interests of this unfortunate people, and by our united efforts satisfy them that we seek no personal degradation for them; that after, by the prowess of our arms, we shall conquer the strong military power which has heretofore held them in subjugation, we will encourage the inauguration of a policy, so happily begun by the intrepid Sherman in his dealings with the people of Savannah. Yet another consideration may be suggested, Mr. Speaker, with this accomplished, why we should not further deal harshly with these people. It is the historical fact that twelve of the thirteen original States owned, possessed, and dealt in slaves; that for reasons satisfactory to several they parted with it, each in their turn, and to their respective advantages. There are wise persons who believe that under profound peace on this subject a like result would have followed ere this in all the border States. But by the fate of war, for which the southern leaders are solely responsible, its sudden extinction is likely to come, and the question of a few years precedence, more or less, in point of time as between the States, amounts to naught in the life of a nation, and can leave no just ground for future bickerings on the subject.

Not among the least of the developments of the times, sir, is the fact that in the dire extremities to which the fortunes of war have driven rebellion the rebels themselves now contemplate the extirpation of slavery and placing of arms in their hands to defeat the cause of the Union. Our arms at the close of last year were everywhere victorious; the forces of the rebels were by deaths, sickness, desertions, and captures, fearfully lessened. To replenish their armies and at the same time secure the fealty of their slaves, as well as reassure their discouraged friends at home and abroad, the rebel leaders are resolved to make use of our measure to abolish slavery. They saw the party with which I have acted arrayed in an almost unbroken column against this amendment; and, well knowing the unyielding nature of party spirit, they judged "the party" would stand fast to their position and thus defeat the passage of the constitutional amendments. And now with the usual dexterity of these old politicians they appear to be making every preparation to appeal to their slaves for two or three hundred thousand soldiers. They would thus be able to say to the slaves, "The Yankees have pretended to desire your freedom, but when the pinch came, when called on to pass a law giving freedom to you, they voted it down. They dislike you as much as they do us. Help us whip the deceitful wretches, and we will give you freedom; you can get it of nobody else; Lincoln's plan of freeing you was voted down."

difficulties of Constitution and laws and prejudice which circumvented the slavery question, but who never made slavery paramount to the Union.

But after all, Mr. Speaker, is it anomalous in the history of the world that the slaves should be used in war? If we appeal to the history of the renowned republics of old, which tolerated slavery as does our own, we shall be convinced to the contrary. In those great civil commotions which at times so terribly shocked the Greek republics, and especially in the long and terrible civil wars of the Romans, we find slavery playing a conspicuous part in the policy of the contending factions; and those contending for the ancient and cherished forms of government, as well as those opposing, vied with each other in efforts to ameliorate the condition of the slave in consideration of the support he would give to this or that cause. But it would hereafter be anomalous in history if we should fail to avail ourselves of whatever support we can derive from this measure, when it is so apparent that our enemies are about to avail themselves of the same resource.

Mr. Speaker, I have done with the subject. In what I have said I have been prompted by no spirit of ill or hate to the mass of the southern people of the Union. I, upon the contrary, deplore the ill fortune by which for the time being they were placed under the power of evil men who for thirty years have been bent upon "precipitating them into revolution." But in what I have said I have endeavored to speak the words of truth and soberness, nothing extenuating nor setting down aught in malice. In what I have said I am amply warranted in the history of those political perturbations which culminated in this tremendous war. Vast has been the sacrifice of blood and treasure already in this war for the Union; but great though it be, we nevertheless owed it to unborn generations to come, to deliver to them unimpaired the great legacy bequeathed to us through blood and fiery trial by our ancestors. We owed it to the great cause of republicanism to show before the world that the form of government can be maintained by a republican people despite the machinations of all foes, internal and external. We owed it to all the best and brightest hopes of mankind to show that millions of freemen could rush to arms in defense of their cause, and could stand persistently by it through good and evil report. Let us hope, Mr. Speaker, that from the bloody ordeal and fierce chastening of the past four years our glorious nation may still brave the trials yet to come, and that ere long we shall enter the sunshine of peace, and stand before the world a free, united, and happy people.

Mr. GRINNELL. I will detain the House but a few moments, intending to divide my time with the gentleman from Illinois, [Mr. FARNSWORTH.] I regard this as a marked day in American pol

The fact that such a design and the raising of such issues are meditated appears plainly from the current news of the day. Now, sir, in view of these anomalous facts, and devoted as I ever have been to the Union of the States and the perpetuation of the principles which animated our fathers, I ask where should be found the position of the loyal man on such a question? Where, in view of which, should be found that noble array of northern men who have heretofore apologized for slavery and bared their breasts to the storm of opposition because the Constitution supported it? Where, in view of this, can be the position of the border-State loyalist? Sir, there can be but one answer in the loyal heart. If the slave is to be used in this war let him be used in the cause of

the Union. Viewed in the light of the rebel purpose to use slaves in their rebellious war, there is no alternative (even if it were desirable at this late day) but to choose that the former slave shall war for the cause of Union rather than against it. Thus much I have taken the liberty to say to those noble men of the North with whom it has been my pride to act politically. Thus much I say to those who have all along realized the vast

low a gentleman from a slave State-and a slaveholder too, I believe-[Mr. KING,] who advocates a constitutional amendment whereby slavery may, become extinct throughout all the breadth of the land. I rejoice that the State of Iowa, which I have the honor in part to represent upon this floor, and is known by her forty thousand majority for freedom, has so honorable a neighbor, so magnanimous and so able a philosopher and statesman upon this floor.

