Mr. KELLEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to exPress the hope that the House will adopt the "bill under consideration as reported by the committee without amendment. Considerable dissent has been manifested, and the House refused by a very decided vote to order the previous question when called by the chairman of the committee. Yet, after the ample discussion the bill has had, and especially after the incidents of yesterday and today connected with the Louisiana bill, I indulge the hope that when the final vote is ordered the House will adopt the bill. nanimity cannot be expected among a numerous body of gentlemen like those who wield the power of this House. They rePresent intelligent and thoughtful constituencies, and it has never been my privilege to mingle with a body of men among whom there was so much well defined individuality of character as in the controlling party of this House. It is impos. sible, therefore, that we should obtain entire unanimity of judgment on important measures. There has been on almost every important law enacted concession, I may say much as I have come to despise the word compromise, as to detail and language. A gentleman suggests to me the word “cooperation.” I accept it as a better word, which more accurately exPresses my sense of our duty. Some days since, when 1st entitled to the floor on this question, I went to the Clerk's desk and that already 6 amendments to the bill had been printed. I had in m mind one which I would gladly have offered. I found it in direct hostility to the purpose of several of those that were in print. It was brief, but I then thought it essential. It was to insert in line 3, immediately after the word “that, ” the words, “such pretended governments are hereby declared void and set aside, and that.” Since then we have had the substitute submitted by the distinguished Gentfrom Massachusetts, [Mr. BANKs;] and the Gentfrom Missouri [Mr. KELso] has one which I regret has not found its way into print, for if any were to be adopted it would command my preference. nder these circumstances we cannot hope to frame a bill on a subject of such primary importance that will meet the unqualified approval of every Republican member. All we can expect to do is to frame one in harmony with and support of that which we passed today, which all must agree is as a whole, though not in my judgment perfect in detail, a wholesome and needed measure. I apprehend that a large part of the dissent from this bill arises from the fact that gentlemen, have not understood the limitations of its scope and purpose, and have regarded it as a reconstruction bill. Let us recall the history of the constitutional amendment now pending. Supposing that it was proposed as a finality, almost every gentleman on this side of the House dissented from and sneered at it, yet we all voted for it; and when it came to be considered by the people it met with an approving response such as few measures have ever received. I remember, sir, that when it 1st came to the House I asserted that my opposition to one of its provisions was irrevocable. Nor was that a passionate exclamation. It was deliberate; for in other connections I had considered the point. Yet after due consideration of the measure as a whole, and ascertaining its limitations, I voted for it. We were ready to reject it because we supposed it was brought to us as a finality, as a conclusive measure. As such it could not have been adopted, I think; and the people responded to it enthusiastically as they did because they had learned that it was but one of several measures essential to the Preservation of the country. They saw, as we had done before we passed it, that it was simply a measure to protect forever the country and the people against the dangers which the Gentfrom Massachusetts [Mr. BANKs] still seems to apprehend as imminent. It protects the sanctity of the national debt. It secures the citizenship of the people of the American Union throughout its limits, be they natives of what State or country they may, and protects them and the Government against claims for damages done during the war, property seized by our Army, or for slaves made free by proclamation or the act of war; it establishes the political equality of men whether they dwell in the cold North or the sunny South, and provides for the repudiation of the rebel debts and the sanctity of the debt of the nation. These were its purposes, and these it performs. The work of reconstruction will be provided for by other bills than the one now under consideration. This, sir, I may say, is little more than a mere police bill. The necessity for it arises from the perfidy of the POTUS. he been true to the duties of his high office and his public and repeated pledges there would have been no necessity for considering such a bill. It does but propose to enable the General commanding the Army of the U.S. to execute the dying purpose of Abraham Lincoln, and, if we may accept as evidence, his oft repeated assurances the early Presidential purpose of AndrewJohnson. Its object is to maintain peace throughout the insurrectionary districts, the people of which, as the President has asserted in a dozen solemn ohave by revolutionary violence been deprived of all civil government. It proposes to give peace and safety to every man within the limits of that extended district, irre spective of the tint of his complexion, or whether he fought against