Their

At what sacrifice? Ask those who are bereaved and those who are wounded. Ask a quarter of a million of Northern, not to count Southern men, who have perished in the field or hospital. Alas! they cannot answer. rude graves in the distant South answer. Fortunes totter; industry is palsied; bankruptcy threatens, for speculation riots around your moneyed centres. The tax gatherer, the embalming doctor, the nurse, and the army scavenger play their part in this great drama, and behind it all stands the gibbering fiend of Abolition, determined to make the war, begun in honor and patriotism, end in hate and disunion! It has already determined not to allow the Democracy to save the Union. But by the God of our fathers! though the Union be shattered; though its bleeding frag ments may seek temporary alliances East and West, the Democracy will, if it take a lustrum to do it, fight under the old constellated banner, making its order of march an order of battle, for the restoration of THE UNION AS IT WAS, by the supremacy of THE CONSTITUTION AS IT IS! [Tremendous cheering, during which the audience rose to their feet. Three cheers were given for the speaker and three for Ohio.] Let the Middle, and Western, and border States firmly move on in the work. The dissonant din of these ideologists of New England will be drowned in the popular voice; the fratricidal hate they have engendered will be assuaged, and into the lacerated bosom of this nation will be poured the hallowed and healing spirit of mutual confidence and conciliation. Thus will the nation reform itself! [Tremendous and continued applause.]

Mr. Cox closed by saying, that such confidence and conciliation could never come from the spirit of Puritanism; but thanks to New Englandaye, to New England-a better and more Christian spirit had been enshrined in the poetry of Oliver Wendell Holmes, a son of Massachusetts, whose beautiful lyric upon Carolina he had been requested to repeat to the audience by a New York Democrat now in Washington, Frederick S. Cozzens, himself an author known to the whole country. Mr. Cox then recited the following:

"She has gone-she has left us in passion and pride-
Our stormy-browed sister, so long at our side!
She has torn her own star from our firmament's glow,
And turned on her brother the face of a foe!

"O, Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,

We can never forget that our hearts have been one;
Our foreheads both sprinkled in Liberty's name,
From the fountain of blood with the finger of flame!

"You were always too ready to fire at a touch;

But we said, 'She is hasty-she does not mean much.'
We have scowled when you uttered some turbulent threat;
But Friendship still whispered, 'Forgive and forget.'

"Has our love all died out? Have its altars grown cold?
Has the curse come at last which the fathers foretold?
Then Nature must teach us the strength of the chain
That her petulant children would sever in vain.

"They may fight till the buzzards are gorged with their spoil,
Till the harvest grows black as it rots in its soil,

Till the wolves and the catamounts troop from their caves,
And the shark tracks the pirate, the lord of the waves.

"In vain is the strife! When its fury is past,
Their fortunes must flow in one channel at last;

As the torrents that rush from the mountains of snow
Roll mingled in peace through the valley below.

"Our Union is river, lake, ocean, and sky;

Man breaks not the medal when God cuts the die!
Though darkened with sulphur, though cloven with steel,
The blue arch will brighten, the waters will heal.

"O, Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,

There are battles with fate that can never be won!
The star-flowering banner must never be furled,

For its blossoms of light are the hope of the world!

"Go, then, our rash sister! afar and aloof,

Run wild in the sunshine away from our roof;

But when your heart aches and your feet have grown sore,
Remember the pathway that leads to our door!" [Applause.]

THE CONSCRIPTION BILL.

EXEMPTION OF THE CLERGY-SLANDERS UPON THE DEMOCRACY REPELLED-STATE RIGHTS AS DEFINED BY MADISON AND HAMILTON-EFFECT OF THE CONSCRIPTION.

