Mr. MARSHALL. I have occupied a great dealmore time than I expected when I began. Myremarks, I know, have been very desultory. I have made these criticisms in good faith. I think there is no warrant in the constitution for the enactment of any such law; and if there was any such power it would still be a great wrong to so useit. There are others who have higher claims to our consideration. In tennessee and other southern States 1,000s of loyal men left their homes to battle for the [lug oiythe Union; and in many cases their entire property was seized in their absenceand appropriated to the use and support of the Federal armies, and their families reduced to poverty and want. These brave men, after their long services to the country, return to find their homes desolate, and their wives and children in poverty and rags and they now come here to ask the Government to pay only for the property actually taken for the use of the Government. The claim of these men to such compensation is a just and holy one. This is not denied. But I do not hearof the enactment of a law to. pay these claims. You have, on the contrary, passed a resolution that such claims shall not he considered, because, as you allege, the Government is not now able to ay these debts. No “ loyal" voice is raisedgiu these Halls to denounce the outrage. NO peans are sung in praise of these wronged defenders of their country. They happen. unfortunately, to be white men and white soldiers, and they may starve and die from want, and no wail will be raised in their behalf; but when moneyis wanted to feed and educate the negro I do not hear any complaints of the hardness of the times or of the scarcity of money. I, sir, am very far from wishing to oppress thenegro. I have no objection to your giving him the benefit of a generous homestead law. Let him go, if you please, on to the public and unoccupiedlands and obtain for himself a home. Give him ample time to pay therefor and acquire a perfect title. But I insist thatyou shn. not for his sake heap further burdens upon the oppressed white men of your country. But, sir, there is another, a higher and hoher claim still upon the justice. not the charity, of the country; that. of the white soldiers who fought the battles of the Republic., hspscially is this so of those gallant men who in 1861 and 1862, when the dreadful storm of civilWar raged in all its fury, did not stop to make terms with their imperiled country but, snatching a hasty kiss from their wives and theirlittle ones, rushed to the front of battle and held aloft the stars and stripes amid the iron hail that literally rained around them. During their absence your currency became inflate, the necessaries of life rose to fabulous prices, and the pittance you have them would not buy bread for their fam lshing babes. and, sir, but for the kind charities of neighbors and friends many of them would have perished miserabl in starvation and beggary. 1,000s of these brave men went to battle never to return. Their bones lie bleaching on the battlefields made sacred by their martyrdom. The survivors, and the wid ows and orphans of those who have fallen, come here With their just petition to have a bounty paid them equal to that given to those who remained behind and made terms with the Government. I speak not for the 3 months men, or the one years men. I speak for those who then enlisted for 3 years and bore the heat and burden of the day. They do not ask for the extravagant local bounties paid to many who enlisted at a later day. The do not even ask for the largest bounties pai by the Government itself. But they do insist that you shall make up to them the $300 afterward aid to all who vo unteered for the same period) of time. Can there be any juster, higher, or holier claim than this? Many of these allant men have gone down to their graves, while others in ruined health have returned to homes, desolated by poverty. The enormoustaxation oppresses those returned veterans or the bereaved families of those whose bones rest on the southern soil. No juster claim can be brought before Congress. But unfortu nately they are white men, white soldiers of the Republic, and so the claim which they send up from their impoverished homes is not listened to. The aggregate amount of this claim has been scandalously magnified, but it is certain that it cannot exceed what in all probability will be the cost to the Government of the measureyou are inaugurating by the passage of this bill. But this bounty claim is for the benefit, of white soldiers, and their widows and orphan children, and their claims will not be heeded. No report is likely to be made in their favor, but we have been consuming 2 whole months in legislating for the negro. Now, sir, if either is to be postponed, I am decidedly in favor of SOSLPOHIB the negro and letting the white soldier, who ought so allantly for his country, be paid what is so just y due him. Sir, there are poor white men in our country who need the charity of the Government asmuch, at least, as colored men. Look around these galleries. Our constituents cannot spare time to come here day after day and listen to the discussions in these Halls, but from the commencement of this session until now you find your gal leries crowded with the children of Ham, who are to he fatted out of the Treasury of the countr. Theseare the people that come here day after day, and darken these legislative Halls, while in constituents are toiling at home unable to pay the taxgatherer. For want of amarket, their grain rots in the granary, while we have for our audience these lazy vagabonds, but in this dispensation highly favore citizens of African descent. K Sir, this measure that is proposed is an enor mity that the peeple will not bear; and I warn my colleagues and Representatives from the; West that when the people of that section understand that this whole Government is in the power and control toda of the manufacturers of Pennsylvania and NewEngland, and the capitalists of Wall Street, that it has been run for the last 4 years in their interest, that it is now being run in the same interest, and that the leading measures before this Congress are being put through in that interest, and in the interest of the negro, to the utter ruin of the laboring white men of the country, they will rise up in indignation and in such away as to make themselves heard against this most outrageous legislation. Here the hammer fell.]