Mr. YATES. I confess, sir, to some cmbarrassment in addressing the Senate at this time, and the greater because I know that the pesitious which iIassume will be dilierent from those of honorable Senators for whose opinions I have very great respect, and to whom it would seem becoming that one so humble as myself should defer. But, sir, the opinions which I have seemto me very important; and it appears to me that I cannot discharge my duty as a representative of the State which I have the honor in part to represent on this floor without expressing them. In doing so, it is with the conviction that this question, as was remarked by the distinguished Senfrom Indiana Iissnnicss] the otherda [lhllfi, is the gravestw iich has ever been discussed y the American senate. The duty of this Congress, it seems to me, is one of tremendous responsibility. Our action ought not only to be ctfectual, but it ought to be timely and final. A mistake now will be fatal. Delays breed danger. We ought to do today what it will be too late to do tomorrow. It will not do to receive the rebellious States into full fellowship in the Union now, because they are not fit to come in. It will not do to keep them out. for it is dangerous to keep them out too long. We desire a restored Union. In union there is strength; but in union there is weakness if the parts, like oil and water, will not coa lesce. A rope of sand will not hold together. We should aim to do what Mr. Lincoln almost always did, the right thing at the right time, in the right way, an at the right place. It should be our aim as legislators to legislate, not for a part of the country only, butforthe whole country, upon principles that will stand the test of time y standing the test of impartiality, of equality, of justice, and righteousness. and, sir, ifthis Congress having the power, as I believe it clearly has, by a general law to restore, through harmonious a justment, the rebellious States, instead of fearlessly and promptly exercising that powerz waits for some constitutional amendment which cannot be adopted, or which if adopted is not founded on correct principles, we shall be recreant to our duty, and we shall incur and deserve to incur the re roach of the nation and of mankind. In discussin the bill which I have had the honor to introuce, I shall not attempt to controvert any of the principles which have been entertained hereto ore by either the Republican Union party or the Democratic party so far as the jurisdiction of the States over the question of slavery was concerned under the Constitution of the U.S.; nor shall I controvert the proposition that the States have the power under the 2nd section of the 1st article of the Constitution to regulate the qualifications of the electors in the States. I shall attempt to show, on the other hand, that by the amendment to the Constitution abolishing sla ver, Congress already has the power by a genera law to do all that is proposed to be done by the various amendments which have been submitted to both Houses of Congress. If we shall fail, having that power, to exercise it, then by reason of the long and dangerous delay which will occur, and by reason of the almost criminal omission on the part of congress to exercise its plain constitutional duty, this Government is in danger of passing into the hands of a party whose action and sympathies have been opposed to the prosecution of the war for the suppression oi? the rebellion, who voted our glorious war a miserable failure at the expiration of 4 years of brilliant service, who oppposed the reclamation of emancipation, who oppose the amendment abolishing slavery in all the States and Territories in the U.S., who tomorrow, if they had the power, would repeal your test oaths, who would) pardon Jeff. Davis, who at this very session of Congress are upon the record in opposition to the protection of the rights of the freedmen, and who stand ready now to receive in the Senate and HoRep Sens&Reps elect fresh from secession State Legislatures and from battle fields where their hands were imhrued in the blood of our loyal countrymen. This is the aspect of affairs as it seems to me today. There is only one way of salvation for the countr. Your amendments to the Constitution of the U.S. cannot be adopted. l dom, then, sir, we shall not have it, and there is no salvation whatever for the country. Let not freedom die in the house and by the hands of her friends. Mr. President, the work of reconstructing a Government, of restoring rebellious States to their former condition, is a more difficult work than building up a new Government. The statesmanship which attempts to restore rebellious and shattered States to their former relations to the Government must encounter prejudices growing out of local State governments State regulations, the conventionalities an usages of society, judicial decisions, the cori Ilicts of Federal and State authority, and all the numerous and divergent opinions of men with regard to the fundamental rights of the citizen and the mode of securing those rights and administering the Government. The work of our fathers, though oneof sublime magnitude, as herculean as it was grand, yet was an exceedingly simple one. Though its fundamental object, to carry out their principles by the machinery of well adjusted and regulated government, required the icked men of the world, whom God in His kind providence furnised the nation, yet the object they had in view was exceeding y plain, simple, and easy to be understood. What was that object? To establish freedom, to secure equality to all men, to