It seems to me this is a day of great opportunities; great for the conservative Republican who shall never more have to apologize for his votes, correcting his record; and a great day for the Democrat, who may now break the shackles of party, and stand forth with the great men and patriots in our early history, and march on in the royal highway of freedom for all nations. Sir, this is one of the days which makes the text for volumes of history big with the fate of races and an empire.

Now, sir, as I have not to talk about my own consistency, having been, so far as I know, always an abolitionist, I am here to say that I do not enter into the discussion of the simple propriety of this measure. No; at the threshold I deny that there can be property in man. I never believed in the doctrine. My whole nature revolted at it, and the reading of books of law, volumes of history, and of God's word, never taught me else than that the institution was barbaric, in defiance of natural

justice, and so shameful in its pretensions that in no State in this Union has its legal existence been established by any law. And here I desired to ask the gentleman from Kentucky, [Mr. CLAY,] when he spoke of the legal and constitutional rights of his people, where he finds a law in the State of Kentucky, or in any other slave State, that establishes the system of African slavery. It cannot be found. Slavery is an outlaw, and we are but proposing to execute the criminal that has been an outlaw for generations in this country.

It is well known that the British constitution and the common law of England and the decisions of the great jurists of England were against the existence of slavery in that country. One John Hawkins was the first to engage in the slave trade in this country. He planted the institution here. Did that legalize slavery? Did he have from his queen any authority to traffic in human beings? None. How did slavery come to exist in the colonies? From whence came the authority to hold slaves? From England? No. Did it come by colonial legislation? No. How, then, came it in these States? By brutal force. As I have already said, it is not found to be established by law in any State, and must stand here as an outlaw. The great expounders of our Constitution have said that the Declaration of Independence itself, proclaiming all men free and equal, laid the corner-stone of our Confederacy, and that it is above all constitutions and all laws. That is enough for me; and we are only tolerating here that which should have ceased to exist long ago, and spared us civil war. Sir, if I had my preference, I would rather see slavery wiped out here by a legal decision, and announced by a chief justice-our Lord Mansfield, I trust-on the great principles of justice, rather than by the tardy action of States.

I wish now to refer for a moment to the statement made by the venerable gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. CLAY] that we are about by this measure to deprive his State of representation in this Chamber. How is that? They now have three fifths representation for their slaves; when the genius of liberty shall take possession of that State, and the votes of the people shall have destroyed slavery there, then their slaves will be counted as freemen. Instead of decreasing their representation, we augment it.

But the gentleman asks, What will you do with our slaves? What shall we do with them? Ah! it seems to me there is something due to those who have so long supported their masters, certainly to be let alone. Cannot they who have supported themselves and their masters in the past take care of themselves? That, sir, is a question which we can well afford to leave unanswered, since the enslaved race are establishing their manhood and fighting our battles.

The gentleman from New York [Mr. BROOKS] stands up here in defense of those who are now in rebellion, so far as to declare that slavery has not ruled the country. I wish, sir, that he had been more conversant with American history; that he had read less of newspapers and more of our political history. Why, sir, it is well known that the great majority of the people of this country have been controlled by the institutions of the South. We propose to break away from that control, and to stand forth free and independent, never more to be bartered away by a body of men banded together for any political or selfish purpose, much less by those in the control of tyrants.

If you look into the facts and figures in regard to this control, you will find that up to the year of the rebellion for two thirds of the time the Presidency of the United States had been held by slaveholders or southern men; you will find that of the Presidents of the Senate slavery had sixtyone out of seventy-seven; you will find that of Speakers of the House of Representatives they had twenty-one out of thirty-three; you will find that of Attorney Generals they had fourteen out of nineteen; and that they have had the Secretaryship of State nearly two thirds of the time; and since the slavery agitation, as if it were to be ready for this conflict of arms, for four fifths of the time have the Secretary of War and the Secretary of the Navy been from the South.

Look, too, at the Supreme Court of the United States and is organization; slavery has had seventeen out of the twenty-eight members. It was

organized purposely, as all the world knows, to give five judges to the slaveholding States, and four to the free States, notwithstanding that the 'free States exceeded the slaves States almost one third in population and one half in wealth and in business for the courts.

Thus do facts answer that assertion of the gentleman. And hence it is the business, the high and holy work of the American people henceforth to sunder these shackles, and no more to be controlled by the system of slavery which was fast binding us and defenseless to be cast into outer darkness.

Mr. Speaker, I have noticed the agonies of gentlemen over the tomb of slavery. I do not forget how they agonized, even to the going down of the sun, against the abolition of slavery in this District. There were, according to them, untold horrors looming up from that measure; but what has been the result of its passage? It has raised the value of property in this District two hundred per cent. It benefited a race and enacted justice. Not one of the horrors which filled men's imagination have visited us. Then, again, when the enlistment of negroes was proposed, we were told that the negroes would not fight, and that if we tried to make soldiers of them our white troops would resist it, and the rebels would fight with increased desperation. Neither assertion was true. So, too, on the discussion of the confiscation law, we were told that if it were passed rebels would fight to the last ditch, and our last victory was won. Twenty thousand people in Savannah and a hundred and fifty thousand in New Orleans have made your prophesy false. They came out to take food from your hands and welcome the old flag. You shed ink in great profusion in protest and opened the lachrymal founts over unborn children; yet the born children mock at your fears, and you are, gentlemen, in tolerable health to-day, except in that sense political in which you seem to be on the verge of dissolution. But there is political health to be found in this grandest opportunity of the century which is given to make the land of the Pilgrims and of Washington free; so free that another rebellion will be impossible; to make the nation's destiny so glorious that Heaven shall look down to see.

