ern people for their slaves. He believed the people of the North were as responsible for slavery as the people of the South; and if the war should then cease, with the voluntary abolition of slavery by the States, he should be in favor, individually, of the Government paying a fair indemnity for the loss to the owners. He said he believed this feeling had an extensive existence at the North. He knew some who were in favor of an appropriation as high as four hundred millions of dollars for this purpose. I could mention persons, said he, whose names would astonish you, who are willing to do this if the war shall now cease without further expense, and with the abolition of slavery as stated. But on this subject, he said, he could give no assurance-enter into no stipulation. He barely expressed his own feelings and views, and what he believed to be the views of others upon the subject."

IV. THE DIVISION OF VIRGINIA.-"Mr. Lincoln said he could only give an individual opinion, which was, that Western Virginia would be continued to be recognized as a separate State in the Union."

V. THE XIIITH AMENDMENT.-Mr. Seward brought to the notice of the commissioners one topic which to them was new; namely, that only a few days before, on the 31st of January, Congress had passed the XIIIth Amendment to the Constitution, which, when ratified by three-fourths of the States, would effect an immediate abolition of slavery throughout the entire Union. The reports of the commissioners represent Mr. Seward as saying that if the South would submit and agree to immediate restoration, the restored States might yet defeat the ratification of this amendment, intimating that Congress had passed it "under the predominance of revolutionary passion," which would abate on the cessation of the war. It may well be doubted whether Mr. Seward stated the case as strongly as the commissioners intimate, since he himself, like Mr. Lincoln and his entire cabinet, had favored the measure. It is probable that the commissioners allowed their own feelings and wishes to color too strongly the hypothesis he stated, and to interpret as a probability what he mentioned as only among the possible events of the future.

It will be seen that in what he said upon these various propositions Mr. Lincoln was always extremely careful to discriminate between what he was under the Constitution authorized to do as Executive, and what would devolve upon coördinate branches of the Government under their own powers and limitations. With the utmost circumspection he pointed out the distinctions between his personal opinions and wishes and his official authority. More especially, however, did he repeat and emphasize

the declaration that he would do none of the things mentioned or promised without a previous pledge of reunion and cessation of resistance. "Even in case the Confederate States should entertain the proposition of a return to the Union," says Mr. Stephens's narrative," he persisted in asserting that he could not enter into any agreement upon this subject [reconstruction], or upon any other matters of that sort, with parties in arms against the Government." Mr. Hunter interposed, and in illustration of the propriety of the Executive entering into agreements with persons in arms against the acknowledged rightful public authority referred to repeated instances of this character between Charles I. of England and the people in arms against him. Mr. Lincoln in reply to this said: "I do not profess to be posted in history. On all such matters I will turn you over to Seward. All I distinctly recollect about the case of Charles I. is that he lost his head." The pertinent retort reduced Mr. Hunter to his last rhetorical resource—a wail of protest, in the very worst tone of sectional egotism, that the Confederate States and their people were by these terms forced to unconditional surrender and submission. To this Mr. Seward replied with patience and dignity "That no words like unconditional submission had been used, or any importing or justly implying degradation, or humiliation even, to the people of the Confederate States. . . . Nor did he think that in yielding to the execution of the laws under the Constitution of the United States, with all its guarantees and securities for personal and political rights, as they might be declared to be by the courts, could be properly considered as unconditional submission to conquerors, or as having anything humiliating in it. The Southern people and the Southern States would be under the Constitution of the United States, with all their rights secured thereby, in the same way, and through the same instrumentalities, as the similar rights of the people of the other States were."

The reader will recall that in his last annual message President Lincoln declared his belief, based "on careful consideration of all the evidence accessible," that it was useless to attempt to negotiate with Jefferson Davis, but that the prospect would be better with his followers. Mr. Lincoln had evidently gone to Fort Monroe in hope of making some direct impression upon Stephens and Hunter, whom Grant represented as having such good intentions "to restore peace and union." He did not neglect to try this joint of the rebel commissioners' armor. Seizing the proper opportunity, he pressed upon Stephens the suggestion of separate State action to bring about a cessation of hostilities. Addressing him, he said:

If I resided in Georgia, with my present sentiments, I'll tell you what I would do if I were in your place. I would go home and get the governor of the State to call the legislature together, and get them to recall all the State troops from the war; elect senators and members to Congress, and ratify this constitutional amendment prospectively, so as to take effect—say in five years. Such a ratification would be valid, in my opinion. I have looked into the subject, and think such a prospective ratification would be valid. Whatever may have been the views of your people before the war, they must be convinced now that slavery is doomed. It cannot last long in any event, and the best course, it seems to me, for your public men to pursue would be to adopt such a policy as will avoid, as far as possible, the evils of immediate emancipation. This would be my course, if I were in your place.