secure the right of the majority to rule; or, to use the language of the present POTUS, “to secure exact justice to all men; special privileges to none." Who will deny that these were the objects for which the Revolution was fun ht, an for which the DeclarIndep was made? These being the objects of our fathers, I do not deny thatwhcn they came to form a Government they encountered an institution which was hostile to the principle which they attempted to establish. Kl do not deny that in an evil hour of compromise, for the sake of concord among the States and to secure the adoption of the Constitution, they most reluctantly recognized the institutionof slavery in the Constitution of the U.S., as is proven by the fact that representation was denied to the colored man in the slave States except thron h the white electors, and the other clause of the constitution which permitted the forcible arrest of the fugitive slave and his return to his master. But it was from no fault of the principles of our fathers that our national troubles sprang up; it was from a departure from their principles in the respect to which I have alluded. S every, which they supposed to be so small an element, which they supposed to be temporary in its character, which they in their hearts believed the States themselves would very soon abolish, grew from a few persons to millions in number, and the institution became so profitable and so cherished that the leaders oipthe South finally planted themselves upon it as the very basis and corner stone of society and government. 2 systems of government and civil society existed in the country, 2 systems of labor, both supported by great and powerful interests and energies, warring, jarring, antagonistic, belligerent, each striving for supremacy. Slavery, in fact, through adroit politicians. became the balance of power. and, wielded and for a time shaped and controlled the policy and legislation of the country. Slavery became almost the Government of the country, and no important question could be discussed in the country except by its relative bearing upon the institution of slavery. It doomed to ignorance, prostitution and crime nearly 4 million people, appropriated the proceeds of their labor, en 1} force ignorance upon them by severe penalities against education, and secured obe ience v, by the lash, the revolver, and the bloodhound. The slaveholder, rioting in wealth from the bended back and shrill agonies of the croinchi slave, became arro out and aristocratic, an If we have not the power now under the con learned not only to believe in African slavery, stitution of the U.S. to secure full freei but boldly to denounce free society as a ihilure, and hence the condition of the poor white man ll of the South became scarcely more tolerable than that of the slaves themselves. But, sir, I will not follow this history, the;, fierce, domineering, bullying spirit of shiver. in our national Capitol. its attempt to establish itself by force it on Kansas, &c., but simply, say that its front liecame so brazen, and its aims j and demands were at such hostile variance with l our free institutions. that it became evident that the 2 systems of freedom and slavery could not exist in the same land and when Abra ham Lincoln. the great emancipator, came before the American people to define and to as sert the great proposition that this nation could not remain ha f s have and half free, when the slaveholders saw that the pewer was departing new free States, when they saw that they could no longer rely upon full conperation from their northern sympathizers, and a resolute spirit in the northern States to resist the further encroachment of slavery, then they waxed wroth, and in the ride and insolence which the system had envendhred they drew the sword and struck at the life of the nation. It was under such circumstances as these that the rebel States raised the banner of revolt, ordained themselves out of the Union, fired upon our flag, and forced us into that self defenswe war which, thank God and our brave Army, resulted in the total extermination of the monster slavery, and planted our flag wherever traitor hands had pulled it down. What was this war about? “State rights." It was a question whether the Constitution and laws of the U.S. were to be the supreme law of the land, or whether State sovereignty, asit was termed, was to be the supreme law. It was whether a State, at its mere pleasure and volition, had aright to secede from the Union and to establish a separate and independent government. Itwas Staterights, which we now see resuscitatetl, creeping up again, and peering out from manifestoes in high quarters, and interpolated, in my humble judgment, without any proper connection, into funeral orations. “ State rights, " which saysif Congress attempts to assertits power Kentucky will go out of the Union. “ State rivhts, " which the honor able Senfrom Maryiand says, if Congress attempts to regulate the qualification of electors in the States, they will claim the right to resist the not even to the point of revolution. Let me here say by way of parenthesis. God forbid we should have any more revolution; but, sir, I am here to say not in the language of threatening, but speaking for the State which I represent, covered all over with lory as she is, having sent 250,000 of her brave volunteers to the field to put down the late rebellion should traitor hands again fire on the flag, she is just as ready now as she was then to send 500,000 more men to crush out the fell spirit of rebellion and disunion. [Great applause in the galleries.]