Mr. Speaker, I am aware that there has been much coaxing outside and inside of this Hall in effort to induce Democrats who have voted against the Republican party and against the amendment so long to come now and vote for the amendment. I for one do not share the solicitude of many on this point. I am in no coaxing mood. If these gentlemen see no wisdom in giving orders for a shroud, that there may be an early and decent burial of that which is in its death-throes and ought to have been hastened to the tomb long ago, we can endure its putrescence till the "ides of March" at least, when at a called session of Congress, if a necessity, a jubilant majority will give the vote which they wereelected to cast, and will ally their names with the honored dead of the centuries. We can pass the constitutional amendment then without coaxing, thank God. The next Congress was elected for that purpose, and we shall have an overshadowing majority which will open a new page in our political history; and to vote for this constitutional amendment is just the feast to which those members fresh from the people were invited. Those who sunder party ties and vote for it cannot fail of grateful remembrance, for slavery and Democracy have been mutual supporters for thirty years. They cling together like the Siamese twins. And so theirs shall be the folly, theirs shall be the curse, if they do not resist the sorcery of party. Let them abide together and go down to the depths "with bubbling groan," for, pleasant in their lives, in death they should not be divided.

Mr. Speaker, I need not give my reasons in full why I shall vote for this constitutional amendment. I will simply state a few of the reasons that will impel me to do so. In the first place, I will vote for it because the Constitution provides for its own amendment. Secondly, I will vote for it because it allows the people of the States to exercise their sovereignty-that "popular sovereignty" which we have heard descanted upon, lo, these many years. I propose to have a practical illustration of the doctrine. I will vote for it because it is a measure of justice to millions in chains, to hundreds of thousands fighting our bat

tles. The country demands it. The people, although their Representatives here heed not their voices, demand it. They demand it by the voice of four hundred thousand majority given in the late election to the present Executive of the United States. Above all there is a voice sounding out louder than the thunder if men would hear it; it is the voice of God to this nation, "Break every yoke and let the oppressed go free."

I rejoice, Mr. Speaker, to welcome so many who are coming into the ranks of free men, and to know that there is a breaking up of unholy alliances. I rejoice not in any mere party victory, but am gladdened in seeing men restored to their right minds and placing themselves in the currents of intelligence and patriotism, so that when there shall be a reorganization of the Government, when there shall be an adjustment, when the war is ended, we shall find men of all classes and of all parties allied together invoking the blessing of Almighty God to the end that this may be the great, the glorious, the free, the mighty nation of the earth.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I take pride in the fact, and let it go down to history, that but one gentleman on the other side of the House has stood up here to advocate "the sum of all villainies," American slavery. Thank God, he did not belong to a slave State. A thousand thanks those who live in the midst of the institution do not dethrone their reason and provoke the vengeance of the Almighty by standing up here in defense of American slavery. But let him, [Mr. | FERNANDO WOOD,] living on northern soil and in a mighty city, degrade, if he choose, his manhood, defame the African race, and thus bear off all the honors to which his pandering and vassalage entitle him. "Let him enjoy his solitary ignominy," is said all around me. Yes, sir, I repeat it. That gentleman, born and reared in a free State, has seen fit to stand up in this year of 1865 and declare that American slavery is the best condition of the African race! He deserves the shackles he would fasten upon others, and, as f trust in God, I believe his posterity will at least wear his brand of ignominy if not wear the chains which he would forge for others. Reproaches of scorn for slavery's defender, but thanks for those who have broken the shackles of party and are coming forth for their country! I rejoice that this is their day of freedom, and that we are now about to give liberty to millions who have no voice in this Chamber.

I will now yield the remainder of my hour to the gentleman from Illinois, [Mr. FARNSWORTH,] who desires to speak upon this question.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Mr. Speaker, "property," "vested rights,"" robbery, "are the dying crics from the agonized hearts of the men who defend man-stealing and women-whipping, and who apologize for treason. I do not rise here for the purpose of making a constitutional argument, but only for the purpose of briefly answering those charges. It seems to me that they come from the wrong side of this question when used by the men who oppose this constitutional amend

ment.

"Property!" What is property? That is property which the Almighty made property. things animate and inanimate, He established When at the creation He gave man dominion over property. Nowhere do you read that He gave man dominion over another man.

"Vested rights!" What vested rights so high or so sacred as a man's right to himself, to his wife and children, to his liberty, and to the fruits of his own industry? Did not our fathers declare that those rights were inalienable? And if a man cannot himself alienate those rights, how can another man alienate them without being himself a robber of the vested rights of his brother-man?

"Vested rights" and "robbery," forsooth, from the slaveholder! Why, sir, it is passing strange that men, from usage and familiarity with a crime, will even get to using the very words and phrases in defense of that crime which legitimately and properly describe the crime itself. There never was a highwayman who had pursued his course of crime for a series of years who did not regard the execution of the law upon him for his crimes as most unjust to him. The poet has well said

that

"No man e'er felt the halter draw, With good opinion of the law,"

It has been truly said by the gentleman who preceded me, [Mr. GRINNELL,] that in the statutes of no slave State in the Union can you find the origin of slavery. There is not a statute in any one of those States that ever established property in slaves; not one. It is a carbuncle; it is an ulcer; it is a cancer which has grown up by stealth upon the body-politic, and which has only from usage become familiarized to men, and they have surrounded it with the statutes protecting the relation that we find in any of the codes of the slave States. You cannot find in any statutes of any civilized nation on the face of the earth where property in things animate or inanimate is established. Nowhere is that property defined; nowhere is it declared in any statute in the world that man shall have property in this or that thing. Because, as I have said before, the Almighty having given property in these things it is only necessary that civilized society should surround it with laws to protect men in the possession and enjoyment of it.