or for his country's flag. Its object is to Preserve peace and vindicate the sanctity of human life. The Gentfrom Massachusetts [Mr. BANKs] said that at 1st it was his purpose to sustain the bill, but that he had concluded to oppose it as he did in a lengthened speech. In assigning reasons for this change of opinion, he said: “It made a frame of civil government to beadmin istered by the regular Army without any restriction or limitation of power except the discretion of regular Army. the The regular Army, in administering that power, was to be without responsibility to Constitution, the to the Congress, or to country, the peopleof the but was to be responsible only to the commander of the Army.” Sir, the bill does in this respect what the law of nations and his oath of office justified Abraham Lincoln in doing and required his successor, AndrewJohnson, to do; that is, to administer under the military power such laws as should give security to property, person and life in districts the civil government of which had been overthrown, and to continue such administration until the lawmaking power could establish civil governments and codes of law for the people. It proposes to enable Grant to do throughout that confederacy, whose armies he crushed; what Scott did in conquered Mexico and what Butler and BANKs did in that art of Louisiana in which by the aid of the avy our Army established itself. They protected life and property and maintained peace while awaiting the action of that branch of the Government which had the right to make terms with the conquered or to frame laws for their government. That is what this bill proposes to do. It abrogates the results of Executive usurpation by ignoring the existence of the illegal and anomalous governments established by the Commander in Chief of our armies and Navy. In the establishment of these “so called ” or “pretended “ States he usurped a greater power than any that is proposed to be ordained i. this bill. Who made the “so called” government of NCarolina? AndrewJohnson. By what power? By virtue of the fact that he was Commander in Chief of the armies and Navy of the nation. And by virtue of that same power, enforced by the persuasive influence of the pardoning power, he arrogates to himself and exercises the right to supervise, control, and govern those governments. He told their conventions what they must and what they might not do, and those socalled sovereign bodies obeyed his commands. Through the officers of the Army he suspends or enforces the enactments of their socalled Legislatures as pleases his whim, so that their laws depend upon his temper or the state of his digestion. There are no States there; and to speak of these organizations as such is an abuse of language: There are pretended States, “so called ” States; States whose nominal Legislatures and Executives are not at liberty to deny that they are subservient to the will and orders of the acting POTUS They are not such republican governments as Congress can recognize. They are known to Con; gress and to the people to be the offspring of executive usurpation and instruments of power in the hands of a usurper, and must be declared void and set aside. But gentlemen cry, “That will produce anarchy; we must not leave the people without government and law.”. No such consequence will ensue. When we brush away these foul usurpations the law will arise that was in force when Lee and Johnston surrendered. The difficulty is that the false man upon whom crime devolved the Presidency will not execute that law. He has given us his construction of it, and we have the results before us. I o shall to depict those results as I proceed, though conscious that my poor effort will sadly lack color and effect. It is important, therefore, that we embody that law, coming to us as it does through the progress of civilization from its dawn to the close of the last war, in statutory provisions, and hold him responsible, under our power of impeachment, for the faithful execution of every clause we enact. Gentlemen will not deny that we have that power if war still exists. The distinguished Gentfrom Ohio, [Mr. SHELLABARGER,) whose views on that point I accept, says that we are not now engaged in war flagrante; that it is war cessante. And what is war cessante It is when 2 armies rest under stipulations of armistice or temporary treaty; that no life shall be taken and no position changed during a given interval. Our condition is nominally that of war cessante; but it is war flagrante on the part of the rebellious people of the socalled or pretended States, for they give neither justice nor safety to the friends of the Union. They slay them by night and by day, sleeping or waking; giving to quasi war horrors that do not belong to it within entrenchments or on tented field. The Gentfrom Massachusetts, [Mr. BANks] defining our condition, said: “It was not peace, it was not war; it was a state of siege.” Sir, I would like to know whether he regards a state of siege as a condition of war or ".? Does he think the people of Leyden and Utrecht heard the drowsy hum of peace during the siege which they endured; and that the tender women and children who cowered in caves during the siege of Wicksburg were vexed by doubt as to whether peace or war prevailed? Was Valdez in doubt on that point when he demanded the surrender of Leyden, and received from Dousa the reply that “When provisions failed the people