Mr. RAYMOND. I think that we can add such an oath as a test of qualification, if we choose. The constitution does not prohibit us from requiring any additional test o qualification which we may deem essential. Now, sir, it is said that by the course of procedure which I suggest a State may be sented partially in one House and not atreprealin the other. Well, sir, why not? If a particular district in a certain State is entitle to representation by virtue of its loyalty, and it sends here a 10al man as its Representative, that man should be admitted, even though all the rest of the State should be disloyal, and thus disqualified from sending a properman as a representative in the other branch of Congress. I see no objection to that in point of constitutional law, and I see some a vantages in point of policy. This is, it occurs to me, the only way in which we can have any representation f the loyal men of the southern States, or do them any kind of justice. We should not judge them sweepingly, classin them with rebels and traitors, and declaring that because some in the State are not entitled to representation, none can have it. Moreover, it would give us some relief and promise us more in future from the great evil which has afflicted the polities of this country for some ears past imean the evil of sectionalism. He can form relations with loyal men in portions of the South. They need not come here in solid phalanx, adhering, as a matter of course or necessity, to one political party, and to one line of national policy, and taking no part in the general interests of the country, except so far as their relations to one particular party incline them to do so. Now, sir, it is objected that it is unsafe to admit upon this floor members from the States whose people were lately engaged in rebellion, because those members may vote in a way to destroy or impair some of the permanent interests of the country, or in a way which conflicts with the opinions which many of us hold to be the only safe opinions on which the Government can be conucted. Well, sir, if they are loyal men (and I do not wish to meet any other here) they will not vote in a disloyal manner. ut, sir, I do not see what right we have to make any point like that. We have no right to canvass how men shall vote before we a mit them to seats upon this floor. If they have the right at all, they hold it wholly independent of that consideration. Moreover, I venture to say we need today, more than we need anything else, He Representatives, intelligent Representatives, loyal representatives from the southern States here upon this floor, for our Own information and guidance on subjects we are daily called upon to canvass and decide. Vhy, sir, that is the mode by which, in the view of the constitution, Congress should become enlightened as to the action itshould take. It is to act upon information furnished by Representatives from the different States. Look at the means we have to resort to now, for lack of such representation, to procure such infor motion. o have to rely upon newspaperreppns, upon chance letters of correspondents. e hear read before Congress, in one branch or the other, co ious extracts from anonymous letters. We ca to our aid agents, sent South as my friendfrom Connecticut [Mr. Dsuiuoj said, toins ect the “southern animus.” This is a roun about and most unsatisfactory way of procuring information to serve as a basis of public action. Each agent will bring from there what he takes there; he will see what he went to seethat and nothing more. Is information thus loosely gathered from irrespOnsible sources a properguide for legislation? Is that properground on which to act? We should ain immenselyin knowledge of the actual condition of the States if we had by our side loyal, intelligent southern men representing loyal districts in the southern States. Now, sir, we have not gone to work to decide upon the admission of members in this way. e have not taken this constitutional mode of considering the claims of southern Representatives to seats on this floor. Instead of acting in accordance with the provisions of the constitution, instead of acting ourselves at all, we have abdicated that high function and handed it over to a point committee of 15 a committee which sits with closed doors, which deliberates in secret, which shuts itself out from the knowledge and observation of Congress, and which does not even deign to give us the information it was appointed to collect, and on which we are to base ouractionbut which sends its rescripts intothis House and demands their ratification, without reasons and without facts, before the going down of the sun I Is that the constitutional mode of acting on this great question? Is it a mode which can satisfy the consciences and patriotic convictions of any man on this floor? This resolution embodies an amendment to the constitution which comes from that committee. It is sent here, and the rompt, instant action of the House is demanded) upon it. Not areason came to us from the committee tbr its adoption, not a statement even of any exigency which required it. I rejoice that the sense of the House revolted from the monstrous outrage of deciding so great a question, one touchin so nearly the fundamental principles of our &)Vernment, on so small a basis. It demanded debate; and I shall be much disappointed if from the able debates of the past few days the House has not received information and criti cism of value in aiding it to form just opinions and take properaction upon the subect. I think, sir, we have aright to as that committee for the entire proramme on which they repose to reconstruct the Government of the E U.S. before we adopt any of its parts. We may have this amendment the basis of representation sent to ucshatonging a, and tomorrow we may have another virtual y consolidating the national Government and substantially extin ishing the rights which belong to the States unlddrthe constitution. I will not assume that this is the direction in which the committee is looking for the reconstruction of the Government, but we are entitled to know definitely and distinctly what it does propose, and all that it proposes before we act at all. When we grope in the dark we know not what we meet, and when we abdicate our own functions and power and put them into the hands of a committee, a creature of our own, which shuts its doors against us, and deliberates in secret and only issues from time to time de crees for us to ratify or reject, it is our right, nay, sir, it is our duty to apprehend the worst, and to demand all the guarantees that full information can furnish for the safety of the trust we have committed to its hands. I think we owe it to ourselves here upon this floor to emancipate ourselves from the omination of that committee. I think we owe it to ourselves here to discharge that committee from the further consideration of certain subjects we have assigned it, and take them where the constitution has placed them, into our own keeping. Whether the House is preared for such action, I do not know. I think or its own dignity it should become so as soon as possible. We are told that we must admit none to the exercise of political power who are not sincere in their loya ty. Now, I have on that point this to submit: we have no means, is the 1st place, of testing the sincerity and loyalty of any man except by his public acts. Vhat, moreover. have we to do with the motives of men North or South, or their opinions upon polities or anything else? I thought the day had gone by when opinions could be coerced by political power, or when Governments took cognizance of opinions at all, apart from public action. I thought that habit had expire when the Inquisition died. We have the right to exact at the hands of ever man loyalty in his public action; and that is alIwe have the right to exact. You have the right to hold whatever opinions you like in regard to the Government if you will. 1866. 