I trust we will hear no more of robbery, of vested rights. Slavery commenced in robbery and theft, and has been carried on by a trespass, and no usage in the lapse of time can make that just or legal or right which in its origin and inception was a crime.

What is that we now propose to do? We propose to say in the organic law of the land that there shall be no more involuntary servitude except as a punishment for crime, And there is another thing; we are now dealing with a class. While there may be now and then a loyal slaveholder in the rebellious States, as a class the slaveholders are traitors, as a class they brought on this rebellion, as a class they are fighting our soldiers in the field, starving our prisoners in their dungeons, and by every high-handed and ruthless outrage conducting this war of trea

But there is another class of people there denominated slaves. What are they? Invariably the friends of the Union; invariably the friends of the Union soldier, giving him aid and comfort, secreting him on his stolen flight from southern dungeons to the lines of our Army, furnishing him food and shelter on the way, and diverting from him the bloodhounds on his track.

It is but a day or two since that I took by the hand the adjutant of that grand old regiment that I raised and took into the field. For a year and a half he had been sojourning in a variety of southern prisons. Escaping from Columbia with a few others, he was for twenty days and nights within the rebel lines, traveling by night, and secreting himself by day in the hut of the slave,

until he reached the lines of Sherman near Savannah. In every instance, (and his tale is but a repetition of the tale told by thousands,) in every instance he could with the utmost confidence approach the humble door of the slave, either by night or by day, and rap for admittance, and could obtain there concealment, protection, and food. He was never turned away and never deceived by any slave from whom he sought assistance. The slaves guarded him; they fed him upon the best they could procure, and sent him on his way rejoicing. And when the slaveholders, those men who, according to the declaration of the member from New York, [Mr. FERNANDO WOOD,] are a brave, generons, and noble people, put upon his track the bloodhounds and the bull-dogs, and when their hoarse howling was heard upon his track, his pursuers were, by the arts taught by the slaves, diverted from the scent, and he was protected.

Sir, it is said, I believe, that every man looks upon and appreciates character from his own stand-point. I suppose that a man who stands upon the gallows and feels the halter drawn about his neck would regard a very disreputable person, if exempt from the doom of that punishment, as very respectable; and I suppose that, if a man has escaped the penitentiary by the statute of limitations or any other device, he would regard as very respectable a character which others might consider very ignoble. Men of a low class regard the character of others from their own low stand-point, and by a comparison with their own position in the moral scale. But it is left for the member from New York to justify and support this barbarous institution of slavery, and to declare that the slaveholders engaged in this rebel

lion are, par excellence, the noble, gallant, and generous people of the United States. Mr. Speaker, I do not so regard them. From the stand-point which I occupy I look upon them in a very different light. I think that they are neither just, generous, nor noble; and, sir, you shall find that, wherever slavery has existed for a series of years, it makes the slaveholder ignoble, unjust, ungenerous, and tyrannical. Such is the natural effect of the institution everywhere.

The member from New York caused to be read at the Clerk's desk a description, as I learned afterward, of some horrid scene in Africa as written by a traveler. I did not know when it was read from what source it was taken, nor had I heard what was said by the gentleman in connection with it. Forming my surmise on the character of the description, I turned to some one near me and asked whether it was a description of the horrid atrocities committed by the denizens of the Five Points and others, constituents of the gentleman, during the riot in New York city a year or two ago. It seemed so apt and complete a description of the scenes which occurred during that riot, as they were detailed in the New York papers, that I thought it must be an extract from some history of those occurrences. We all recollect that during that riot colored orphan asylums were set on fire, negro women with children in their arms were murdered, and in some instances negroes were burned. Those are scenes which were participated in by voters of that member's own city and district. You need not go to Africa to find scenes

of horror.

I think that we should deal justly with the unfortunate class of people who will be freed by the adoption of this amendment. Justice, long delayed, should be awarded to them. Why, sir, suppose that by some turn of the wheel of fortune the slave should become the master, and the gentleman from Kentucky, [Mr. CLAY,] who addressed the House yesterday, should become the slave. Would he then cry out, "Robbery! violation of vested rights!" if we sought to strike the shackles from his limbs? Yet his slave is a man. And Thomas Jefferson declared that it was by no means impossible that some turn of the wheel of fortune might bring about that state of circumstances; and he declared that in case of a contest between the masters and their slaves the Almighty .possessed no attribute that would take sides with the masters.

Mr. Speaker, I thank God that by the votes of my constituents, who sent me here by over thirteen thousand majority, I have the privilege to-day of standing up here and advocating this amendment; and I know that when the light of the past and the present and the future shall with their concentrated rays throw a focal blaze upon the page of history that we are making to-day, it will be a source of the highest pride for my children to point to the record which I make and the vote which I give to-day; while I know equally well that as to the men who may vote against this amendment, and particularly those who apologize for the institution of slavery, their action will be an everlasting disgrace to themselves and their children and their children's children. Sir, we are making history, and we are making it fast. These things will not be looked upon fifty years hence as they are now. When this usage of slavery is abolished and when we have ceased to be familiarized with the clank of chains, then we shall look upon this thing with the horror it deserves.

