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tainty, this doubt, this veto of the civil rights bill, has made more sorrowful men and women in this country than were ever made by any other man that has trod the continent. Sir, the men that elected this Administration were actuated by the loftiest motives that ever influenced any people. They gave their children, they voted their money, they gave their prayers in November, 1864, for the reelection of Mr. Lincoln and the putting down of the rebellion, and the unity of the country, and the liberty of every man within the bounds of the Republic. They were God-fearing men and women, too, who had given the years of their life to aspiration, to thought, to prayer, to action for the freedom of all, and for the elevation of the humblest men within the bounds of the country. When they have seen this hesitation, when they have witnessed what we have witnessed during the last twelve months, when they have realized the great loss of the opportunity, in the early summer, last year, to give impartial suffrage and amnesty to the freedmen, and to the men who have been fighting against their country, when they have witnessed all these things their hearts have been wrung with a great sorrow not surpassed by the sorrow of the four bloody years of war in which three hundred thousand of their sons and brothers gave their lives to their country. The President of the United States-I do not mean to say that he purposed or intended it, for I do not believe he could be so ungrateful to the noble men that elected him-I believe, upon my conscience, has made more anxious nights, more troubled days, more bitter thoughts, more agony and sorrow of honest, conscientious, Godfearing men and women of our country than were ever made by any other man that ever lived. Upon my conscience I say that I believe Mr. Johnson has made more thoughtful men and women bow their heads in anxiety and sorrow during the past year than did the rebel chiefs during their four years of fire and blood.

Mr. HOWE. I listened to a declaration of my colleague just now that interested me very deeply and rejoiced me considerably. I hope it will turn out to be entirely correct. I understood him to say that the President of the United States is peculiarly tolerant of political opposition; that in point of fact we never have had a President more tolerant than he; that he tolerates opposition even in the members of his own Cabinet, and that he makes no removal from office for opinion's sake. Now, Mr. President, if this turns out to be so, I shall be very glad, I shall be exceeding glad, for I am bound to say that of all the Presidents we have ever had in office, I think there is no one of them under such heavy obligation to be tolerant of opinions opposed to his own as the present President.

Sir, the relations between the present President of the United States and the party which made him President are of a very peculiar character. That party, you must remember, sir, is made up in the main of a body of men against whom the President had been at war all his life until the great body of those men with whom he had acted all his life turned their backs

upon the Government and became traitors to it; and when that happened, the President of the United States declined to go with them any longer, stood by the flag as he had always stood, remained true when thousands about him were false. That was the single fact which commended him to the confidence of that party which made him Vice President of the United States. I say he was commended to their judgments and to their confidence by the simple fact that he did not prove a traitor when thousands about him did. For that act of simple fidelity, that is what it is, simply fidelity to his duty as a citizen, we were grateful, profoundly grateful; and having proved in the very morning of the struggle that he was disposed to stand by the old flag and to uphold the authority of the nation, we were led to believe that he would stand there and thus to the end of the struggle; and so in its very

morning we clothed him with the authority and with the emoluments of a brigadier general in the Army, and we sent him to Nashville to assist in defending one of the strategic points in the great controversy that was going on. The President of the United States alludes to that, I see, occasionally as an act which placed him at a. point of imminent peril. Ay, Mr. President, Nashville was a point of imminent peril; in that day there was no point in the United States which was not a point of imminent peril; but when we sent the present President to Nashville we sent security with him; we planted our armies between him and the enemy, a wall of adamant, and gave to Nashville the same security we gave to Washington and to every other point within the national lines. It was a place of peril because widespread defection and treason had covered the country with peril. That was all. But it was not peculiarly perilous. We made that-not we who fill these seats, but this nation made Nashville as secure as any point. He staid there; he did his duty; and grateful for that duty done, we said to him because he had been faithful over a few things we would make him ruler over many, and we did make him the Vice President of the United States, commended to us as I said before by the single fact that he had been loyal in the beginning of the struggle, and he had been faithful to the one trust we had imposed in him as a general in the Army.

It happened that when he had been made by our votes Vice President a terrible disaster overtook the country and he became the President; and it happened that soon after he became the President of the United States the fact was developed that there was a difference of opinion upon some points of policy between the President and the great body of that party. which had been instrumental in making him President, upon questions which we thought, and which we think, and which I for one know, are vital and fundamental, if there are any vital and fundamental questions in American politics. We found that he was in harmony with those who had opposed his election, and at variance with those who had given him his election. I am not here to discuss the right or the wrong of that difference, for this is not the occasion; I have spoken upon it once and others have spoken upon it freely. I am not here to arraign the sincerity of these opinions of the President; this is not the occasion for that, if that sincerity is open to attack at all, which I do not say. But conceding him to be sincere in his convictions of duty, this is the thing, I say: that the President was bound to concede sincerity to those who differed with him, for they had shown that they were disposed to have no personal controversy with him; they had shown that they were grateful for every political merit he had discovered, and I think they had shown as much magnanimity as ever was exhibited in the conduct of one party toward one who had been a leading and a life-long opponent of theirs. He was bound, I say, to concede sincerity to his opponents. I do not say that the President was bound to surrender his own convictions of duty because the party which made him President took another view; but I do say he, of all the Presidents who ever lived, was bound to be tolerant of this difference that existed and was developed in the body of the party which made him President. That is why I say that he of all men that have ever been put in the presidential office was bound to exercise that very toleration which my colleague tells us now he is going to exercise and is exercising.