of that city would devour their left i.reserving their right to defend their liberty?” Sir, when the people of that city, gathering around the good burgomaster Vandenwerf, Presented their wasted forms and cried for bread, he knew they were suffering war's most agonizing horrors, and, like a true soldier, replied: “Bread I have none; but if my death can afford you relief tear my body in ieces and let those who are most hungry evour it!” Sir, when the gentleman said our condition was that of a state of siege, he declared it to be that most ruthless form of war which knows not sexor age. What man in all Protestant christendom has not thrilled at the horrors of war, and at its glories, too; at the burst of pride with which Walker welcomed those citizens of Londonderry, who had searched his cellar to find whether he had food to sustain him in uttering such brave words of resistance, and came to tell him that there was nothing within his premises for the sustenance of wife or child. But who, sir, are the besieged; who are the starvelings of this state of siege which is not war.” Who exist furtively upon the bleak mountain side or bury themselves in the mias matic swamps? They are Union men, our friends, the companions in arms of the soldiers who, carrying our flag, broke the military power of the rebellion, and who, if we will but protect them, will break its spirit and curb even its proud leaders and make of them at least passably good citizens. If there be a siege they are its victims, and this bill will enable their fellow soldiers, those who stood beside them in the battle field, to restore them to their homes and shield and protect them. The Gentfrom Ohio, [Mr. LeBLoND] more logical by far than the Gentfrom Massachusetts, asserts that the old States still exist, and says that we should not expect– “That perfect peace, would prevail throughout thoseStates as soon as the war ended. It was in the nature of things there would be lawless conducton the part of mally citizens.” But he also asserts that “The civil authorities thero have been using the power they have to keep down this lawlessnessand to punish men for the commission of offenses.” Sir, had the latter assertion been well founded, the 39th Congress might possibly have adjourned without enacting such a bill, and escaped the reproaches of our constitquents and the hissing curses of southern Union men. War, while it calls forth the noblest attributes of individuals and communities, is, and must ever be, a great demoralizer. We therefore do not hold the people of the South responsible for individual acts of violence. We have felt the demoralizing effects of the late war all over the North. Crimes of unusual magnitude and turpitude have been committed in almost every city of the North. But the treatment of their perpetrators in contrast with that of murderers of Union men at the South serves to distinguish between a state of war and peace. This contrast shows that in passing such a bill as this we will not be legislating to meet individual cases of violence, but to restrain a community that is at war with the Government and all who sustain the government. At the North perpetrators of great crimes have been ofand brought to trial and punishment. Their forms have graced the gibbet and admonished those who would offend in like degree that they are in a land of law. But will gentlemen who deny the existence of war tell me what one murderer of a Union soldier has been brought to trial and punished by the civil authorities of these pretended States? The military arrested some few mur derers and tried and convicted them, but through the machinations of AndrewJohnson, the Present leader of the rebellion, they have been turned loose and have received the wel come of their fellow citizens, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Thus the crimes of individuals are assumed by the communities of which they are members, and in the crimes and their assumption by the community we find a reply to the question whether the gentleman's state of siege be war or peace. Sir, if the Present condition of the Union men of the South be peace, may God pity the most courageous and hardy of those whose country is at war! Let us in mercy assume that it is not peace, but war, and arm the Union men for their defense of home, family, and life. The bloody barbarities of the rebel captors at Fort Pillow disgrace the annals of civilized warfare; but atrocious as they were they are exceeded by the horrors inflicted by the socalled civil authorities of NewOrleans upon the unarmed members of the constitutional convention and its friends gathered around it in that city. And, sir, the loathsome details of the sacking of Badajos are exceeded by the atrocities reported to us by the committee to inquire into what gentlemen on the other side of the House mildly term the “Memphis riots.” Our abhorrence of the atrocities at Badajos is mitigated by the fact mentioned by Napier, that 100s of soldiers attempted, and many lost their lives in the attempt, to stay the outrages. There is no mitigating fact of that kind in the report of the “Memphis riots” committee. The Gentfrom Maine [Mr. PIKE] has E. us a picture of the condition of the nion men, soldiers and citizens, white and black, of SCarolina; and the report of the committee of which he is chairman contains, I am told, much more than we have yet heard. I beg leave to turn to the State of NCarolina for a few illustrations