please, to make contracts and enforce contracts, I give notice that, if no one else does, I shall introduce a bill,. and urge its passage through Congress, that will secure to those men every one of these rights; they would not be freemen without them. It is idle to say that a man is free who can not go and come at pleasure, who can not buy and sell, who can not enforce his rights. These are rights which the first clause of the constitutional amendment meant to secure to all.”

On a subsequent day, December 20, 1865, when this subject was again before the Senate, Mr. Sumner spoke in its favor. Referring to the message of the President on the "Condition Southern States," the Senator said:

the

"When I think of what occurred yesterday in this chamber; when I call to mind the attempt to whitewash the unhappy condition of the rebel States, and to throw the mantle of official oblivion over sickening and heart-rending outrages, where human rights are sacrificed and rebel barbarism receives a new letter of license, I feel that I ought to speak of nothing else. I stood here years ago, in the days of Kansas, when a small community was surrendered to the machinations of slave-masters. I now stand here again, when, alas! an immense region, with millions of people, has been surrendered to the machinations of slave-masters. Sir, it is the duty of Congress to arrest this fatal fury. Congress must dare to be brave; it must dare to be just.

After having quoted copiously from the great Russian act by which the freedom given to the serfs by the Emperor's proclamation" was secured," and having emphasized them as examples for American legislation, Mr. Sumner said:

"My colleague is clearly right in introducing his bill and pressing it to a vote. The argument for it is irresistible. It is essential to complete emancipation. Without it emancipation will be only half done. It is our duty to see that it is wholly done. Slavery must be abolished not in form only, but in substance, so that there shall be no black code; but all shall be equal before the law."

He then read extracts from letters and documents, showing the hostile sentiments of the people, and the unhappy condition of the colored population in nearly all of the rebel States, and closed by saying: "I bring this plain story to a close. I regret that I have been constrained to present it. I wish it were otherwise.

But I should have failed in duty had I failed to speak. Not in anger, not in vengeance, not in harshness have I spoken; but solemnly, carefully, and for the sake of my country and humanity, that peace and reconciliation may again prevail. I have spoken especially for the loyal citizens who are now trodden down by rebel power. You have before you the actual condition of the rebel. States. You have heard the terrible testimony. The blood curdles at the thought of such enormities, and especially at the thought that the poor freedmen, to whom we owe protection, are left to the unrestrained will of such a people smarting with defeat, and ready to wreak vengeance upon these representatives of a true loyalty. In the name of God let us protect them. Insist upon guarantees. Pass the bill now under consideration; pass any.bill; but do not let this crying injustice rage any longer. An avenging God can not sleep while such things find countenance. If you are not ready to be the Moses of an oppressed people, do not become its Pharaoh.”

Mr. Cowan rebuked the Senator from Massachusetts for applying the term "whitewash" to the message of the President. He then charged Mr. Sumner with reading from "anonymous letterwriters, from cotton agents, and people of that kind," and placed against them "the testimony of the President of the United States, not a summer soldier, or a sunshine patriot, who was a Union man, and who was in favor of the Union at a time and He then proin a place when there was some merit in it. ceeded to read extracts from the President's message and General Grant's report.

On a subsequent day, Mr. Stewart, of Nevada, made a speech in opposition to the positions assumed by Mr. Sumner. He declared his opinion that "if the great mass of the people of the South are capable of the atrocities attributed to them by the anonymous witnesses paraded before this Senate, then a union of these States is impossible; then hundreds and thousands of the bravest and best of our land have fallen to no purpose; then every house, from the gulf to the lakes, is draped in mourning without an object; then three thousand millions of indebtedness hangs like a pall upon the pride and prosperity of the people, only to admonish us that the war was wicked, useless, and cruel."

After making the remark, "In judging of testimony upon

ordinary subjects, we take into consideration not only the facts stated, but the character and standing of the .witness, his means of information, and last, but not least, his appearance upon the stand," Mr. Stewart thus spoke in behalf of the principal witness relied upon in the defense of the South: "In this great cause, the Senate properly called upon the chief Executive of the nation for information. Was he a witness whose character and standing before the country would entitle his testimony to consideration? Let the voice of a great people, who have indorsed his patriotism and administration, answer. Were his means of information such as to entitle him to speak advisedly upon this subject? Let the machinery of the Government, that collects facts from every department, civil and military, upon the table of the Executive, answer. Was not his appearance before the public, in communicating this testimony to the Senate and the country such as to remove all grounds of suspicion? Let the exalted tone, bold and fearless statement, pure and patriotic spirit of both his messages be his best vindication."