But, sir, as to the fact whether he has exercised that spirit of toleration or not, as to whether he will exercise it hereafter, I have an event or two to refer to. My colleague says that he has made a few removals, not for opinion's sake, but to reward gallantry and fidelity exhibited in the soldiers of our Army. I am told-my colleague knows whether my information is correct-that among the removals which he has been asked to make is one of a

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gentleman who has for several years filled the office of sub-Indian agent for the Indians in the northeastern part of Wisconsin. I am told that he has been asked to remove him from that office, and to place in it a gentleman who has been connected with the Army it is true, because he has filled since 1861 or 1862 the office of paymaster in the Army, paying troops at different points-the city of Washington being one, the city of Madison, in our own State, being another, and, I believe, the city of St. Louis, being the third-a faithful officer, no doubt, but I take it not coming within the description of those officers to which our resolutions and our laws referred when they called for discrimination in their favor in the distribution of patronage. But, sir, I am told further that the Representative from the district in which this office is located, recognizing the propriety of discriminating in favor of soldiers, did think that this paymaster, or ex-paymaster, was not the most deserving soldier, and suggested that instead of his being appointed in place of that agent whose removal was decided upon, one General Swett should be appointed, who had been in the Army and had been in the line and on the field, had been shot, not to pieces, but had been crippled for life, had displayed great gallantry, had been placed in command of Camp Douglas, near Chicago, and in the discharge of his duty as such commandant, by his energy and by his activity, had really saved the city of Chicago from that conspiracy which was developed there in 1864. I am told that it was proposed by the Representative of that district that this individual should be the recipient of this office instead of the ex-paymaster, and I am told that that proposition is absolutely and peremptorily declined, and that my colleague declines it; and I am told that he has obtained from the President-I recite this as rumor; I do not vouch for the truth of any of these statements; I speak of them here because here they can be contradicted-a peremptory order on the Secretary of the Interior that the former agent be removed and that the ex-paymaster be appointed.

Now, if that is so I am afraid, whatever may be the motive of the President, it will be understood as being intended to favor political opinion and not military service. I fear that the more because I have been told that this ex-paymaster was a member of the convention in our State last fall and presided over the deliberations of that body, to whose action my colleague has referred several times here as having had very important influence upon the action of the State and upon his action here. That fact being known in Wisconsin, if it be true that the President peremptorily orders his appointment instead of the appointment of this wounded and crippled soldier, I am afraid it will be understood as a removal for opinion's sake, or if not a removal for opinion's sake, an appointment for opinion's sake. That is one fact which leads me to fear that there is great danger, in spite of what my colleague says, that this power of removal, if conceded to the President, will be exercised for political and partisan purposes.

There is another fact to which I wish to call the attention of my colleague. I have my eye upon it now, and I will read it. I read it from a newspaper, it is true, and perhaps as such it is not entitled to any consequence.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. What is the paper? Mr. HOWE. It is the Wisconsin Union, which is published at Madison. My colleague is familiar with the paper, no doubt. I understand that it is a paper which supports the President's policy very vigorously. It copies from the Journal the following. I read as it appears in the Union:

"Mr. Rublee, of the Journal, writing from Washington, gives the radical office-holders the following pleasing assurance: Mr. ELDRIDGE (the Representative of the fourth district) alleges that he and a number of others of his party were at the White House on yesterday evening, and that the President assured him that every Federal office-holder in Wisconsin who does not sustain the President's policy will be removed and those who sustain him put in their places."".

This organ may be mistaken; Mr. ELDRIDGE may not have told the truth; but I really think Mr. ELDRIDGE would not have made such a statement unless the President had made it to him, and I rather think this organ of the President would not have published it if it had not believed it and approved it. I quoted, it will be remembered, the other day a declaration which I have not heard refuted yet, not from the President, but from one who certainly sus tains the President most gallantly and most bravely, that no man should eat the President's bread and butter unless he did sustain the President's policy. There are papers lying on this table, if it were proper to allude to them, which have given me further cause to distrust the entire accuracy of the statement submitted by my colleague. I cannot refer to them in this connection.

I have thought it worth while to present these two or three items, for I really feel that my colleague may be mistaken; that the President will, if it is found that we agree to it, think it justifiable to insist upon making vacant all places filled by those who do not sustain his policy and to supply their places by those who do.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, the other day, in my absence from my seat, my colleague thought proper to present to the Senate certain resolutions of the Legislature of Wisconsin that were not addressed to this body, upon which the body could take no action whatever; resolutions condemning me in the severest terms; resolutions instructing me to resign; and the grounds upon which they were placed were that I sustained the administration of President Johnson. Is that what my honorable colleague calls toleration of a difference of opinion? Does my colleague indorse those resolutions?

Mr. President, in regard to this great question of the relations the President bears to the party which elected him, my colleague falls into a very great mistake in supposing that the party which elected Mr. Johnson was the old Whig party. Not at all, sir, True, there were a great many persons who had been in the Whig party before it was dissolved that joined the Union party; but let me tell my colleague that in the organization of the Union party it was the Free-soil Democracy uniting with the elements of the dissolved Whig party that made up that Union party which won the victory.