The salutary advice was wasted. Mr. Stephens was a very incarnation of political paradoxes. Perhaps in all the South there was not another man whose personal desires were so moderate and correct, and whose political theories were so radical and wrong. At the beginning he had opposed secession as premature and foolish, war as desperate and ruinous; yet, against his better judgment, he had followed his "corner-stone" theory of slavery and his "supremacy" theory of States rights to the war and the ruin he foretold. Now, at the end of four years' experiment, he still clung obstinately to his new theory of secession as a "continental regulator," and the vain hope that Mr. Lincoln would yet adopt it. When at last the parties were separating, with friendly handshakings, he asked Mr. Lincoln to reconsider the plan of an armistice on the basis of a Mexican expedition. "Well, Stephens," replied Mr. Lincoln, "I will reconsider it; but I do not think my mind will change." And so ended the Hampton Roads conference.1

The commissioners returned to Richmond in great disappointment, and communicated the failure of their efforts to Jefferson Davis, whose chagrin was as great as their own. They had all caught eagerly at the hope that this negotiation would somehow extricate them from the dilemmas and dangers whose crushing portent they realized, but had no power to 1 Stephens, War between the States," Vol. II., pp. 610-618.

66

2 Campbell," Recollections," etc. Pamphlet. 3 Stephens, "War between the States," Vol. II., Pp. 224-226.

4 This meeting at the African Church was supplemented, a few days later, by a grand concerted effort at public speech-making at different places in Richmond, intended to electrify the South. Pollard, the Southern historian, thus describes it: "All business was suspended in Richmond; at high noon processions were formed to the different places of meeting; and no less than twenty different orators, composed of the most effective speakers in Congress and the cabinet, and the most eloquent divines of Richmond, took their stands in the halls of legislation, in the churches and the the

avert except by surrender; and now, when this last hope failed them, they were doubly cast down. Campbell says he "favored negotiations for peace "2-doubtless meaning by this language that he advocated the acceptance of the proffered terms. Stephens yet believed that Mr. Lincoln would be tempted by the Mexican scheme and would reconsider his decision. He therefore advised that the results of the meeting should be kept secret; and when the other commissioners and Davis refused to follow this advice, he gave up the Confederate cause as hopeless, withdrew from Richmond, abandoned the rebellion, and went into retirement.3 His signature to the brief public report of the commissioners stating the result of the Hampton Roads conference was his last participation in the ill-starred enterprise.

Davis took the only course open to him after refusing the honorable peace which Mr. Lincoln had tendered. He transmitted the commissioners' report to the rebel Congress with a brief and dry message, stating that the enemy refused any terms except those the conqueror may grant; and then arranged as vigorous an effort as the circumstances permitted, once more to "fire the Southern heart." A public meeting was called, and on the evening of February 6 Jefferson Davis and others made speeches at the African Church, which, judging from the meager reports that were printed, were as denunciatory and bellicose as the bitterest Confederate could have wished. Davis, particularly, is represented to have excelled himself in that lurid flow of partisan passion and vaunting prophecy which he so effectively used upon Southern listeners for many years. "Sooner than we should ever be united again," he said, "he would be willing to yield up everything he had on earth- if it were possible he would sacrifice a thousand lives"; and further announced his confidence that they would yet "compel the Yankees, in less than twelve months, to petition us for peace on our own terms."5 He denounced President Lincoln as "His Majesty Abraham the First," and said "before the campaign was over he aters, and swelled the eloquence of this last grand appeal to the people and armies of the South... was an extraordinary day in Richmond; vast crowds huddled around the stands of the speakers or lined the streets; and the air was vocal with the efforts of the orator and the responses of his audience. It appeared indeed that the blood of the people had again been kindled. But it was only the sickly glare of an expiring flame; there was no steadiness in the excitement; there was no virtue in the huzzas; the inspiration ended with the voices and ceremonies that invoked it; and it was found that the spirit of the people of the Confederacy was too weak, too much broken, to react with effect or assume the position of erect and desperate defiance." [Pollard, "The Lost Cause," pp. 684, 685.] 5 "Richmond Dispatch," Feb. 7, 1865.