Mr. McBRIDE. Mr. Speaker, by the vote on the motion of the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. AsHLEY] this House will decide whether the proposed amendment to the Constitution, by which slavery shall be prohibited within the limits of the United States, shall be submitted to the several States for their action or not. No one authorized to speak for the people of the State whose interests I represent upon this floor has yet spoken upon this question in either branch of Congress, and I avail myself of the privilege of giving expression to my views with greater pleasure because my State has been hitherto unheard; and secondly, that they are in emphatic harmony with the clearlyexpressed sentiments of my constituents.

I shall ask the indulgence of the House for but a brief time, while I present in concise form the reasons which govern my vote on this grave question. I have no wish to enter the broad field which has been swept by this debate for the purpose of

gleaning after the myriad reapers who have entered the harvest before me, but I will traverse the limited scope which I have prescribed to myself with as much rapidity as is consistent with the perspicuous presentation of the positions which I shall endeavor to establish by the way, promising to be (for I know how anxious most members are to close this debate) neither elaborate nor diffuse.

The first question that presents itself in the consideration of this proposition is whether we have the power to take the proposed action of initiating the abolition of slavery by a prohibition of it in our fundamental law; if we have not the power to do it, the rightful authority as an American Congress, then all discussion as to the propriety, the expediency, or even the necessity of the act is of course idle folly.

But, sir, I have listened carefully and attentively to the arguments of gentlemen upon the proslavery side of this question, who deny our authority to amend the Constitution as proposed, without being able to perceive the justice or soundness of their assumption. I perused with patience the ingenious argument of the distinguished gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. PENDLETON,] made at the last session of Congress, and reiterated Saturday last by his colleague, [Mr. BLISS,] the gentleman from New York, [Mr. PRUYN,] and a member from New Jersey whom I do not choose to name. The gist of that argument being that slavery is a State institution, never submitted by them to Federal control, that it is an indefeasible right of property conferred by State laws, and not to be divested by any other sanction, is a fallacy which can, I think, be most easily and conclusively met and answered.

You assert that slavery is a local institution, deriving all its right to exist from the municipal laws of each State where it is acknowledged. I admit the assertion. You assert that it was a subject left by the framers of the Constitution to the States, to be by them controlled, legislated upon, encouraged, fostered, or abolished in the States, as to them seemed most expedient. That I also admit.

You assert that, owing its existence to State laws and State authority, and being a subject left by the framers of our fundamental law to the exclusive control of the State authority, therefore we have no right to so amend the Constitution as to take Federal control of and abolish it. This assertion I deny. The conclusion does not follow from your premises, as I now propose to demonstrate. This is a proposition to amend the Constitution of the United States and to establish in that Constitution a power hitherto not possessed. That Constitution is the existing fundamental law of all the States, having been assented to and ratified by them. It contains among its provisions one by which it prescribes the methods by which the instrument may be altered, changed, and amended. Those methods are, that the two Houses may, by a two-thirds vote, propose amendments; or Congress may, on application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, call a convention to propose amendments to the Constitution; and in either case, whenever the proposed amendment or amendments shall be ratified by three fourths of the States, they shall become valid and binding provisions of the Constitution; and upon this power of amendment there is one and only one limitation, and that is that "no State without its consent shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate. The full and complete power to amend the Constitution in any and every particular is given and confirmed by the fifth article of the Constitution, curtailed by the single existing limitation as to equal State representation in the Senate. If the States had intended, when the Constitution was originally formed, to forever keep the institution of slavery beyond Federal control, they should and would have excepted that also, with the right of equal suffrage in the Senate, from among the subjects of rightful amendment,

zance, and we are following strictly the methods it prescribes.

Sir, we are told that by this amendment, if it succeeds, we are encroaching upon the rights of the States, and that we are taking a step toward consolidation. Certainly we are; and if the States, in the mode prescribed by the Constitution, choose to yield not only the right which they have hitherto enjoyed of controlling and perpetuating the system of slavery, but every other political right exercised by them, they can unquestionably do so, It may be very unwise policy for them to do so; but it can nevertheless be done constitutionally; and that is the question I am now considering.

I think, then, that I have established the proposition that, as all the States have agreed by their ratification of the Constitution to abide all amendments which shall be made to that instrument which receives the sanction of three fourths of their number, having first passed the preliminary ordeal of a two-thirds majority of both Houses of Congress, or of a national convention, our proposed amendment is perfectly within our province and power.

And now, Mr. Speaker, I pass from the question of our power to amend, and come to the equally important practical question, the expediency of the proposed amendment. Ought slavery in these United States to be abolished? Is it our duty as statesmen seeking the good of the country and of posterity to put an end to this institution? Is it our duty as citizens, loving our country and seeking her glory and prosperity, and withal having her good name among nations committed to our care, to rid her of this institution?

Sir, it seems to me that but one patriotic answer can be given to these questions, and that is an affirmative one. View it in whatever light you may, the answer must still be the same. Look at it as a question of mere political economy, and the argument of material prosperity alone would say abolish it forever. The argument of statistics and facts, so triumphantly conclusive as to defy all attempts at refutation, which my friend from Maryland [Mr. CRESWELL] presented the other day, ought of itself to determine every man who seeks for the proper development of this fair western continent, to vote for the abolition of slavery on every proper occasion.