From 1854 to the present hour there is not a single doctrine laid down in the platform of the Union party to which Mr. Johnson has in the slightest degree proved false since he be

came

President of the United States. Sir, that party was organized in 1854, upon the dissolution of the Den ocratic party. The Democratic party dissolved on the repeal of the Missouri compromise and the attempt to enforce slavery in the Territory of Kansas. Then that portion of the Democratic party which was opposed to the extension of slavery, uniting with members of the Whig party entertaining the same sentiments, which party was already dissolved, formed this great organization denominated the Republican party of the United States; and, sir, the fundamental elements on which that party was organized in 1851 were the union of the States, opposition to the extension of the institution of slavery, and the preservation to each and every of the States of its supreme control over its own domestic institutions. In 1856 the sole issue was the extension of slavery; in 1860 it was the same issue.

Then after the success of Mr. Lincoln as the chief of the Republican party we entered upon another issue. What was it? A war to sustain the Union against the secession of the South. As the war progressed slavery was put at stake, slavery was thrown into the scale; and the question which in 1861 was, shall the Union be dissolved, shall the Government live or die, was changed in 1863 to the question whether slavery or the Union shall die. Sir, under the administration of Mr. Lincoln and the super. intending providence of Almighty God, and next to that the patriotism of the American

people which filled up our armies and filled our Treasury, we succeeded at last in winning the great victory, sustaining the Union, and crushing the institution of slavery. To crown that great victory we brought forward the constitutional amendment. My honorable friend from Missouri [Mr. HENDERSON] has the honor of introducing it into this body. The Senator from Illinois, [Mr. TRUMBULL,] as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has the honor of conducting it during its discussion here. I, as an humble member of this body, took part in that debate. Though the measure was introduced by the Senator from Missouri, it was my good fortune, and I look back to it with pride, to make in this body the first speech that was made in favor of that amendment to the Constitution.

From that hour until during the present session, when we have succeeded in carrying this amendment and having it adopted by three fourths of all the States, I have looked forward with an eye single to the accomplishment of that great victory. I pressed it in this body and elsewhere; and when many of those gentlemen on this floor who now claim to be the special champions of freedom told me over and over again that we could neither carry the amendment through Congress nor carry it through the States, my faith never faltered for an instant. Here and elsewhere and everywhere, as both the Senators from Massachusetts well know, I insisted that we could carry the amendment in this body and carry it through the House of Representatives, and that we could carry it through the country and carry it through three fourths of the State Legislatures, and that the adoption of that amendment would be the crowning, final, crushing, eternal victory over the rebellion by removing forever the cause which had produced it. Sir, steady to that purpose, with a faith which in darkness has no fear and in danger feels no doubt, I pressed on and on, in spite of opposition here and elsewhere, until I have seen it accomplished.

Now, Mr. President, in relation to the question upon which we are at present divided, when did this division begin? What did it begin about? Last spring, one year ago, every member of the Senate on the Republican side but six-and I will name the men, and there shall be no mistake about it-was in favor of the resolution recognizing Louisiana.

Mr. COWAN. Name them.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, in opposition to that proposition stood the two Senators from Michigan, [Mr. CHANDLER and Mr. HOWARD.] There was the Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. SUMNER.] The other Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. WILSON] was in its favor. The Senator from Missouri [Mr. BROWN] was opposed to it, and the Senator from Ohio, [Mr. WADE.] Yes, sir, upon this question, the very question and the only question upon which there is a division between the President and gentlemen now who claim that Congress is in opposition to him

Mr. GRIMES. You do not mean the whole Senate?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. The whole Senate on this side that night, with the exceptions I have

named.

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Mr. DOOLITTLE. On the night that ques tion was up there were eighteen of our friends who were for it.

Mr. MORRILL. How does the Senator ascertain that fact?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Because I was present. Perhaps the Senator from Maine was not in the Senate that evening.

Mr. MORRILL. I was in the Senate, and Iparticipated in the opposition to the resolution that night.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. The only two material points upon which the struggle was made were, first, whether suffrage should be extended to the colored people of the South as a conditionprecedent to those States being recognized and their representatives admitted; and secondly, whether those States were not subjugated provinces, and no longer States in the Union; and upon both these questions Mr. Lincoln's policy was precisely that of Mr. Johnson. Now, we have had a great division here for six months, it is said, and when you come to your final report of the reconstruction committee upon these two points on which the controversy began, you find that they have abandoned both. Mr. CONNESS. Mr. President

Mr. DOOLITTLE. No, sir, I will not yield at present. I am arguing this point, and I propose to call the attention of the Senate to it.

say that in the report of the reconstruction committee they abandon universal or "impar tial" negro suffrage as a condition-precedent to the recognition of these States and the admission of their representatives, and I say they have abandoned the other proposition that they are not States-that they are conquered or subjugated provinces. They admit them to be States, organized States, and propose to submit to their Legislatures the question upon the ratification of amendments to the Constitution.

Mr. President, my friend from Massachusetts says that ninety-nine out of every hundred of the Union party that elected Mr. Johnson are against him on these questions. He will find himself utterly mistaken. I can very well conceive that Mr. Johnson in relation to his friends now is very much like the position of Mr. Lincoln to the Union party after he was nominated at Baltimore, and before the Opposition had presented their platform at Chicago and nominated their candidate.