It

and Seward might find 'they had been speaking to their masters.'"1

This extravagance of impotent anger, this rage of baffled ambition, would seem merely pitiably grotesque were it not rendered ghastly by the reflection that it was the signal which carried many additional thousands of brave soldiers to bloody graves in continuing a palpably hopeless military struggle.

THE XIIITH AMENDMENT.

We have enumerated with some detail the series of radical antislavery measures enacted at the second session of the Thirty-seventh Congress, which ended July 17, 1862-the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia; the prohibition of slavery in the national Territories; the practical repeal of the fugitive slave law; and the sweeping measures of confiscation which in different forms decreed forfeiture of slave property for the crimes of treason and rebellion. When this wholesale legislation was supplemented by the President's preliminary Emancipation Proclamation of September 22, 1862, and his final edict of freedom of January 1, 1863, the institution had clearly received its coup de grace in all except the loyal border States. Consequently the third session of the Thirty-seventh Congress ending March 4, 1863, occupied itself with this phase of the slavery question only to the extent of an effort to put into operation the President's plan of compensated abolishment. That effort took practical shape in a bill to give the State of Missouri fifteen millions on condition that she would emancipate her slaves; but the proposition failed, largely through the opposition of a few conservative members from Missouri, and the session adjourned without having by its legislation advanced the destruction of slavery. When Congress met again in December, 1863, and organized by the election of Schuyler Colfax of Indiana as Speaker, the whole situation had undergone further change. The Union arms had been triumphant--Gettysburg had been won and Vicksburg had capitulated; Lincoln's edict of freedom had become an accepted fact; fifty regiments of negro soldiers carried bayonets in the Union armies; Vallandigham had been beaten for governor in Ohio by a hundred thousand majority; the draft had been successfully enforced in every district of every loyal State in the Union. Under these brightening prospects, military and political, the more progressive spirits in Con

1 Jones, “A Rebel War Clerk's Diary," Vol. II., p.

411.

2 Message, Dec. 8, 1863.

gress took up anew the suspended battle with slavery which the institution had itself invited by its unprovoked assault on the life of the Government.

The President's reference to the subject in his annual message was very brief:

The movements [said he] by State action for emancipation in several of the States not included in the Emancipation Proclamation are matters of profound gratulation. And while I do not repeat in detail what I have heretofore so earnestly urged upon this subject, my general views and feelings reomit no fair opportunity of aiding these important main unchanged; and I trust that Congress will

steps to a great consummation.2

His language had reference to Maryland, where during the autumn of 1863 the question of emancipation had been actively discussed by political parties, and where at the election of November 4, 1863, a legislature had been chosen containing a considerable majority pledged to emancipation.

More especially did it refer to Missouri, where, notwithstanding the failure of the fifteenmillion compensation bill at the previous ses sion, a State convention had actually passed an ordinance of emancipation, though with such limitations as rendered it unacceptable to the more advanced public opinion of the State. Prudence was the very essence of Mr. Lincoln's statesmanship, and he doubtless felt it was not safe for the Executive to venture farther at that time. "We are like whalers," he said to Governor Morgan one day, "who have been on a long chase: we have at last got the harpoon into the monster, but we must now look how we steer, or with one 'flop' of his tail he will yet send us all into eternity." 3

Senators and members of the House, espe cially those representing antislavery States or districts, did not need to be so circumspect It was doubtless with this consciousness that J. M. Ashley, a Republican representative from Ohio, and James F. Wilson, a Republican rep resentative from Iowa, on the 14th of Decem ber, 1863,-that being the earliest opportunity after the House was organized,-introduced. the former a bill and the latter a joint resolt tion to propose to the several States an amendment of the Constitution prohibiting slavery throughout the United States. Both the prope sitions were referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, of which Mr. Wilson was chairman: but before he made any report on the subject had been brought before the Senate, where it discussion attracted marked public attention

Senator John B. Henderson, who with rare courage and skill had, as a progressive con servative, made himself one of the lead

coln," p. 752.