When an American citizen enters a foreign land and sees the degradation to which the downtrodden masses are subjected by their kingly rulers, his soul revolts at the injustice, but his mouth is closed against remonstrance. If he talks of the beneficence of free institutions and the glory of republican government he is told to learn to practice what he preaches before he seeks to proselyte abroad. If the American, indignant at the wrongs he sees done to unhappy Ireland by the proud rulers of England, expresses his hope to see her emancipated from their rigorous rule, he is asked to think of the millions pining in chains beneath the starry flag of the country he so proudly praises. If, burning with that instinctive hatred of tyranny which finds new fuel in the dark history that records the endurance of noble Hungary, and the oppression of despotic Austria, he ventures an utterance of the feelings of his heart, he is shamed into silence by the sneering suggestion that a more galling tyranny and a more degrading slavery stain the prosperity and dim the glory of his own fair land. If then, sir, it were only to make our Government consistent with itself, to make her an example of freedom, to which all the nations of the world might turn and be instructed, free her from every stain, and wipe off every reproach based upon the existence of human bondage; if it were only to vindicate our good name with mankind, I would vote to abolish slavery.

But, sir, I contend that the argument against the institution as an offender against the rules of common justice, as a felon self-convicted of ineffable crimes, as a traitor-assassin seeking madly the life of this free nation, demands that it be sum

If domestic slavery was beyond our control originally, the Constitution points out the way by which we may legitimately take it under cogni

enough has it debauched and deadened the conscience of the people; long enough has it shocked humanity and defied Heaven by its violations of every principle of truth and morality; and now, having filled up its cup of crime and villainy by a treason so rank and foul as to shame all historic example and all criminal parallel, we, who hold the

malefactor in our grip, owe it to humanity, to justice, to ourselves, and the world, to strangle the guilty monster. If, instead of being guilty of the indictment which I have presented, slavery were only an element of political discord, a constant subject of agitation and disturbance as it has undoubtedly always been, still the peace, order, and prosperity of the country demand its extinction. Glance at our brief national history and learn that no danger to our national integrity has ever existed that is not chargeable to the irritating effects of slavery. It was the one subject which in the Convention to frame our Constitution was the most difficult of adjustment, and threatened us with all the evils of national disintegration and anarchy. Its demands and exactions began then; they have ended by a vain attempt to destroy the nation which it could not longer keep in subjection beneath its iron yoke. Not a single serious danger to our nation has ever existed since we became one people that does not find its origin and motive in the institution. Foreign aggression we never feared; subjugation from abroad we have always defied; but domestic dissension, arising out of the dissim ilarity of our institutions and the conflicts to which these diversities have given rise, has ever been the care and dread of our statesmen.

Slavery demanded those acquisitions of territory in 1803 which finally led to the fierce controversy as to the admission of Missouri, which came so near involving us in revolution and civil war in 1820. In 1832, taking the guise of mere commercial jealousy in the shape of nullification, it again threatened the country with the horrors of war and bloodshed. Demanding the annexation of Texas, a demand yielded to against the moral sense of the nation, and thrown to it as a "sop to Ceberus," the war with Mexico ensued, and all the fierce and bitter agitation of 1850. Not satisfied with having torn and distracted the country by that fierce excitement before which in 1850 all that had preceded it "paled their ineffectual fires," and grasping with insatiate hunger at every element of power and strength, the demon of slavery again in 1854 roused the fiery tide of sectional and political excitement by endeavoring to rob the free Territories of the nation of the fair jewel of their glory and prosperity and appropriate them for its own base uses. And for the last ten years we have had no other question in national politics deserving the name or dividing politics save slavery and its incidents. It has at every period in our history, when our integrity as a nation has been threatened, been the prompting enemy of the public peace, the active offender against order and quiet. It has filled the land with broil, with hate, with intestine commotion and irreconcilable discord. When after six years of continual and angry agitation it capped the climax of its crimes in 1860 by letting loose upon the country all the devastations of civil war-a war that has made the world stand still with horror as it gazed upon the desolation and the havoc that have marked its gory track-it left the hand of vengeance with no further excuse for clemency. It filled up the measure of its wickedness, and proclaiming itself an open enemy, it henceforth became an outlaw whom it is our duty to follow to utter extermination.

The gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. CLAY] complains that this amendment is treating Kentucky with bad faith. Sir, the charge comes with bad grace. Why, sir, in 1820 the North, confiding in the faith of Kentucky pledges, agreed to the compromise of the great statesman of the West, Henry Clay, but when the time came that the North was to realize the benefits guarantied by that compromise, Kentucky, in the person of her Senator, made the motion which broke the plighted faith of the nation and covered the national Legislature with a stain of dishonor from which the waters of time can never wash it clean. Sir, let me ask that gentleman whether it is kind in Kentucky to insist that her interest, if in antagonism with that of her twenty-odd sisters, who he says are arrayed against her, shall be maintained and theirs sacrificed? Is it good faith to her sister States to insist that her interests shall be maintained at their expense? That slavery is the motive of the rebellion we can establish by every fact bearing upon our troubles. Why is it that West Virginia clung to the Union while the chivalry district went off in revolt? Simply because slavery was the dominant interest in the latter,

and had little power in the first. Why did the free mountaineers of Tennessee rally round the flag of their fathers with an honest devotion unsurpassed by any example furnished in history, while the planting regions of the same State went frenzied into the dark abyss of rebellion? Slavery explains the reason. Go to the mountains of Kentucky and of North Carolina, where the husbandman earns his scanty living by the honest toil of his own hands, and where slave labor is the exception and not the rule, and fidelity and devotion to the Union burn as warmly and as brightly as in any part of our land. Go to the cotton and rice fieldstilled by the sweat and moistened with the tears of the slave, and rebellion fierce and bitter seems to reign in every heart. If then rebellion is the result of slavery, let us destroy slavery and thus destroy the motive to rebellion, give peace to the country, and harmony to all our

future.