From the time of Mr. Lincoln's nomination there was a wonderful opposition raised in the ranks of the Union or Republican party. The Senator from Ohio [Mr. WADE] came out with his protest. It was rumored all over the country that Mr. Lincoln was about to resign or withdraw as a candidate and give place to somebody else, and it was more than whispered, too, by leading men on this floor connected with the Republican party, that if a Democrat should be nominated at Chicago who was in favor of a prosecution of the war, they would abandon Mr. Lincoln and give their adhesion to the Democratic candidate. But, sir, when the platform of the Opposition came to be presented, when the people came to look at the platform laid down at Chicago, Mr. Lincoln was elected from that hour; the tide set instantly in his favor, and nothing could resist it. And I say to gentlemen now that you will find that instead of its being true as you say that ninetynine in every hundred of the Republican party are opposed to Mr. Johnson, before the next fall elections are over a majority of that party will be with him, and very likely you among them. Sir, I have seen since I have been here in this body and a member of the Union party, almost as unanimous an opposition in the Union party to Mr. Lincoln as I see now here against Mr. Johnson, and I have seen them come in, and I expect to see them come in again.

Mr. President, when gentlemen talk about ruling Mr. Johnson and me out of the Union party, or crowding us off the Union platform on which he was elected and on which I helped to elect him, they know but little of Mr. Johnson or of me. I do not yield the platform on which I stand, whoever may abandon it. I do

not yield it whoever may come upon it. Parties in opposition to principle are to me nothing more nor less than mere means to an end. When you ask me or undertake to drive me to abandon the ground on which we have elected our Administration, I will be no more bound by your party ties than is flax when it is touched with fire. But, sir, when you argue with me a principle you will find me there every time. Though professed Republicans may abandon the platform, and though professed Democrats may abandon their party and come on to my platform, I will not abandon it.

Now, Mr. President, let us look at this matter a little as reasonable men. We organized in this great campaign. We fought the battle through. We vanquished all opposition. We captured the rebellion, and with it we captured the Democratic party also. They surrendered unconditionally to our Administration, to our principles, to our platform, and pledged themselves to its support, both North and South. These are the facts. Now what would a wise general do? What shall we do with this great victory? Shall we be afraid of it and run away, or shall we stand fast by our principles and the position we have taken, and master the situation ourselves? That is the question. I know that the Democratic party as such, being completely vanquished with our success in the capture of the rebellion, have come forward and admit that our ground is the right ground. Do they say now that the war is a failure? Not at all. They declare that it is a glorious success. Do they now say that they are in favor of the institution of slavery or extending it, or allowing it to be extended? Not at all. They are rejoicing that slavery is abolished. They come forward and avow in all their newspapers and in all their resolutions and in all their party creeds precisely what we avowed in the campaign of 1864. Is not that a victory? Will you run away from your own victory? Why could we not as men have stood up by the side of our President, whom we had chosen, who stood precisely on the ground on which we placed him, in whom there has been no variableness on this question, no shadow of turning, but moving right on? Why could we not have stood by him and reaped all this great victory, built up the Union party of the country, and held its administration for a quarter of a century?

Mr. President, the whole secret was told by the frank, open-hearted, manly Senator from Ohio [Mr. WADE] when he made his answer to the speech which I delivered in this body on the 17th of January. What did he say? He said that he agreed with Mr. Johnson in all he had done; he found no fault with what he had done; he had proceeded upon the policy of our party, upon the policy of Mr. Lincoln, and had improved upon the policy of Mr. Lincoln; and, said that Senator, in substance, the only thing which remains to be done to put the key-stone in the arch is universal, impartial negro suffrage in the South. With that the whole policy of Mr. Johnson would have been complete. That was the point of difference. It began at the beginning of this session with that, and with the resolution that my colleague brought in, that we must treat these States as Territories, that we must provide provisional governments for them as Territories. These two ideas were the ideas that began this war upon the President and upon his policy. The President had made no war upon anybody. He had made no war upon anybody's policy or position. He had simply in his first message, and every subsequent act of his has conformed to that, brought forward the true state of the case. He was the executor of Mr. Lincoln. Mr. Lincoln, in his last speech, from which I before read an extract in this body, about three days before his assassination urged upon the country this policy.

But, Mr. President, in relation to the power of appointment. I said to my colleague that within my recollection, now thirty years of political affairs, I have never known an Administration more tolerant of opposition than the

Administration now in power. I believe it. If Mr. Johnson has erred at all, it has been in being too tolerant, not merely of opposition of opinion, but of opposition in the shape of the most vilifying, wicked, unfounded, libelous abuse which has been thrown upon him from one end of the country to the other by newspapers whose editors or proprietors were holding office under the Government. In relation to some of those matters, neither you nor I, if we had the responsibility of the executive department upon us, would tolerate that kind of personal abuse. It is unbecoming to allow it.

But, sir, in relation to Mr. Johnson, as I have said, he, like other men, may err; but for three years to come he is to be our President, the President of our choice, the President in whose hands, to a considerable extent, the destinies of this country are necessarily placed; and within the next three years to come we must settle all these great questions, and we must dispose of our pending relations with Mexico and with Great Britain. In what condition are we placed now, with these States all unrepresented, with the people growing more and more discontented-I mean the Union men of the South as well as those who have been in war against us-for the reason that for six long months here you have turned your back upon representatives as loyal as any man who sits upon this floor, some of whom have been wounded upon the battle-field while serving the cause of the country, and treated them pre. cisely as you would treat the disloyal of the South. They become aggrieved; they become discontented and disappointed; their hearts are failing within them; and, as Mr. Lincoln said would occur, we, by turning our backs upon them, are doing all in our power to demoralize, disperse, and disorganize our friends in the South. What condition, I ask, are we in if we should have (what may come upon us at any hour) difficulties growing out of our relations with Mexico? Suppose that, from our complications there, we are involved in a war with Austria or France, or both together, what condition are you in to call upon the people of the South to come up to aid you in the great conflict? I tell you, Senators, it is our duty to close up this question. What is the effect of the proposition before us, reported from the committee on reconstruction? Is there a man on this floor who believes that that proposition, if it be submitted to the several States, will be adopted by a majority, much less by three fourths of them? Who believes if we should submit it that it would be so adopted? I do not think there is any man who can believe it. If they will not adopt it, what, then, is the effect? Instead of being reconstruction it is obstruction to the restoration of the States and of the Union.

