, of the necessity of time in this business of reconstruction; that it is not desirable or safe to make too much haste, but that it is due to the magnitude of the subject that we should proceed with deliberation. Caution is the parent of safety, and in doing what we may not be able to undo if wrong it is necessary to be extremely cautious. It is more than an error to err now. To be caieless or reckless at this time is to be crimina. I desire here to apply what I have said as to the necessity of time to a proposition that has been introduced by the honorable Senfrom Massachusetts as a substitute for the resolution to amend the Constitution reported by the ComReconstruction. Sir, I listened with profound admiration to the speech which the Senator delivered in favor of the proposed substitute. It was worthy of the subject, worth of the occasion, worth of the author, and whon those who heard it shall be forgotten, the echoes of its lofty and maes tic periods will linger and repeat themsefves among the corridors of history. I cordially indorse the prevailing sentiment of that speech. I believe that the founders of this Republic intended that all free men should participate in the political and civil rights of the country. I thin the distinction which they made was not between white men and black men that distinction is of modern ori n; but the distinction which they made was between freemcii and slaves. But, sir, is the proposition of the honorable Senfrom Massachusetts practicable at this time? I do not give it as in opinion, but it is an incontrovertible fact hat a very large majority of the people of the U.S. deny the constitutional power of Congress to enact such a law. Pass thatlaw at this session and it becomes an issue in the next litical campaign, and those who sustain it an s it here will be committed to its support, an those who oppose it will strive to elect men in favor of its re eal. A majority of this Congress may believe in the constitutionality and expediency of such legislation, but another Congress, if a majorit should happen to sympathize with the honorable Senfrom Kentuc, would abro the law, and so the political rights of millions of people would be as varyingas the capricious fortunes of the political parties of the country. Adopt that proposition, and it will follow as a matter of course that the doors of Congress will be thrown open at once to the Representatives of the rebel States, and is there reason to suppose that the rebel element whaicny is now predominant in those States would not control that vote, so as to make its entire representation in Congress a representation possi hl antagonistical to the eace and the pere tuity of this Union? Isay ranklythatl conceive it to be of more consequence not only to the future interests, but to the life of this nation, that the rebel States should have alimited representation in Congress until the great questions growing out of the late war are adjusted, or in a sure process of adiustment, than that the negroes anywhere should immediatel vote. ir, although there is question a out it, it seems to me there can be little doubt that at this particular time the negroes of the rebel States areunfitto exercise the elective franchise. I have recently copversed with 2 officers of the Federal Army from Texas, who told me that there, in the interior and agricultural portions of that State, the negroes do not yet know that the are free; and one of the officers told me that e personally communicated to several negroes for the 1st time the fact of their freedom. Emancipation may be known in the towns and cities throughout the South, but the probabilities are that in the agricultural portions of that country the negroes have no knowledge that they are free, or only vague conceptions of their rights and duties as free men. Sir, give these men a little time, give them a chance to learn that they are free, give them a chance to acquire some knowledge of their rights as free men; give them a chance to learn that they are independent and can act for themselves, give them a chance to divest themselves of that feeling of entire dependence for subsistence and the sustenance of their fami lies upon the land holders of the South to which they have been so long accustomed; give them a little time to shake the manacles off of their minds that have just been stricken from their hands, and I will go with the honorable Senfrom Massachusetts to give them the right of suffrage; and I will here express the hope that the ay is not far distant when every man born upon American soil within the pale of civilization may defend his manhood and his rights as a free man by that most effective bal lot which“ Executes the free manswill As lightning does the will of God." I suppose that I might as well, as I have allude to this question of constitutional amendments, refer to the proposed substitute offered by the honorable Senfrom Missouri, [Mr. zunnasosj I confess that I was somewhat surprised the other day to hear the honorable Senator characterize the amendment which had been reported from the committee of 15 after 2 or 3 weeks deliberation, and after it had passed the other House by a majority of more than 2/3rds, as stuff and nonsense and say that the substitute which he proposed was sufficient in the place of all constitutional amendments or congressional legislation in reference to former slaves. I will not assail the amendment proposed by the honorable Senator in the same manner in which he attacked the report of the committee, but I will remark that the constitutional amendment which he offers as a substitute allows a State to make any discrimination that is not founded upon race or color. NewYork State, under that constitutional amendment, might exclude every man born in Europe from the right of suffrage or from representation, and any discrimination could be founded upon nativity, intelligence, condition, circumstances, sex, and upon anything and everything, provided that it is not upon color or race; and to adopt that amendment at this time and in this form would seem to give countenance to the charge so often made, that we are more willing to [Kittielaws and comstitutional amendments for black than for white men. I object to this constitutional amendment of the Senfrom Missouri because it allows all the Indians in the States of the Union to vote. Sir, the bloodthirsty and murderous Sioux of Minnesota, the Cayuses and the Walla Wallas and the Snakes, that handitti of the desert, in Oregon, and the Digher Indians of California, are all made voters y the Senators constitutional amendment, and invested with that high prerogative of American citizenship. Does the onorable Senator suppose that the State of Minnesota, or the State of Oregon, or the State of California would submit from choice to this degradation, if not danger of political association?