11th of January, 1864, introduced into the

Senate a joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution that slavery shall not exist in the United States.1 It is not probable that either he or the Senate saw any near hope of success in such a measure. The resolution went to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, where it caused some discussion, but apparently without being treated as a matter of pressing importance. Nearly a month had elapsed when Mr. Sumner also introduced a joint resolution, proposing an amendment that "Everywhere within the limits of the United States, and of each State or Territory thereof, all persons are equal before the law, so that no person can hold another as a slave."2 He asked its reference to the select committee on slavery, of which he was chairman; but several senators argued that such an amendment properly belonged to the Committee on the Judiciary, and in this reference Mr. Sumner finally acquiesced. It is possible that this slight and courteously worded rivalry between the two committees induced earlier action than would otherwise have happened, for two days later February 10- Mr. Trumbull, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, reported back a substitute in the following language, differing from the phraseology of both Mr. Sumner and Mr. Henderson :

ARTICLE XIII.

SECTION 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

SECT. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.3

Even after the Committee on the Judiciary by this report had adopted the measure, it was evidently thought to be merely in an experimental or trial stage, for more than six weeks elapsed before the Senate again took it up for action. On the 28th of March, however, Mr. Trumbull formally opened debate upon it in an elaborate speech. The discussion was continued from time to time until April 8. As the Republicans had almost unanimous control of the Senate, their speeches, though able and eloquent, seemed perfunctory and devoted to a foregone conclusion. Those which attracted most attention were the arguments of Reverdy Johnson of Maryland and Mr. Henderson of Missouri,- senators representing slave States, advocating the amendment. Senator Sumner, whose pride of

erudition amounted almost to vanity, pleaded earnestly for his phrase, "All persons are equal before the law," copied from the Constitution of revolutionary France. But Mr. Howard of Michigan, one of the soundest lawyers and clearest thinkers of the Senate, pointed out the inapplicability of the words, and declared it safer to follow the Ordinance of 1787, with its historical associations and its well-adjudicated meaning.

There was, of course, from the first no doubt whatever that the Senate would pass the constitutional amendment, the political classification of that body being thirty-six Republicans, five Conditional Unionists, and nine Democrats. Not only was the whole Republican strength, thirty-six votes, cast in its favor, but two Democrats,- Reverdy Johnson of Maryland and James W. Nesmith of Oregon,with a political wisdom far in advance of their party, also voted for it, giving more than the two-thirds required by the Constitution.

When, however, the joint resolution went to the House of Representatives there was such a formidable party strength arrayed against it as to foreshadow its failure. The party classification of the House stood one hundred and two Republicans, seventy-five Democrats, and nine from the border States, leaving but little chance of obtaining the required two-thirds in favor of the measure. Nevertheless there was sufficient Republican strength to secure its discussion; and when it came up on the 31st of May the first vote showed seventy-six to fiftyfive against rejecting the joint resolution.

We may infer that the conviction of the present hopelessness of the measure greatly shortened the debate upon it. The question occupied the House only on three different days — the 31st of May, when it was taken up, and the 14th and 15th of June. The speeches in opposition all came from Democrats; the speeches in its favor all came from Republicans, except one. From its adoption the former predicted the direst evils to the Constitution and the Republic; the latter the most beneficial results in the restoration of the country to peace and the fulfillment of the high destiny intended for it by its founders. Upon the final question of its passage the vote stood: yeas, ninety-three; nays, sixty-five; absent or not voting, twenty-three. Of those voting in favor of the resolution eighty-seven were Republicans and four were Democrats. Those voting against it were all Democrats. The resolution, not having secured a two-thirds vote, was

2 "Globe," Feb. 8, 1864, p. 521.

3 " Globe," March 28, 1864, p. 1313.

New York, Joseph Baily of Pennsylvania, and Ezra Wheeler of Wisconsin, the latter having also made the only speech in its favor from the Democratic

thus lost; seeing which Mr. Ashley, Republican, who had the measure in charge, changed his vote so that he might, if occasion arose, move its reconsideration.