the Congress of the United States. Sir, our friends here sometimes overlook and do not fully comprehend, in my judgment-I say it with all respect-that deep-seated feeling there is existing among the great mass of the people of the North. My friend from Massachusetts is utterly mistaken when he thinks that ninetynine hundredths of the Republican party, as it is called, or the Union party, are with him on this question. He will find himself utterly mistaken if he relies on any such anticipation.

I had hoped that this question would have been voted upon long ago. I know that this discussion has taken a wide range and made many digressions-digressions which perhaps

ought to regret, and which certainly I will not continue by any longer trespassing on the time of the Senate.

Mr. WILSON. Mr. President, the Senator from Wisconsin seems to have addressed his remarks to me

Mr. CONNESS. I rise to a question of order.

The PRESIDING OFFICER, (Mr. ANTHONY in the chair.) The Senator will state his point of order.

Mr. CONNESS. It is that this discussion has no relation whatever to the question before the body. It has proceeded for nearly two hours, and gentlemen rise here and occupy the entire time in repeated speeches upon interpolations introduced by themselves. If we are going to consume the day in this kind of debate I propose that there be an opportunity given to more than the Senator from Wisconsin and the Senator from Massachusetts. I propose that we shall not listen constantly to the speech of the 17th of January repeated here upon every appropriation bill or other bill that may be introduced; and I ask either that the discussion be confined to the question before us, or that it be more general than it is.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The discussion certainly does not relate to the subject before the Senate, but under the practice of the Senate the Chair does not feel authorized to rule it out of order. A wide range of debate has always been allowed in the Senate.

Mr. WILSON. It is very seldom that I ever say anything on these questions; I have occupied scarcely an hour during the whole of the session; and I am very much surprised that the Senator from California, who occupies more time than any other member of the Senate, should make a point of order of this character. I did desire at this time to reply to a few of the remarks made by the Senator from Wisconsin; but as the Senator from California has raised this point of order, if it is the wish of the Senate to close this discussion, I shall forego that answer.

Mr. COWAN. It is very well known that I never interfere in discussions of this kind, or very rarely, at least, because I know that the effect of them is not to convince anybody but perhaps to widen the breach. I only rise now for the purpose of correcting some errors into which the honorable Senator from Massa

cess of his zeal, and, I may say, in the excess of his hostility to the President.

The honorable Senator from Massachusetts belongs to one wing of the Republican party; I belong to the other wing. We had the President heretofore, and he had to put up with it; we have got the President now, and he has got to put up with it.

Mr. President, I do not care to be drawn into a discussion of these party questions. I foresaw in certain movements that took place in the beginning, that it was war on the Administration and intended as war on the Administration by some who took part in it; and fear-chusetts [Mr. WILSON] has fallen in the exful of the result I have struggled from the beginning to avoid it, to endeavor if possible and by every means to have our friends in Congress and the President of the United States act harmoniously and act together on these great questions. The system of policy which Mr. Johnson inherited from Mr. Lincoln had been in operation for years. He presented it. You have not presented any better policy. Something must be done. This policy of the President must be accepted, certainly, unless there is a better policy. We must do something. Why not then come up, one and all, and take hold of this matter? I can assure my friend from Massachusetts that the people of this country, now that the war is over, demand peace, and will have it, and that it shall be peace in reality and not a mockery. They demand the union of these States, not their disunion. They demand reconstruction, not obstruction. They demand, and will have, the loyal representatives of the southern States in

Mr. WILSON. I should like to see the wing to which the Senator belongs.

Mr. COWAN. The honorable Senator will find the wing this fall, and it will be such a wing as will sweep him and his faction out of existence, or I am very much mistaken in the signs of the times. He may succeed up in Massachusetts, or along there, but he will not succeed anywhere else, I think, very well, with all the bluster and parade that he makes as though he and his set were the whole Republican party.

The Senator to-day has descended into matters which more properly belong to the execu

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tive sessions of this body. He has charged the President here-with what, pray? A design to betray the Republican party? [Mr. WILSON shook his head.] To betray was the word; and I speak it knowing what I do speak and understanding what I do say, and I speak it more in sorrow than in anger, that in this party of ours for some time it has been the fashion, when anybody differed from certain gentlemen upon this side, there was no tolerance of a difference of opinion; there was no term too harsh to be applied to the recusant. Any man of sense could have seen that that was a very handsome way to keep up a party, particularly when that party had its platforms promulged to the world; when they were written down and before the world, and could be read, and when the people themselves had pronounced upon them.

Now, I say to the honorable Senator from Massachusetts, and all those who hold similar opinions with him-I trust there are not many who will be so unguarded in their language as he has been-that so far from the President betraying the Republican party, if its written records are to be evidence of what it believes and what it thinks, the President to-day stands upon its platform firmly. Take that platform, produce your articles, bring forward your resolutions, and show where he has violated a single one of them; and when you do I will undertake to show upon this floor, and I will show it beyond the possibility of a denial, that it is the honorable Senator, and those who believe with him, who never were members of the party, who never ought to have belonged to it, and were the burden that it has always carried; that they are those who caused the divergence; they are those who, carried away into these new schemes and these new projects, have split it and divided it. I understand the Senator belongs to a party who discard platforms, who discard the belief of yesterdaya party of progress, who boast, "Are we not wiser to-day than we were yesterday? Have we not learned something in the experience of the past?" I should be glad if they had. Now

Mr. SHERMAN. As the time for an adjournment is approaching, I rise to a point of order.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator will state his point of order.

