CHAPTER XV

THE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT

CHAP. XV.

1861.

THOUGH the efforts for compromise which we

in

they were presented to Congress, they were not entirely barren of result. At a point where it was least expected, they contributed to the adoption by Congress of a measure of adjustment which might have restored harmony to the country if the movement of the Cotton States had not been originated and controlled by a conspiracy bent upon rebellion as its prime and ultimate object.

The report of the Committee of Thirty-three was made about the middle of January, but at that time none of its six propositions, or recommendations, commanded the attention of the House. The secession stage of the revolution was just culminating. All was excitement and surprise over the ordinances of the Cotton States, and the seizure, without actual collision or bloodshed, of the several Southern forts and arsenals. The retirement of the Southern Members of Congress, and the meeting of the revolutionary leaders to unite and construct their provisional government at Montgomery, prolonged what was to the public a succession of dramatic and spectacular incidents, resembling the move

ments of a political campaign rather than the CHAP. XV. serious progress of a piece of orderly, business-like

statesmanship.

The North could not yet believe that the designs of the Cotton-State hotspurs were so desperate. The more conservative Congressmen from the North and from the border States still hoped that good might come if an effort of conciliation and compromise were once more renewed. Accordingly, near the close of the session (February 27, 1861), Mr. Corwin, Chairman of the House Committee of Thirty-three, brought forward one of the propositions which had been reported more than a month before from his Committee. The original report proposed, in substance, an amendment of the Constitution providing that any constitutional interference with slavery must originate with the slave States, and have the unanimous assent of all the States to become valid. Mr. Corwin, by an amendment, changed the phraseology and purport to the following:

ART. 13. No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere within any State with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.

"Globe,"

This amendment was adopted by the House on February 28, yeas 133, nays 65; the Senate also 1861, p. 1285. passed it during the night preceding the 4th of March, though in the journals of Congress it appears dated as of March 2. The variation is explained by the fact that the legislative day of the journal frequently runs through two or more calendar days. In that body the vote was, yeas 24,

Ibid.,

p. 1403.

CHAP. XV. nays 12, and it was approved by President Buchanan, probably only an hour or two before the inauguration of his successor.

Mr. Lincoln alluded to this amendment in his inaugural address, reciting its substance and giving it his unreserved approval. "I understand," he said, "a proposed amendment to the Constitution — which amendment, however, I have not seen-has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable." The new Administration soon after transmitted this joint resolution to the several States to receive their official action. But nothing came of it. The South gave no response to the overture for peace, and in the North it was lost sight of amid the overshadowing events that immediately preceded the outbreak of hostilities.

While no practical benefit grew out of the constitutional amendment, other measures were adopted by Congress, which proved of value later in the struggle. The retirement of the Southern Members gave the Republicans a certain power of legislation in both branches, though under conditions which required them to be circumspect and conservative. Indeed, their policy during this stormy and difficult period was to remain strictly on the defensive. They must wait patiently until

Mr. Buchanan's term should expire, and until Mr. CHAP. XV. Lincoln could be inaugurated and assume control of the executive functions. We find, therefore, in the Congressional debates only so much party assertion as declared that they would not recede from the position taken by the party and indorsed by the people in the Presidential election. Indeed, it may be said that they did not fully maintain their position. They consented to the passage of the bills organizing the new Territories of Colorado, Dakota, and Nevada, without insisting that they should contain a prohibition of slavery. While this might be regarded as an important concession, and was claimed by Douglas as an abandonment of the Chicago platform, yet by this moderation they perhaps also secured the admission of Kansas into the Union as a free State, which greatly strengthened their power in the Senate.

So, again, on the other hand, they yielded a point to which perhaps it might have been more prudent to adhere. The Select Committee of Five and the Military Committee of the House had recommended three measures of considerable present and prospective importance. One was a bill to provide for calling forth the militia, designed to supply the President with military power to execute the laws. Another to provide for the collection of duties on board a ship, where the custom-house could not be used, was intended to meet pending difficulties in Charleston harbor. Another was a proposition to amend the force bill of 1795. If these acts had become laws, they might, perhaps, have furnished the incoming Administration with at least a part of the legal authority for which Lincoln was obliged

CHAP. XV. to call the special session of 1861. But the Republican Senators and Representatives adhered to their course of inaction, and abstained from passing these bills, with the double view of avoiding sectional irritation, and to leave the new Administration free to develop its own policy.

Mr. Buchanan's Administration had been as unfortunate in its financial management as in its treatment of the slavery question. "No nation has ever before been embarrassed from too large a surplus in its treasury," said he in his inaugural address. His Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Cobb, soon removed this "embarrassment." When he took charge of the department the treasury was full to overflowing; when he abandoned it to go into secession, even the Senators and Representatives in Washington could not get enough cash on their salaries to pay their board bills.

66

To-day," says the Washington correspondent of the New York "Tribune," under date of December 6, 1860, "the Speaker's warrants on the treasury in favor of the pay of Members of Congress were presented and refused for a want of funds." This disgraceful state of affairs was brought to light by a selfish device invented by some of the Members, in the scramble for pocket-money. Under date of December 7, the same paper relates: "Some Members of the House of Representatives were sharp enough to get the Speaker's certificates for pay and mileage, and present them personally at the treasury, instead of collecting them through the Sergeant-at-Arms - thus securing their own dues, while others have been denied even pro rata, the Secretary already acknowledging an exhaustion of