The Senator's remarks were principally directed in opposition to the policy of regarding the rebel States as "conquered territories." He finally remarked: "I wish to be distinctly understood as not opposing the passage of the bill. I am in favor of legislation on this subject, and such legislation as shall secure the freedom of those who were formerly slaves, and their equality before the law; and I maintain that it can be fully secured without holding the Southern States in territorial subjugation."

Mr. Wilson replied: "The Senator who has just addressed us questions the testimony adduced here by my colleague yesterday. He might as well question the massacre at Fort Pillow, and the cruelties perpetrated at Andersonville, where eighty-three per cent. of the men who entered the hospitals died-Andersonville, where more American soldiers lie buried than fell throughout the Mexican war; where more American soldiers lie buried than were killed in battle of British soldiers in Wellington's four great battles in Spain, and at Waterloo, Alma, Inkermann, and Sebastopol. The Senator might as well question the atrocities of sacked Lawrence and other atrocities committed during the war. If he will go into the Freedman's Bureau, and examine and study the official records of officers who, for five or six months, have taken testimony and have large volumes of sworn facts; if he will go

into the office of General Holt, and read the reports there, his heart and soul will be made sick at the wrongs man does to his fellow-man."

The Senator, in the course of his remarks, took occasion to express his opinion of "conservatism:""Progress is to be made only by fidelity to the great cause by which we have stood during the past four years of bloody war. For twenty-five years we had a conflict of ideas, of words, of thoughts-words and thoughts stronger than cannon-balls. We have had four years of bloody conflict. Slavery, every thing that belongs or pertains to it, lies prostrate before us to-day, and the foot of a regenerated nation is upon it. There let it lie forever. I hope no words or thoughts of a reactionary character are to be uttered in either house of Congress. I hope nothing is to be uttered here in the name of 'conservatism,' the worst word in the English language. If there is a word in the English language that means treachery, servility, and cowardice, it is that word 'conservative.' It ought never hereafter to be on the lips of an American statesman. For twenty years it has stood in America the synonym of meanness and baseness. I have studied somewhat carefully the political history of the country during the last fifteen or twenty years, and I have always noticed that when I heard a man prate about being a conservative and about conservatism, he was about to do some mean thing. [Laughter.] I never knew it to fail; in fact, it is about the first word a man utters when he begins to retreat.'

Mr. Wilson declared his motives in proposing this bill, and yet cheerfully acquiesced in its probable fate: "Having read hundreds of pages of records and of testimony, enough to make the heart and soul sick, I proposed this bill as a measure of humanity. I desired, before we entered on the great questions of public policy, that we should pass a simple bill annulling these cruel laws; that we should do it early, and then proceed calmly with our legislation. That was my motive for bringing this bill into the Senate so early in the session. Many of the difficulties occurring in the rebel States, between white men and black men, between the old masters and the freedmen, grow out of these laws. They are executed in various parts of the States; the military arrest their execution frequently, and the agents of the Freedmen's Bureau set them aside; and this keeps up a continual conflict. If these obnoxious State laws were promptly annulled, it would con

tribute much to the restoration of good feeling and harmony, relieve public officers from immense labors, and the freedmen from suffering and sorrow; and this is the opinion of the most experienced men engaged in the Freedmen's Bureau. I have had an opportunity to consult with and to communicate with many of the agents of the Bureau, with teachers, officers, and persons who understand the state of affairs in those States.

"But, sir, it is apparent now that the bill is not to pass at present; that it must go over for the holidays at any rate. The constitutional amendment has been adopted, and I have introduced a bill this morning based upon that amendment, which has been referred to the committee of which the Senator from Illinois [Mr. Trumbull] is chairman. This bill will go over; possibly it will not be acted upon at all. We shall probably enter on the discussion of the broader question of annulling all the black laws in the country, and putting these people under the protection of humane, equal, and just laws."

The presentiment of the author of the bill was realized. The bill never saw the light as a law of the land. Nor was it needful that it should. It contributed to swell the volume of other and more sweeping measures.