Mr. SHERMAN. I ask if there is any limitation upon debate in the Senate.

Mr. COWAN. I ask the Senator to put his point of order in writing. I believe that is the rule.

Mr. SHERMAN. I will do so; but in the mean time I call on the Senator to take his seat. I am now serious. This debate has been continued for five or six days, and I hope we shall be allowed to come to a vote.

Mr. COWAN. I will change the subject and speak to another point. The honorable Senator from Massachusetts has told the Senate

Mr. SHERMAN. I ask that the rule be enforced, and that the Senator take his seat until the point of order is disposed of.

Mr. COWAN. I clearly have a right to reply to personal matter.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio rises to a point of order.

Mr. SHERMAN. The Senator must take his seat, and I will reduce the point of order to writing. The Senator made his point on me, and I insist that the rule shall be enforced.

extra judice, beyond the rule; but I wish to say to the honorable Senator from Massachusetts, because it illustrates the folly of this persistent quarrel that is kept up upon the President of the United States and which has been brought into the body

Mr. SHERMAN. In compliance with the demand of the Senator from Pennsylvania I send the point of order in writing to the Chair; and I should like to have the Senator comply with the rules as he enforced them against me.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio raises the following point of order: "The point of order is, that the remarks of the Senator from Pennsylvania are not pertinent to the question before the Senate."

Mr. HOWE. Would a motion that the Senator from Pennsylvania have leave to proceed

be in order?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Not until the point of order has been decided. The point of order is undoubtedly well taken according to the rules of the Senate, but under the practice and the wide range of debate that has always been allowed in the Senate, the Chair does not feel that he would be following the precedents in deciding that the Senator is out of order. The Senator from Pennsylvania will proceed, unless the Senator from Ohio appeals from the decision of Chair.

Mr. SHERMAN. I simply want it to be understood, because, having this bill in charge, I wish to do my duty, and I think it is the duty of the Chair to submit the question to the Senate and let us be governed by the will of the Senate. I believe that has been the usual course on such questions.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will follow that suggestion and submit the point of order to the Senate.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I hope before that is done

The PRESIDING OFFICER. That is done.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Chair decides to submit it to the Senate?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. To submit it to the Senate.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Senator from Ohio assumes that that is usually done. I have never known it to be done in the eleven years that I have been a member of the Senate.

Mr. SHERMAN. I think it is the rule. Mr. TRUMBULL. Never on a question like this. This is the first time that it has ever been done.

Mr. FESSENDEN. The Senator is out of order unless he appeals from the decision of the Chair.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Chair has not decided.

Mr. FESSENDEN. It is to be left to the Senate.

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be decided.

Mr. FESSENDEN. That is for the Chair to settle. I understand the Chair has made a decision that it shall be left to the Senate. Mr. TRUMBULL. And now I can argue

Mr. COWAN. I propose to ask leave of the Senate to reply to that part of the remark-before the Senate how it shall be decided. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The rules require that the Senator from Pennsylvania shall resume his seat until the Senator from Ohio has stated his point of order.

Mr. COWAN. But I ask leave to proceed upon a new subject.

Several SENATORS. That is unnecessary.
Mr. COWAN. I will waive it.

Mr. TRUMBULL, (to Mr. CoWAN.) You have a right to say what you please.

Mr. COWAN. I agree with my friend from California [Mr. CONNESS] that this has all been

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair submits the point of order to the Senate, but that is not a decision, and the Senator from Illinois has a right to argue the question.

Mr. TRUMBULL. Now, I wish to sayMr. COWAN. I believe I have the floor. Mr. TRUMBULL. On this question I believe I have the floor. Sir, I would not have interfered with this question of order at all but for the remark which fell from the Senator from Maine or the Senator from Ohio, that it had been usual to submit a question of this kind to

the Senate. When an amendment has been offered to an appropriation bill and it was objected that it was a private claim, the Chair has often submitted that question to the Senate for its decision; but I have no recollec tion, and I think the Senator from Maine will find it difficult to produce a case, where, on a question of debate, when the whole subject was up, when a bill was under consideration and a Senator was discussing that bill, he was ever called to order in the Senate of the United States for the irrelevancy of his remarks, and the question was submitted to the Senate as to whether he should go on or not. Iconsider it a very important matter in this body to undertake to limit debate. The Senator from Pennsylvania must be the judge himself of what latitude he thinks proper to indulge in; and although I am quite willing to give him leave to proceed in order, as some one has suggested, I insist that he has a right to proceed and discuss this bill and make such a speech as he thinks proper, and that there is no rule that has ever been enforced in the Senate to deny him that right. I should be very sorry at this day to see a majority of the Senate decide that the Senator from Pennsylvania is out of order because in their opinion his remarks are irrele vant to the particular point under consideration. The whole bill is now open before the Senate. We are discussing an amendment to an appropriation bill, which, in my judgment, properly entitles any Senator who thinks proper to indulge in remarks-he must be his own judge as to the propriety of them-in making such remarks as he thinks proper, not, of course, violating the rules of the Senate in what he says; but so far as relevancy is concerned, he is to judge of that.