But we are met with another objection, that if we emancipate we must enfranchise also. I deny the conclusion; but I should not be deterred from the move, even if it were correct. A recognition of natural rights is one thing, a grant of political franchises is quite another. We extend to all white men the protection of law when they land upon our shores. We grant them political rights when they comply with the conditions which those laws prescribe. If political rights must necessarily follow the possession of personal liberty, then all but male citizens in our country are slaves. This illustration alone reduces the conclusion to an absurdity. Sir, let the rights and status of the negro settle themselves as they will and must upon their own just basis. If, as a race, they shall prove themselves worthy the elective franchise, I tell gentlemen they will enjoy the right; they will demand and they will win it, and they ought to have it. If, on the contrary, as a race, they are so far inferior to those with whom they must compete as to be unequal to the high and responsible position of free electors, any attempt to elevate them to that standard will be a sigual failure. I have no faith in their ability to contend in the race before them successfully, and no fear of degrading my own race by contact with them, for, sir, there is an antagonism between the races which will prevent anything like a complete blending of them, and I leave all questions of the consequences of emancipation to be settled by justice and expediency as experience shall dictate. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," and I will do what right and expediency require now, and leave the consequences to be provided for as they may arise. Conscious as I am that the best interests of the country and posterity require a mitigation of the evils with which slavery has afflicted this war-desolated and strife-torn land, I will not suffer myself to be prevented from giving my aid to this beneficent proposition by any imaginary evils that it may not provide for. If the abolition of slavery shall still leave us the dregs of this pestiferous question to be dealt with at a future time, I am willing to trust the future for their settlement, well convinced that all others are mere subordinate difficulties which time and statesmanship will enable us to wisely overcome. Mr. C. A. WHITE obtained the floor.

INSPECTORS OF STEAMBOATS.

Mr. WASHBURNE, of Illinois. I ask the unanimous consent of the House to introduce for reference a bill to provide for two assistant inspectors of steamboats for the city of New York, and for two local inspectors at Galena, Illinois.

Mr. CHANLER. 1 object, unless the gentleman withdraws his objection to the bill I endeavored to introduce yesterday.

Mr. WASHBURNE, of Illinois. Then I understand the gentleman objects to legislation for New York city.

Mr. CHANLER. No, sir.

MINNESOTA RAILROAD GRANTS.

certain land claims; which was read a first and second time, and referred to the Committee of Claims.

And then, on motion of Mr. ASHLEY, (at twenty minutes past four o'clock, p. m.,) the House adjourned.

IN SENATE.

WEDNESDAY, January 11, 1865.

Prayer by Rev. B. H. NADAL, D. D., of Washington, District of Columbia. The Journal of yesterday was read and approved.

PETITIONS AND MEMORIALS,

Mr. TRUMBULL presented a petition of officers in the military service of the United States, with the army of the James, praying for an increase of the pay of Army officers; which was referred to the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia.

Mr. CLARK presented a petition of citizens of Virginia, setting forth the inefficiency of the State government for the protection of the loyal citizens of Virginia, and praying for the establishment of a territorial government; which was referred to the Committee on Territories.

Mr. HARRIS presented two petitions of citizens of New York, clerks in the Treasury Department, praying for an increase of salary; which were referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also presented a petition of citizens of New York, clerks in the Navy Department, praying for an increase of salary; which was referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also presented a petition of citizens of New York, clerks in the Interior Department, praying for an increase of salary; which was referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also presented a petition of citizens of New York, clerks in the War Department, praying for an increase of salary; which was referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also presented a petition of officers in the military service of the United States, praying for an increase of pay and that the commutation price of the ration may be fixed at sixty cents, and that the pay of officers' servants may be the same as private soldiers in the Army; which was referred to the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia.

He also presented a petition of real-estate agents of the city of Albany, New York, praying that there be refunded to them a proportionate part of the tax paid by them as commercial brokers under the act of 1862; which was referred to the Committee on Finance.

Mr. DOOLITTLE presented a memorial of the Chamber of Commerce of the city of Milwaukee, praying for the construction of a ship canal around the falls of Niagara; which was referred to the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia.

Mr. WILSON presented a petition of medical storekeepers in the service of the United States, authorized under the act of Congress approved May 20, 1862, praying to be allowed the pay and emoluments of surgeons of the Army; which was referred to the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia.

He also presented two petitions of military officers in the service of the United States, with the army of the James, praying for an increase in the pay of Army officers; which were referred to the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia.

Mr. CHANDLER presented a petition of citizens of Muskegon county, Michigan, praying for an appropriation for the improvement of Muskegon harbor; which was referred to the Committee on Commerce.

Mr. MORRILL presented the petition of the local board of steamboat inspectors, praying for an increase of salary; which was referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also presented the petition of Mrs. Denis Sullivan, of Alexandria, Louisiana, praying com

United States; which was referred to the Committee on Claims.

LAND CLAIMS.

Mr. RICE, of Maine, by unanimous consent, introduced a joint resolution for the adjustment of

BILLS INTRODUCED.

Mr. TRUMBULL asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a joint resolution (S. R. No. 91) appointing General Richard Delafield to be a regent of the Smithsonian Insti

tution; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on the Library.

Mr. RAMSEY asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a bill (S. No. 386) to incorporate the National Protection Insurance Company, of the District of Columbia; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on the District of Columbia.

Mr. RAMSEY also asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a bill amendatory of an act to amend an act entitled "An act to promote the progress of the useful arts,' approved March 3, 1863; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on Patents and the Patent Office.

Mr. CHANDLER asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a bill (S. No. 388) further to provide for the verification of invoices; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on Commerce.