On the 26th of February, 1863, the House having under consideration the bill to call out the national forces, Mr. Cox said: Mr. Speaker, I am obliged to the Chair for the prompt manner in which he has protected my right to the floor, and for the emphasis with which he brought down the gavel for that purpose. [Laughter.] I hope now that I shall not be further interrupted. Mr. Speaker, I was somewhat amused and instructed by what fell from my reverend brother [Mr. FESSENDEN] from Maine, who has just taken his seat. It was proper that he should defend his clerical brethren. But after the high-wrought eulogy which he uttered in their behalf, I was surprised at the lame conclusion at which he arrived. How could he as a patriot argue that so valuable a class of citizens should be excluded from serving their country in the army? If they are as worthy and as patriotic as he believes, will they seek exemption? The very argument, combining with other reasons which I may give, but from which he will doubtless dissent, compel me to oppose the exemption of the clergy from this sweeping conscription. There are some clergymen for whom I have an unbounded reverence and respectmen who preach the gospel of "peace on earth and good will to men." They do not turn the living word into reproach by "vain disputations." They do not create jar on earth and ill will to men. From the first settlement of the region from which the gentleman comes, down to the present time, the largest part of the clergy seem to have been specially commissioned, in their own opinion, to read lectures upon political matters to the people of this country, and to all mankind. They have descended from their spiritual elevation to grope amid the passions and cor

ruptions of partisan strife. They have thus divided the churches, and degraded the mission left them by their loving Master.

Mr. S. C. FESSENDEN. I challenge the gentleman to produce the proof of that assertion.

Mr. Cox. I refer the gentleman, for the proof, to New England history, from the days of Cotton Mather and the burning of witches, down to the present unhappy time. Why, sir, let the dominant clergy of New England continue to have their way now, as they had it once when Catholics, Episcopalians, Baptists, and Quakers were persecuted, punished, exiled, and murdered for conscience sake, and the gentleman will live to witness, perhaps with transport, Episcopalian and Catholic clergymen garroted and burned in the streets of Boston. [Laughter.]

Mr. S. C. FESSENDEN. Will the gentleman allow me now?

Mr. Cox. I have no objection, if the gentleman wants to ask a question.

Objected to by a member from the Republican side of the House. Mr. Cox. That objection does not come from this side. 1

Mr. Speaker, there is a certain class of preachers to whom gentlemen on this side of the House are under no special obligations. They have prayed us frequently into the nethermost abysses. [Laughter.] And why? Because we belonged to that old Democratic party which has been coeval with this Government-which has never, as an organization, been unfaithful to the interests and honor of the whole country, and which has never lost its chivalric respect for the safeguards and immunities of the Union and Constitution. Simply to have affiliations with that party has always been sufficient to bring down the anathemas, by "bell, book, and candle," of those clergymen who now, through the ministerial member from Maine, seek exemption from the inconvenient consequences of the troubles which they have themselves been mainly instrumental in bring ing upon our beloved land. Long before the radical politicians, North and South, began to rend the nation in their hate, these preachers had riven the churches in their crazed and demoniac fury. I ask you, men of the South yet remaining with us, as I ask you Northern Representatives, is any one more responsible for the present unhappy condition of the country than these firebrands of the sanctuary-North and South? Have not the fiercest zealots of secession and abolition been found among those who have kindled on God's altar the unhallowed embers of sectional asperity? The gentleman from Maine wants proof. Why, sir, it is easy enough to furnish it. Go back to the three thousand clergymen of New England, who, in the name of the Most High, felt themselves accredited to send to the Congress of the United States a special denunciation of Stephen A. Douglas for his championship of the rights of the people of the Territories. Their anti-slavery evangel was met by him with the same defiance which the Democracy displayed in the days of Jefferson, when the New England clergy reviled that apostle of our political faith. The impertinent and improper interference by a portion of the clergy in the politics of the country, is not peculiar to our day, though never before has it been so conspicuous as in fomenting the troubles which have culminated in this calamitous war.

There are two kinds of clergymen in this country. I have before me

a description of one class, with which I have no doubt gentlemen on the other side are more familiar than with those who minister in the church in which I happen to worship. [Laughter.] I will recite the description:

"A minister, whom hell had sent,

To spread its blast where'er he went,
And fling, as o'er our earth he trod,
His shadow betwixt man and God.”

Now, sir, all ministers who come within that definition I want to see enrolled in the army and marched to its front. There let them do their duty, and see whether they cannot help to put down this rebellion which they have been so long instigating. Let them suffer some of the consequences that our brothers undergo in the Southwest and along the Rappahannock. I would not have them go merely as clerks, letter-writers, or chaplains. Let them shoulder the twelve-pound musket, do picket duty, and trudge like our brave boys amid winter snows, spring mud, and summer suns, under the packed knapsack, and my word for it, they will come back sanctified by grace. [Laughter.] After the eulogy pronounced upon the clergy by the gentleman from Maine, may we not presume that they would be in a better condition for the sacrifice, than many an unsanctified Democrat? Would they not ascend into the realms of glory with less inconvenience or delay? [Laughter.] Very many of them, from my observation, would not be as much of a loss to the country as my clerical friend over the way would suppose.