Mr. SHERMAN. I have now the rule, and I will read it to the Senate. It is a rule that is very rarely referred to, because we do not look to these questions closely:

"7. If any member, in speaking or otherwise, transgress the rules of the Senate, the Presiding Officer shall, or any member may, call to order; and when a member shall be called to order by the President or a Senator, he shall sit down, and shall not proceed without leave of the Senate."

That settles that question.

"And every question of order shall be decided by the President without debate, subject to an appeal to the Senate; and the President may call for the sense of the Senate on any question of order."

And my impression is that it is usual for the Chair to submit a question of order to the SenOn the question of practice I may not be correct. Senators who are older than I am can speak as to that.

ate.

Several SENATORS. Not on a question of relevancy.

Mr. SHERMAN. That is the general par liamentary law. How far that is to be enforced in the Senate, is a matter for the Senate to determine. I do not wish to be discourteous to my friend from Pennsylvania, but this ques tion has been before us for five or six days, and I want to have it disposed of.

Mr. TRUMBULL. A point of order on a question of relevancy is never submitted to the

Senate.

Mr. CLARK. If the Senator from Ohio will allow me, I will suggest to him that he had better, in this case, withdraw his point of order, because there can be no general rule on a ques tion of this kind. You may in this case decide that the Senator from Pennsylvania is out of order, but that does not decide that any other Senator is out of order until the Senate take the question on that particular case.

Mr. SHERMAN. I am perfectly willing to withdraw it. The only reason why I insisted upon it so far was that the Senator from Pennsylvania took the technical objection that I must reduce my point of order to writing, and that being unusual, I thought I would insist on the enforcement of the rule.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair did not insist that the point of order should be reduced to writing. The Senator from Ohio had a right to state it without reducing it to writing.

Mr. SHERMAN. The Senator from Pennsylvania insisted on the point of order being reduced to writing, which was very unusual. Mr. COWAN. The words on which you made your point of order.

Mr. CLARK. Allow me to say that on that point I think the Senator from Pennsylvania was wrong. When a Senator is called to order for words spoken in debate, because they are opprobrious or improper, then they are to be reduced to writing, but not in a case of this kind. I think the point of order had better be withdrawn, and let the debate go on.

Mr. SHERMAN. I withdraw it. Mr. GRIMES. I object to the withdrawal of the point of order, because I want to have this question settled.

Mr. CLARK. It settles nothing.

Mr. GRIMES. I want to have it settled for hereafter. Several times during this session when a Senator has been debating a question here and arguing it as he chose to argue it, somebody has got up and raised a point of order that he was out of order. I have never seen it done until this winter, and I want to have a stop put to it.

I

Mr. CLARK. The Senator from Iowa will allow me to suggest to him that taking this question now will decide nothing with regard to it. I have never known it done before, and presume it will not be done again, if this point of order is withdrawn, any more than if we were to vote upon it. I think if, by general consent, the point of order is withdrawn, and the debate is allowed to go on, Senators will keep themselves within the ordinary rule of parliamentary law. They must, in a great measure, be allowed to judge for themselves what is proper.

Mr. SUMNER. I wish to call the attention of the Senate to a debate that is historic, perhaps the greatest debate that ever occurred in this Chamber, known as that between Mr. Webster and Mr. Hayne. Senators will remember that that occurred on a simple resolution relating to the disposition of the public lands. On the consideration of that resolution, the whole question of the relations between the North and South was opened; also the question between the rights of the States and the General Government, and the original formation of the national Constitution, all of which were most thoroughly discussed by Mr. Webster in at least two separate speeches. I am not aware that on that occasion any one undertook to call Mr. Webster to order by saying that he must confine himself to the consideration of the public lands. I take it, that debate may be considered as having practically settled in this Chamber that a discussion may be made a departure, if I may so express myself, from the original topic; but that departure must always be regulated by the good sense and the discretion of the Senators who take part in it.

Mr. CONNESS. With the permission of the Senator from Pennsylvania, I desire to say one word. I understood the Senator from New Hampshire to say that a question of order arising out of the latitude debate had taken and the inappropriateness of the debate to the subject had never been raised in the Senate before. I think the Senator was in error in that statement. I have several times since I have been here heard such questions of order made.

Mr. CLARK. Questions of order have been raised upon particular motions, such as a motion to commit or a motion to take up a subject, where the debate is always limited; but upon a general debate like this I never knew a question made.

Mr. CONNESS. I wish simply to say, in conclusion, without intruding on the time of the Senator from Pennsylvania, that I had no intention certainly to raise the question for the first time, but supposed I was following the ordinary path that was pursued here, as the debate had taken a very wide course. I drew upon myself remarks, somewhat personal, from the Senator from Massachusetts, and which I think had better not have been made by him, as they were not strictly correct. I did not

intend any offense to the Senator. I supposed I was doing that which I had a right to do, and which could not be regarded as offensive by any Senator.

Mr. COWAN. I have but a single word to say. I suppose that the debate was out of order, according to the rules of this body. I think the whole of it was logically out of order. That is logically out of order which considers persons instead of questions. The question here is as to the authority of the President and the propriety of the exercise of certain powers on his part. The range of the debate is wide enough to include all Presidents and all power and all Governments, and all that kind of thing. I think the divergence was on the part of the Senators from Wisconsin. I think any debate, unless it be in executive session, in which the person of anybody is introduced or the motives of anybody as a person is introduced is out of order; and it is out of order for the plain, palpable reason that it destroys all order and becomes disorder, and does not conduce in any way to the ends of truth.