The ever-vigilant public opinion of the loyal States, intensified by the burdens and anxieties of the war, took up this far-reaching question of abolishing slavery by constitutional amend ment with an interest fully as deep as that manifested by Congress. Before the joint resolution had failed in the House of Representatives the issue was already transferred to discussion and prospective decision in a new forum.

When on the 7th of June, 1864, the NaWhen on the 7th of June, 1864, the National Republican Convention met in Baltimore, the two most vital thoughts which

animated its members were the renomination of

Mr. Lincoln and the success of the constitutional amendment. The first was recognized as a popular decision needing only the formality of an announcement by the convention; and the full emphasis of speech and resolution was therefore centered on the latter, as the dominant and aggressive reform upon which the party would stake its political fortunes in the coming campaign.

It is not among the least of the evidences of President Lincoln's political sagacity and political courage that it was he himself who supplied the spark that fired this train of popular action. The editor of the "New York Independent," who attended the convention, and who with others visited Mr. Lincoln immediately after the nomination, printed the following in his paper of June 16, 1864: "When one of us mentioned the great enthusiasm at the convention, after Senator E. D. Morgan's proposition to amend the Constitution, abolishing slavery, Mr. Lincoln instantly said, 'It was I who suggested to Mr. Morgan that he should put that idea into his opening speech.'" The declaration of Morgan, who was chairman of the National Republican Committee, and as such called the convention to order, immediately found an echo in the speech of the temporary chairman, the Rev. Dr. Robert J. Breckinridge. The indorsement of the principle by the eminent Kentucky divine, not on the ground of party, but on the high philosophy of true universal government and of genuine Christian religion, gave the announcement an interest and significance accorded to few planks in party platforms. Permanent chairman Dennison reaffirmed the doctrine of Morgan and Breckin ridge, and the thunderous applause of the whole convention greeted the formal proclamation of the new dogma of political faith in the third resolution of the platform:

Resolved, That as slavery was the cause and now constitutes the strength of this rebellion, and as it must be always and everywhere hostile to the prin

ciples of republican government, justice and the national safety demand its utter and complete extirpation from the soil of the Republic; and that while we uphold and maintain the acts and proclamations aimed a death blow at this gigantic evil, we are in by which the Government in its own defense has favor, furthermore, of such an amendment to the Constitution, to be made by the people, in conform ity with its provisions, as shall terminate and torever prohibit the existence of slavery within the limits or the jurisdiction of the United States.

We have related elsewhere how upon this and the other declarations of the platform the Republican party went to battle and gained an overwhelming victory—a popular majority of 411,281, an electoral majority of 191, and a House of Representatives of 138 Unionists to 35 Democrats. In view of this result the President was able to take up the question with confidence among his official recommendations: and in the annual message which he transmitted to Congress on the 6th of December, 1864, he urged upon the members whose terms

were about to expire the propriety of at once carrying into effect the clearly expressed popular will. Said he:

At the last session of Congress a proposed amendment of the Constitution, abolishing slavery throughout the United States, passed the Senate, but failed, for lack of the requisite two-thirds vote, in the House of Representatives. Although the present is the same Congress, and nearly the same members, and without questioning the wisdom or patriotism of those who stood in opposition, I venture to recommend the reconsideration and passage of the measure at the present session. Of course the abstract question is not changed; but an intervening election shows. the measure if this does not. Hence there is only almost certainly, that the next Congress will pass a question of time as to when the proposed amendment will go to the States for their action. And as it is to so go at all events, may we not agree that the sooner the better? It is not claimed that the election has imposed a duty on members to change their views or their votes any further than, as an additional element to be considered, their judgment may be affected by it. It is the voice of the people, In a great national crisis like ours unanimity of now for the first time heard upon the question. action among those seeking a common end is very desirable. almost indispensable. And yet no approach to unanimity is attainable unless some deference shall be paid to the will of the majority, simply because it is the will of the majority. In this case the common end is the maintenance of the Union; and, among the means to secure that end, such will, through the election, is most clearly de

clared in favor of such constitutional amendment.1

On the 15th of December Mr. Ashley gave notice that he would on the 6th of January. 1865, call up the constitutional amendment for reconsideration; 2 and accordingly on the

1 Lincoln, Annual Message, Dec. 6, 1864.
2 "Globe, Dec. 15, 1864, p. 53.