But, Mr. Speaker, I would not have addressed the gentleman from Maine in this style, had it not been that he rung into his speech over and over again, what has been rung into the speeches of other gentlemen on that side of the House since this debate began, as well as into newspapers and stump speeches, the usual quantity of malignant talk about Copperheads," and the disloyal Democracy. A very beautiful mode of argumentation this! It is calculated to produce a very pleasing impression on this side of the House! The debate on this measure from its opening has been characterized by this tender affability of manner! One would have supposed it would have been wise to have made the effort to conciliate this side of the House in favor of this measure; but you sought to conciliate nobody. War Democrats-Peace Democrats—to use your inapposite language, are all alike. My eloquent friend from New York [Mr. STEELE], who has spoken so well for the Governor of his State, and the rights of his State, and who expressed his willingness to sustain, through the States, your calls for aid-he is no exception. You sought not to conciliate my friend from Indiana [Mr. HOLMAN], who has been laboring for the last two hours at my side to make this bill, if possible, less objectionable by a substitute. He, too, has the fang and poison of the Copperhead. You sought not to conciliate any class of opinion, however loyal and conscientious. You were unwilling, when this bill came in first, to allow it to be scrutinized. You sought to force it through without amendments, without discussion; and but for the determined nerve of this side of the Chamber, you would have accomplished your purpose and passed the bill with all of its infernal enginery of oppres sion. Gentlemen, you did not know us. We were determined in the first

place to have discussion; and in the second place to get the bill back into a position where it could be amended, and as many of its obnoxious features removed as it was possible to remove in this Congress. What we resolved to do, that we have accomplished. Before I come to the discussion of the bill itself, I owe it to the people of my district to repel the charges made by you upon their representative.

The three Republicans who have last spoken [Messrs. DUNN, STEVENS, and FESSENDEN] have charged that we are disloyal to the country; to the country which we love as well, I will not say better than you; to that country which we love only less than we would love our Heavenly Father. From the beginning of the debate we have heard nothing but contemptuous scorn and contumely hurled against this side of the House. Do you believe that members of this House, though in a minority, who are your equals here, will silently permit such language to go unlashed? If we were dishonored at home, do you think we are craven enough to receive such epithets without giving scorn for scorn? But being in fact the majority, having received the approbation of our constituents at home, do you imagine that we will sit here in timid crouching, and receive your contumely without making some fit reply? Do you expect that we will, under the forms of courtesy, mouth honeyed words for your abuse? Do you imagine we cannot tell denunciation from debate? You forget that we come fresh from the people, covered all over with their generous approbation. My eloquent friend from Indiana [Mr. VOORHEES] told you last night that you were but corpses stalking against public decency, for a short time only, before the public gaze. [Laughter.] A nice party, indeed, this company of corpses, to talk to us, the Representatives of the people! [Laughter.] The gentleman from Indiana [Mr. DUNN], conscious of his defunct condition, talked to us, as he confessed, from the confines of his sepulchre,

"Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound;

Mine ears attend the cry." [Great laughter.]

If you gentlemen who play the political phantom wish to carry out the proper definition of a ghost, cease to squeak and gibber your abolitionism and go back into your cerements, for daylight, thank God! has begun to dawn. [Laughter.] Do you suppose that we, who are fresh from the people, have any reason to distract our minds at what you utter against us? Do you suppose, for instance, that we who represent Ohio, where we had nineteen members of Congress to elect, and under an infamous gerrymander which allowed us only two democrats, and who will come back to the next Congress fourteen to your five, are to be lectured by you for disloyalty? Do you take us to be as contemptible as yourselves? You ghosts of the dead past mistake the temper of our constituents as you have mistaken us. We know our rights under the Constitution. We have a sound record, to which we can forever point; for we have stood by the country when you failed it. We have, under the ineradicable love of law and order, stood by your own Administration when you have stigmatized and denounced it. We did our best in the Congress before this, to settle these troubles, when adjustment was easy. We labored with anxious care, that peace might continue in the land. The people believe that you were