nity was given in the discussions of the House. He proceeded to consider the probable alternative. "Suppose,' said he, "as some dreaming theorists imagine, that these States have never been out of the Union, but have only destroyed their State governments, so as to be incapable of political action, then the fourth section of the Fourth Article applies, which says, "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form of government.' But," added he, "who is the United States? Not the judiciary, not the President; but the sovereign power of the people, exercised through their representatives in Congress, with the concurrence of the Executive. It means political government-the concurrent action of both branches of Congress and the Executive." He intended his line of debate to be an attack, at the very beginning, upon the assumption of the President in his attempt at reconstruction. "The separate action of the President, or the Senate, or the House," added Mr. Stevens, "amounts to nothing, either in admitting new States or guaranteeing republican forms of government to lapsed or outlawed States. Whence springs," asked he, "the preposterous idea that any one of these, acting separately, can determine the right of States to send Representatives or Senators to the Congress of the Union?"

Though many others had foreseen and appreciated the danger, Mr. Stevens was the first to state in detail the effect which might be produced by the manumission of the slaves upon the congressional representation of the Southern States. He pointed out the fact that by counting negroes in the basis of representation the number of Representatives from the South would be eightythree; excluding negroes from the basis of representation, they would be reduced to forty-six; and so long as negroes were deprived of suffrage he contended that they should be excluded from the basis of representation. "If," said he, "they should grant the right of suffrage to persons of color, I think there would always be white men enough in the South, aided by the blacks, to divide representation and thus continue loyal ascendency. If

they should refuse to thus alter their election laws it would reduce the representation of the late slave States and render them powerless for evil." Mr. Stevens' obvious theory at that time was not to touch the question

of suffrage by national interposition, but to reach it more effectively perhaps by excluding the entire colored population from the basis of congressional representation, until by the action of the Southern States themselves the elective franchise should be conceded to the colored population. As he proceeded in his speech Mr. Stevens waxed warm with all his ancient fire on the slavery question. "We have," said he, "turned, or are about to turn, loose four million slaves without a hut to shelter them or a cent in their pockets. The diabolical laws of slavery have prevented them from acquiring an education, understanding the commonest laws of contract, or of managing the ordinary business of life. This Congress is

bound to look after them until they can take care of themselves. If we do not hedge them around with protecting laws, if we leave them to the legislation of their old masters, we had better have left them in bondage. Their condition will be worse than that of our prisoners at Andersonville. If we fail in this great duty now when we have the power, we shall deserve to receive the execration of history and of all future ages."

In conclusion Mr. Stevens declared that "Two things are of vital importance: first, to establish a principle that none of the rebel States shall be counted in any of the amendments to the Constitution until they are duly admitted into the family of States by the law-making power of their conqueror; second, it should now be solemnly decided what power can revive, recreate, and reinstate these provinces into the family of States and invest them with the rights of American citizens. It is time that Congress should assert its sovereignty and assume something of the dignity of a Roman senate." He denounced with great severity the cry that "This is a white man's government." "If this republic," said he with great earnestness, "is not now made to stand on solid principle it has no honest foundation and the Father of all men will shake it to its center. If we have not yet been sufficiently scourged for our national sin to teach us to do justice to all God's creatures, without distinction of race or color, we must expect the still more heavy vengeance of an offended Father, still increasing his afflictions, as he increased the severity of the plagues of Egypt until the tyrant consented to do justice, and when that tyrant repented of his reluctant consent and attempted to reënslave the people, as our Southern tyrants are attempting to do now, he filled the Red Sea with broken chariots and drowned horses, and strewed the shores with the corpses of men. Sir, this doctrine of a white man's government is as atrocious as the infamous sentiment that damned the late Chief Justice to everlasting fame, and I fear to everlasting fire."

The Administration, says Mr. Blaine, saw that the speech of Mr. Stevens was the first gun fired in a deter

mined war to be waged against its policy and its prestige; it therefore determined upon as forcible a reply as possible, and for this duty detailed a Republican supporter of the President, Henry J. Raymond, who, though he now appeared for the first time in Congress, was one of the most influential men in the country, having founded and conducted the New York Times and taken a prominent part in the anti-slavery agitation and the formation and direction of the Republican party. As an editor and polemical writer he had no peer but Horace Greeley, of the New York Tribune, who was in opposition to the President, and he had acquired force and facility as a debater by distinguished service in the New York legislature.

Mr. Raymond spoke on December 21. Unfortunately for the effect, both moral and argumentative, of his speech the floor was taken before him by a State Rights Democrat of mediocre ability, William E. Finck [0.], who had felt called upon to reply to Mr. Stevens.

Mr. Finck made a number of plausible points, though none were very profound. He said that if Tennessee were not a State within the Union, as Mr. Stevens had insisted was the case, then Andrew Johnson, citizen of Tennessee, was not eligible to hold the office of President. Allegiance and protection being reciprocal duties, by what right did we demand from the South the one and refuse to it the other? What became of the doctrine of equality when the white man was stripped of his political rights in order to have these conferred upon the negro? He wished to restore the Union to its true constitutional character, a confederated and not consolidated government.

Mr. Raymond clearly indicated at the beginning of his speech that the Administration was not over-grateful for the support of Democrats of the Vallandigham sort, whom Mr. Finck represented.

I cannot help wishing, sir, that these indications of an interest in the preservation of our Government had come somewhat sooner. If we could have had from that side of the House such indications of an interest in the preservation of the

Union, such heartfelt sympathy with the efforts of the Government for the preservation of that Union, such hearty denunciation of those who were seeking its destruction, while the war was raging, I am sure we might have been spared some years of war, some millions of money, and rivers of blood and tears.

Mr. Raymond's principal aim was to join issue with Mr. Stevens on his theory of dead States.

"The gentleman from Pennsylvania believes that what we have to do is to create new States out of this conquered territory, at the proper time, many years distant, retaining them meanwhile in a territorial condition, and subjecting them to precisely such a state of discipline and tutelage as Congress and the Government of the United States may see fit to prescribe. If I believe in the premises he assumes, possibly, though I do not think probably, I might agree with the conclusion he has reached; but, sir, I cannot believe that these States have ever been out of the Union or that they are now out of the Union. If they were, sir, how and when did they become so? By what specific act, at what precise time, did any one of those States take itself out of the American Union? Was it by the Ordinance of Secession? I think we all agree that an ordinance of secession passed by any State of the Union is simply a nullity because it encounters the Constitution of the United States, which is the supreme law of the land.

Did the resolutions of these States, the declarations of their officials, the speeches of members of their legislatures, or the utterances of their press accomplish the result? Certainly not. They could not possibly work any change whatever in the relations of these States to the general Government. All their ordinances and all their resolutions were simply declarations of a purpose to secede. Their secession, if it ever took place, certainly could not date from the time when their intention to secede was first announced. After declaring that intention, they proceeded to carry it into effect. How? By war. By sustaining their purpose by arms against the force which the United States brought to bear against it. Did they sustain it? Were their arms victorious? If they were, then their secession was an accomplished fact. If not, it was nothing more than an abortive attempt-a purpose unfulfilled. This, then, is simply a question of fact, and we all know what the fact is. They did not succeed. They failed to maintain their ground by force of arms-in other words, they failed to secede.