Mr. FARNSWORTH SPEECH OF FARNSWORTH OF Illinois, IN THE House February 7, 1867. The House having under consideration the bill (H.R.No. 1143) to provide for the more effectual government of the insurrectionary States. Mr. FARNSWORTH said: Mr. SpeakER: The Gentfrom Ohio [Mr. LEBLoND] stated that it seemed to him that it would be the death knell to civil liberty if we pass this bill. Sir, if civil liberty means the right to slaughter and slay and despoil at pleasure then I trust this is the death knell to it. This bill was framed for the purpose of protecting the people of the disorganized States, all the people, in their rights. The necessity of the bill is found in the fact that no such protection is found in the ten disorganized States at the present time, afforded by the courts, or by any civil tribunal. The power of the courts, and of such governments as they have in those States, is in the hands of disloyal, unrepentant rebels, who still have the same virus and the same hatred of the institutions of our country that they had during the war. I am glad that my colleague on the select committee to inquire into some of these disorders [Mr. PIKE] has called the attention of the House, and of the country, to some of the testimony which we have taken, and I propose to present to the House some other of the testimony he had not time to read. I take it that it is no longer a question of doubt it cannot be skulked or avoided or denied, that the loyal men, the Union soldiers and the freedmen, in these disorganized and disloyal States are not protected. They are murdered with impunity; they are despoiled of their goods.their property; they are banished, scattered, driven from the country. I know that some newspapers and some pol iticians have been in the habit of denying all this. They state that what we are told by ref. ugees, by these exiles from those States, is all false; that they are made up reports to effect northern sentiment; that there are designing men traveling north for the purpose of exciting sympathy with their tales of suffering, and that there is no foundation for their reports. But when the military authorities, all with one accord, unite in telling us that there is no protection for life and property, there is no longer any reasonable doubt. W. have testimony that unless the military is clothed with some additional authority there the U.S. garrisons and troops will have to be withdrawn. Why? Because if a soldier is brutally mur dered, and the military arrest the offender he is taken from their hands by writ of habeascorpus, issued by the State courts and is discharged. And it is mean and damnable for us to send soldiers clothed in the U.S. uniform into those States thus to be murdered, unless we provide some means of redress. General Schofield, who has never been considered a Radical, but always, I believe, very conservative, says that — “The courts throughout theseStates fail to dojus tice to the freedmen—that is, fail to punish white men for assaults and outrages committed on the freedmen.” He says, also, that — “The courts not only fail to punish outrages and assaults but they fail to administer justice in matters of contract between freedmen and white men.” If, for instance, a freedman is kicked off from a plantation and clubbed, and brings suit before a magistrate for the wages due him, and the white simply asserts that the freedman was insolent, i. court dismisses the case. h know that the offenders will be arrested under GenlGrant's Order No. 44, and held until they are. “I do not think the civil authorities are disposed to administer justice if left to their own will.” He further othat trials are not impartial. General Baird, who was in command of the district of Louisiana, says: “Murders were frequent. In some instances I think the civil courts would do justice to the negroes rwehgearred no feeling was aroused or question raised into the rebellion, and as between white men and black men, or Union men and rebels. If any such question was raised, as a general thing it would be impossible to get justice done. “In case of murder of freedmen it was almost impossible to get the man arrested, and if would be sure arrested he to get released on very low bail. I remember onesuch case, where the man was released on $300 bail.” General Wood says, in regard to Mississippi, “that there is no diminution of crime, and punishments are seldom inflicted.” GenlSickles says, in reference to SCarolina and Georgia, that the courts do not furnish any redress for murder or other crimes committed upon Union men, freedmen, or soldiers, and that unless the military can be clothed with power to protect themselves and punish offenses committed against them, the garrisons will have to be withdrawn. Sir, it is impossible to find an officer of any considerable rank, who has spent 3 months in any of those States, in command of any district, or as superintendent or asst commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau, who will not make the same statement. Then the question arises, is it the duty of the Government to afford protection to our people there? There is no adequate protection now to Union men, to soldiers, or to freedmen in those States. I care not what laws you.here, so long as they remain a dead letter because there is no power there to enforce them. No matter what enactments' you may place upon your statute books, unless there is some power provided to enforce them i.n those States they are good for nothing. Crime of all descriptions runs rampant through the land. These people are holding out their pleading hands, they are looking to us with ghastly faces, they are imploring us now, as they have been for the last 2 years, to give them that protection which they never yet have had afforded them. Therefore the JtCom on Reconstruction have reported this bill in accordance with the recommendations of their commanders; in accordance, I believe, with the sentiments of the General of the Army, and of every other loyal man who is desirous, that this shall be a Government in fact as well as in name. This bill is intended to give to that people the protection, which we owe to them, and which they so much need. I have just received a NewOrleans paper, the NewOrleans Tribune, of the 27th ultimo, which contains an account of the brutal treatment of a family in Texas. I send it to the Clerk's desk to be read.