sented here. We had no right to blockade their coast. Why? They were not represented here. They are States, says the President, and each State is entitled to two Senators, and to at least one Representative. Suppose the State of South Carolina had sent to Congress, during the war, a Representative; had Congress. nothing to do but to admit him, if found qualified? Must he be received because he comes from a State, and a State can not go out of the Union? Why, sir, is any thing more necessary than to state this proposition to show its absolute absurdity?"

The President said: "The President of the United States stands toward the country in a somewhat different attitude from that of any member of Congress. Each member of Congress is chosen from a single district or State; the President is chosen by the people of all the States. As eleven States are not at this time represented in either branch of Congress, it would seem to be his duty, on all proper occasions, to present their just claims to Congress."

"If it would not be disrespectful," said Mr. Trumbull, "I should like to inquire how many votes the President got in those eleven States. Sir, he is no more the representative of those eleven States than I am, except as he holds a higher position. I came here as a Representative chosen by the State of Illinois; but I came here to legislate, not simply for the State of Illinois, but for the United States of America, and for South Carolina as well as Illinois. I deny that we are simply the Representatives of the districts and States which send us here, or that we are governed by such narrow views that we can not legislate for the whole country; and we are as much the Representatives, and, in this particular instance, receive as much of the support of those eleven States as did the President himself."

Mr. Trumbull finally remarked: "The President believes this bill unconstitutional; I believe it constitutional. He believes that it will involve great expense; I believe it will save expense. He believes that the freedmen will be protected without it; I believe he will be tyrannized over, abused, and virtually reënslaved, without some legislation by the nation for his protection. He believes it unwise; I believe it to be politic."

Without further debate, the vote was taken on the question, "Shall the bill pass, the objections of the President of the United States notwithstanding?" The Senators voted as follows:

YEAS-Messrs. Anthony, Brown, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Cragin, Creswell, Fessenden, Foster, Grimes, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Kirkwood, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morrill, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Wade, Williams, Wilson, and Yates-30.

NAYS-Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Guthrie, Hendricks, Johnson, McDougall, Morgan, Nesmith, Norton, Riddle, Saulsbury, Stewart, Stockton, Van Winkle, and Willey-18.

ABSENT-Messrs. Foot and Wright-2.

The President pro tempore then announced, "On this question the yeas are thirty and the nays are eighteen. Two-thirds of the members present not having voted for the bill, it is not a law."

CHAPTER IX.

THE CIVIL RIGHTS BILL IN THE SENATE.

DUTY OF CONGRESS CONSEQUENT UPON THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY-CIVIL RIGHTS BILL INTRODUCED-REFERENCE TO JUDICIARY COMMITTEE-BEFORE THE SENATE SPEECH BY MR. TRUMBULL-MR. SAULSBURY-MR. VAN WINKLE-MR. COWAN-MR. HOWARD-MR. JOHNSON-MR., DAVIS-CONVERSATIONS WITH MR. TRUMBULL AND MR. CLARK-REPLY OF MR. JOHNSON-REMARKS BY MR. MORRILL-MR. DAVIS "WOUND UP"-MR. GUTHRIE'S SPEECH-MR. HENDRICKS-REPLY OF MR. LANE-MR. WILSONMR. TRUMBULL'S CLOSING REMARKS-YEAS AND NAYS ON THE PASSAGE OF THE BILL.

THE preceding Congress having proposed an amendment to the Constitution by which slavery should be abolished, and this amendment having been "ratified by three-fourths of the several States," four millions of the inhabitants of the United States were transformed from slaves into freemen. To leave them with their shackles broken off, unprotected, in a new and undefined position, would have been a sin against them only surpassed in enormity by the original crime of their enslavement.

As provided in the amendment itself, it devolved upon Congress "to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." The Thirty-ninth Congress assembled, realizing that it devolved upon them to define the extent of the rights, privileges, and duties of the freedmen. That body was not slow in meeting the full measure of its responsibility.

Immediately on the reassembling of Congress after the holidays, January 5, 1866, Mr. Trumbull, in pursuance of previous notice, introduced a bill "to protect all persons in the United States in their civil rights, and furnish the means of their vindication." This bill, having been read twice, was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

It was highly appropriate that this bill, involving the relations of millions of the inhabitants of the United States to the Government, should be referred to this able committee, selected from among the men of most distinguished legal ability in the Senate. Its members were chosen in consideration of their high professional ability, their long experience, and exalted standing as jurists. They are the legal advisers of the Senate, whose report upon constitutional questions is entitled to the highest consider

ation.

To such a committee the Senate appropriately referred the Civil Rights Bill, and the nation could safely trust in their hands the great interests therein involved.

The bill declares that "there shall be no discrimination in civil rights or immunities among the inhabitants of any State or Territory of the United States on account of race, color, or previous condition of slavery; but the inhabitants, of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall have the same right to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding. Any person who, under cover of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, shall subject, or cause to be subjected, any inhabitant of any State or Territory to the deprivation of any right secured or protected by the act, or to different punishment, pains, or penalties, on account of such person having at any time been held in a condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, or by reason of his color or race, than is prescribed for the punishment of white persons, is to be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction, to be punished by a fine not exceeding $1,000, or imprisonment not exceeding one year, or both, in the discretion of the court."

Other provisions of the bill relate to the courts which shall have jurisdiction of cases which arise under the act, and the means to be employed in its enforcement.

That no question might arise as to the constitutionality of the law, all the provisions which relate to the enforcement of the act were borrowed from the celebrated Fugitive Slave Law, enacted in 1850. It was a happy thought to compel the enemies of the negro themselves, as judges, to pronounce in favor of the constitutionality of this ordinance. It is an admirable illustration of the progress of the age, that the very instruments which were used a few years before to rivet tighter the chains of the slave, should be employed to break those very chains to fragments. It shall forever stand forth to the honor of American legislation that it attained to more than poetic justice in using the very means once employed to repress and crush the negro for his defense and elevation.

Within less than a week after the reference of this bill to the Judiciary Committee, it was reported back, with no alteration save a few verbal amendments. Cn account of pressure of other business, it did not come up for formal consideration and discussion in the Senate until the 29th of January. On that day Mr. Trumbull, having called up the bill for the consideration of the Senate, said:

"I regard the bill to which the attention of the Senate is now called, as the most important measure that has been under its consideration since the adoption of the constitutional amendment abolishing slavery. That amendment declared that all persons in the United States should be free. This measure is intended to give effect to that declaration, and secure to all persons within the United States practical freedom. There is very little importance in the general declaration of abstract truths and principles unless they can be carried into effect, unless the persons who are to be affected by them have some means of availing themselves of their benefits. Of what avail was the immortal declaration 'that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,' and 'that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men,' to the millions of the African race in this country who were ground down and degraded, and subjected to a slavery more intolerable and cruel than the world ever before knew? Of what avail was it to the citizen of Massachusetts, who, a few years ago, went to South Carolina to enforce a constitutional right in court, that the Con