of their condition throughout the South generally. I select it, not because I regard NCarolina as the worst of these socalled States, but be cause, with the single exception perhaps Flor ida, a Union man is as safe in NCarolina as elsewhere in the insurrectionary district. I remember, sir, that more than a yeat ago 3 friends of mine from NewEngland, one of whom must be known to gentlemen from Massachusetts Mr. Thomas Drew, of. Boston, formerly editor of the Massachusetts Plowman returned to this city from NCarolina. They had gone thither to invest capital in renting or purchasing a plantation. They proposed to carry capital, seeds, and im: plements and NewEngland culture and thrift to the people of that State and to settle among them. But they had made no settlement. They were returning to cold and sterile Massachusetts. Do gentlemen ask why? It was because when they were about making a contract of lease or purchase for a property one Roddick Carney and his father had notified the owner of the property that if he rented to the “Yankees” they would burn his dwelling and outbuildings, and with the same frank amiability notified my friends that if they purchased every freedman they employed or “Yankee” they brought there to work should be mur. dered. “But did you believe them.” said I. “Oh, yes, ” said Mr. Drew, “for Roddick Carney had but a few days before, as he said for fun, shot 2 negro boys to show how good a marksman he was.” Some few weeks ago a discreet and coura. geous friendfrom another quarter of the coun: try was going into the same State, and I begged him to let me hear his views of the condition of the people. I received a lengthy communication from him last Saturday. I will offer some extracts from his interesting letter, from which it appears that Roddick Carney would probably have executed his threats had my riends persisted in their patriotic and philanthropic enterprise. The writer says: “Some 14 months since one Roddick Carney with a few friends committed a number of outrages upon the loyal citizens of Beaufortand Pitt counties, and in mere wantonness shot and killed 2 negro boys. The civil authorities, neglecting or refusing to take any measures to ers, arrestand punish these murder a lieutenant with a squad of men was sent to arrest them. Whilo they were endeavoring to arrest him Carney shot. killed the lieutenant. Another unsuccessful attempt to military, arrest him was made by the and he is now living undisturbed in Beau fort county. “This murderer, Carney, has in his possession a colored boy, namedJoseph Wiggins, theson of a respect able negro man, and he refuses to give him up. The civil authorities professthat they are afraid to arrest him or have anything to dowith Carney for the relief of the enslaved negro.” 14 months ago this man Roddick Carney perpetrated 2 unprovoked murders. Nearly 14 months since he murdered a lieutenant of your Army engaged in the performance of duty; and if the civil authorities are discharging their duties, and if there be peace there, why in the name of law and justice is he living unine lested and respected in the community in which he dwells? But let me read another extract from this same communication: “Near Hillsborough, in Orange county, in November of 1866, a freedman who had raised a small quantity of corn invited a few of his friends to assist him in shucking it. In singing the evening while the party, were and dancing, a rebel named them, armed himself with –C hea a gun, went to the freedman's house, and with oathsand curses demanded to know what they were doing. The freedmen, fright ened, attempted to escape, when he deliberately shot one of their number, killing him almost instantly: The coroner's jury returned a homicide, ’ verdict of "accidental and there the matter rests.” Do not these statements portray a capital state of peace? My informant is a cool, courageous, business man, a man of veracity, upon whose statement and judgment I confidently rely. He indicates the reason for these crimes and this impunity in a brief passage, as follows: “It must be understood that 4 5th s of the white population are fanatically devoted to the cause of the rebellion, that the Present socalled State government iasncootmhepro, pserodve entirely of men who have, in one formor lion, their devotion to secession and rebel tempat nd in whose creed the cardinal plank is confor Yankees and g and hate for the Government of the U.S. The “Howard aeemepetnadnmceebnyt' stood, from the 1st, no chance, of ac a Legislature, most of the members of which were elected on their rebel war record, after much ranting declamation in which the candidates boastedof haying carried the rebel flag in triumph from Big Bethel to Bentonyille, vieing with each other in vaunting what they had done to destroy the oal Government and drench the country with 0.001. “As a matter of form the courts are open; as a matter of fact there is no such thing as an impartial administration of justice by the courts between whites and blacks, rebels and Union men; the prejudice of the judges, justices, the lawyers, and of the juries in favor of the egrroeebs efol wrbhiditeit and against the Union men Mr. Speaker, I cannot better illustrate the power and efficiency of civil authorities so euloized jby the Gentfrom Ohio [Mr. LE than by asking the Clerk to read a short extract from the same letter of my correspondent. It relates to the Governor of one of the pretended States.