My friend from Massachusetts is entirely mistaken in the instances which he gives. He states that a soldier was removed in the city of Philadelphia to make way for an enemy of the party. I need not say to the Senate, because it will learn that in due time, that this is utterly, totally, and entirely untrue, not that I mean to say that the Senator from Massachusetts knows that it is so; but the real truth of the matter is, that the person appointed is as radical, according to his record, and more radical than the honorable Senator from Massachusetts, with all his radicalism, dare be; and he comes here indorsed, I think, with all the radicalism that has ever prevailed in the country, all of which will be disclosed in proper time by my friend from Oregon, [Mr. WILLIAMS,] to whom the case is committed.

Now, with regard to the other appointment, the gentleman who was marshal of western Pennsylvania was a gentleman of my profession, a friend of mine; and I may say for him that he is as honorable, as upright, and as good a man as there is in the country. He has held that office for three or four years without the slightest stain upon his reputation or his credit in any way. The gentleman who has been appointed to take his place, instead of being a civilian, is a soldier, has been a soldier through the war; and what I rose especially for was to caution my friend from Massachusetts about the too liberal use of the vocabulary of the English language which is used to designate crime. He said to the Senate here, in open session, that this man had committed acts which, but for the interference of friends, would have sent him to the penitentiary. I think the honorable Senator is a just man; at least he talks largely of justice here. I think he is a charitable man. I think, when he manifests such extraordinary affection for an alien race and for an oppressed people, he would not hurt his brother.

But, sir, it is the fashion of the times; these words come so glibly upon the tongue, and they are held to be of so little import here, that a reputation is stabbed as though it were as vile trash as that which fills a purse. Let the honorable Senator reflect for one moment upon the gross injustice of such a charge as this, made here openly, in broad day, to the American people; and let him reflect that he makes it of a soldier-a soldier, I can tell him, who, after this disgrace of his, rode the raid with Sheridan, and fought the battles in the valley. In my country, whether this charge be true or be not true-I know nothing of itno man would dare to charge that appointee to his face with a crime that would render him infamous. No man, whether he believes it or not, would charge that until it was properly investigated upon a presentment by a grand jury and a verdict of the fellow-citizens of the guilty man. I put it to Senators whether this is the place where a man's reputation may be torn to tatters; where his wife may be made to weep for shame among the other weeping

and doleful trains of which the Senator has told us; and whether he wishes to make himself the conduit, the mouth-piece, by which to convey insult and infamy to this man's children when the grave closes over both him and the Senator from Massachusetts. Sir, the rule was that prosecution should be free, but that defamation never should be free. Let him who charges a crime upon his fellow-man go to the law. If it is a crime at all it is a crime against the law; and when charges are to be made of this infamous character let the law be appealed to, let the prosecution be free, but let the defamation be limited, not only by the law, but by the restraints which every gentleman and every man of honor feels ought to regulate him in his intercourse with his fellow-man.

Mr. President, as I said at the outstart-and I trust it is not more out of order than a great many things which have occurred in this debate -the honorable Senator belongs to one wing of the Republican party; I belong to the other. I have no uncharitableness for him and the people who believe with him. I may believe that their doctrines are erroneous, that their projects for the future are mischievous and will result in evil, but I have no crimes to charge upon them. The sure harbinger of the downfall of any party which resorts to that means to bolster itself up is to be found in the means itself. The man who stands firmly and strongly upon a good cause and upon the justice of it never turns aside from the question to argue the personal character of his opponent, for one of the best reasons in the world: the personal character of the opponent has nothing to do with it. The logic of a bad man is not necessarily bad logic because it comes from his mouth; nor is the logic of a good man necessarily good logic because it proceeds from the mouth of a pure man. It is only weak people who resort to those indices; and whenever you find a man resorting to them it is a sure evidence that he is not competent to decide upon the true. But has it come to this in the Senate of the United States, that we are to leave questions for personal motives and for a personal consideration of the characters of those who choose to advocate this or that doc. trine?

Mr. President, I simply rose to say this much. I had not intended to say a word as long as the debate was confined to its legitimate limited range, because I supposed everybody had made up his mind on that point, and I did not attempt to influence anybody; but when the honorable Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Howe] got up and undertook to dive into the secret machinery by which the President of the United States was guilty of ingratitude to him and his set, and when the honorable Senator from Massachusetts undertook to state boldly that the party was betrayed by the President, and when particular instances were given, it was utterly impossible to sit still and allow those things to go to the country without attempting to send along with them an antidote, however feeble it may be.

I have only to say further, that one day we shall wake up from this delusion by finding that if we undertake to govern an empire of the size of this, including so many States as this does, so many varieties of men, so many interests clashing with one another, we shall have to be much more charitable to one another, and we shall have to be much more tolerant of divergent opinions, and to yield ours, when it becomes necessary, for the common security and the common peace. As was well said by my friend from Wisconsin, [Mr. DOOLITTLE,] what the nation wants now is peace, not war. What it wants now is repose, and not factious and turbulent activity. What it wants is a restoration of law and order, obedience to the Constitution and to the recognized authorities of the land; that crimination and recrimination shall cease; the past be forgiven; that by-gones be by-gones; and that if there is to be retribution, if the hand of retribution has not fallen upon the nation heavily enough now, North and South, when there is hardly a family throughout the length and breadth of the land that is

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