491 obey its laws and act with due allegiance to the constitution and laws of the U.S. That every man may be compelled to yield. What he may do is our concern; what he may believe or think is his, and his alone. We have heard a great deal of the necessity of requiring irreversible guarantees from the southern State before we can restore them to political power. It is claimed we must have nothing less than an amendment to the constitution on every point we may deem essential to the public good; and that to these amendments the southern States must consent as a condition precedent to readmission to the Union. On that point I wish to say that I believe we are seriously misled by reliance upon such amendments as guarantees for the future on any subject of vital importance. Take, for instance, the one which guaranties the non-assumption of the rebel debt and the non-repudiation of the national debt. That has been sent out by this House to the country as an amendment to the constitution, and it is supposed that when it is ratified by the requisite number of States, the payment of our debt is perfectly and permanently secured. Now, sir, I do not believe that either with or without an amendment to the constitution there is the slightest danger that one dollar of the rebel debt will ever be paid. It is not generally supposed that the people of the South have ever been over zealous touching the payment of their debts, and I see no reason to believe that the war has so increased their resources or their zeal in this behalf as need stir the patriotic apprehensions of Congress. Now, sir, in regard to our own debt, suppose you put into the constitution as an amendment a declaration, as broad as you like, and ratify it as often as on like, that this debt shall never be repudiatedl. y Will that declaration ay it? You are to pay it, principal and interest, y voting taxes and in no other way; and when the tax bill is brought into the House, what man will be constrained in the least, as to the vote he will give upon it, by that particular clause of the constitution Of the U.S.? and if there are any here or elsewhere, or if there shall be in any future time, men on this floor who wish to avoid the obligation to pay the debt, either principal or interest, they Will do it by voting not to levy the taxes that are absolotely requi site to its payment and you cannot coerce the vote of a single man on that question, bga constitutional amendment. So, too, in regard to the right of secession. Suppose we put an amendment against that doctrine into the constitution. The States North and South ratify it unanimously, if on please. It will be effectual so long as nobody wants to secede. When they do want to secede, they will override that prohibition justas they will over ride all the rest of the constitution. There is nothing like a guarantee, nothing like security in it. Secession will always be, as it always has been, a question of will and of power. The constitution cannot constrain the Will, and if the power is there with the will it, matters little what the constitution contains. Mr. Speaker, we must bring ourselves to look upon this matter precisely as it is. We must not be deluded by words nor misled as to the one true and sole reliance for the payment of our debt, for the preservation of our Union, for the attainment of all the great objects which this nation was intended to accomplish, and which, we trust, it. will yet achieve. e have just one thing and only one to rely on for them all. It is the same which has carried us through this long and arduous war. It is the patriotism of the people of the U.S. It is their determination to maintain in the future, as they have maintained in the past the integrity and the honor of their country. If they have it, and have enough of it to meet the emergencies as they arise, we shall go safely through. If they have it not, all the paperconstitutions on the face of the earth could never either give it to them or supply its place. So, sir, I put no great faith in these socalled guarantees of the constitution for objects which can o y rest upon the public conscience and the public will. They divert our attention from the real nature of the task we have to perform, and lead us to rely on other agencies than those which alone can we us aid. We must still iut faith in the people and in all the people. We must remember that public interest is after all the only guide of public conduct, and mustlearn that we best consult the safety and welfare of the nation when we promote the welfare and the prosperity of all its parts. We must cease to regar the people of the southern States as public enemies, and look upon them and treat them as identified necessaril with us in the fate and fortunes of this great the public. It may be hard for us thus to recognize so soon as friends the men who have been in armsa ainst us; but if we are to have any safety for the future, unless we are willing to convert our own Government into a despotism, and to ate mutual hatred amoiigits members repreyrpeeatrus, for generations to come, we must acknowledge the fact that the southern States are, and will remain forever, so long as the Union endures, essentiall parts of our common country. I have card it said here that we are to hold these States as provincial dependencies. The Gentfrom Ohio, [Mr. Snsmssacsnfl in the case he supposed, in case they should never give evidence of what he styles a sincere loy alty, avowed his willingness to hold them as provinces and dependencies forever! Has the gentleman seriously thought of the meaning which his words imply? Ten million people held by a republican Government, itsel based on the principle that the only just foundation of government is the consent of the governed, as ependencies forever! Why, sir, there has been no such outrage perpetrated or contemplated for a thousan years in the history of aations. We are to send there agents to collect. our taxes, and they must be collected at the point of the ba onet. We send there judges to old courts, an armies to keep the people in subjection. I commend to the gentleman, and to every one who sympathizes in his views, to read in the DeclarIndep the causes which were held then, an which will beheld always and eve here, to justify rebellion. They are precisel; the things which must go with the policy covered by that proposition. I am not Willing, by any such conuct, tosanctify the rebellion we have crushed. If we are to treat them hereafter in that way, we shall simply justif the course the have taken. it