Mr. COLLAMER asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a bill (S. No. 389) relating to clerkships in the Post Office Department; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on Post Offices and Post Roads.

Mr. COLLAMER also asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to introduce a bill (S. No. 390) relating to the postal laws; which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on Post Offices and Post Roads.

REPORTS OF COMMITTEES.

Mr. TEN EYCK, from the Committee on the Judiciary, to whom was referred the memorial of Elias H. Chambers, praying to be indemnified for the loss of Treasury notes destroyed by fire, asked to be discharged from its further consideration, and that it be referred to the Committee on Claims, the Judiciary Committee not deeming it || advisable to report any general bill on the subject, but to leave each claim to be acted upon on its own merits.

The request was granted,

Mr. DOOLITTLE, from the Committee on Indian Affairs, reported a joint resolution (S. R. No.92) to postpone and prevent the sale, for less than their appraised value, of certain Indian lands in Minnesota; which was read, and passed to a second reading. He gave notice that he would call up the resolution to-morrow.

He also, from the same committee, to whom was referred a joint resolution (S. R. No. 89) directing inquiry into the condition of the Indian tribes, and their treatment by the civil and military authorities, reported it without amendment.

PENSIONS.

Mr. FOSTER. The Committee on Pensions, to whom was referred a bill (S. No. 365) in relation to pensions, have directed me to report it back without amendment, with a recommendation that it be passed. The bill is very short, and is intended to effect a very desirable object; it has the sanction of the Department; and I ask the unanimous consent of the Senate that it be considered now. I think it will take but a moment. By unanimous consent, the bill was considered as in Committee of the Whole. It provides that no person in the Army, (including regulars, volunteers, and militia,) or in the Navy or Marine corps, shall be allowed to draw both a pension as an invalid and the pay or emoluments of his rank or station in the service.

The bill was reported to the Senate without amendment, ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, read the third time, and passed.

MESSAGE FROM THE HOUSE.

A message from the House of Representatives, by Mr. MCPHERSON, its Clerk, announced that the House had passed a bill (H. R. No. 657) to amend the third section of an act entitled "An act making appropriations for sundry civil expenses of the Government for the year ending the 30th of June 1865, and for other purposes," so far as the same relates to witnesses in the courts of the United States.

COMPENSATION FOR CALLED SESSIONS. Mr. BUCKALEW submitted the following resolution; which was considered by unanimous consent, and agreed to:

Resolved, That the Committee on Finance be authorized to report a bill or joint resolution providing compen

sation to members of the Senate at special called sessions of the Senate, commencing with the Thirty-Eighth Congress, such compensation to be confined to sessions when the House of Representatives is not convened, and to members who are required to journey from their homes to the capital in order to attend such sessions.

PRINTING OF EVIDENCE.

Mr. TRUMBULL, from the Committee on the Judiciary, reported the following resolution; which was considered by unanimous consent, and agreed to:

Resolved, That the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to print certain evidence before them relating to the right to seats of Messrs. Cutler and Smith as Senators from the State of Louisiana.

SECOND ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF WAR.

Mr. WILSON. I am directed by the Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia, to whom was referred the bill (S. No. 385) authorizing the President to appoint a Second Assistant Secretary of War, to report it back without amendment, and with the recommendation that it pass; and I ask the unanimous consent of the Senate to act upon it now.

There being no objection, the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, proceeded to consider the bill. It proposes to authorize the President to appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, for the term of one year from its passage, an officer in the War Department to be called the Second Assistant Secretary of War, whose salary shall be $3,000 per annum, payable in the same manner as that of the Secretary of War, who shall perform all such duties in the office of the Secretary of War belonging to that Department as shall be prescribed by the Secretary of War, or as may be required by law.

The bill was reported to the Senate without amendment, ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, read the third time, and passed.

PROMOTION OF NAVAL OFFICERS.

Mr. GRIMES. The Committee on Naval Affairs, to whom was referred the bill (H. R. No. 607) to provide for an advance of rank to officers of the Navy and Marine corps for distinguished merit, have instructed me to report it back with an amendment, and I ask for its present consid

eration.

Mr. SUMNER. Will it take any time?
Mr. GRIMES. I think not.

Mr. SUMNER. I wish to bring forward the resolution for the termination of the reciprocity treaty to-day.

Mr. GRIMES. We can pass this bill in a

moment.

Mr. SUMNER. Very well.

By unanimous consent, the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, proceeded to the consideration of the bill (H. R. No. 607) to provide an advance of rank to officers of the Navy and Marine corps for distinguished merit. It provides that any officer of the Navy or Marine corps, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, may be advanced not exceeding fifty numbers in rank, for having exhibited eminent and conspicuous conduct in battle or extraordinary heroism.

The second section provides that any officer of the Navy or Marine corps, either of volunteers or otherwise, who shall be nominated to a higher grade by the provisions of the first section of this act, or of those of section nine of an act to establish and equalize the grades of line officers of the United States Navy, approved July 11, 1862, shall be promoted, notwithstanding the number of the grade may be full, but no further promotions are to take place in that grade, except for like cause, until the number is reduced to that provided by law.

The Committee on Naval Affairs reported the bill with an amendment in section one, line five, to strike out the word “fifty” and insert "thirty;" so that the clause will read:

That any officer of the Navy or Marine corps, by and with the advice and eonsent of the Senate, may be advanced not exceeding thirty numbers in rank, &c.

The amendment was agreed to.

The bill was reported to the Senate as amended, and the amendment was concurred in, and ordered to be engrossed, and the bill to be read a third time. It was read the third time, and passed.

MANSLAUGHTER IN THE DISTRICT.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Committee on the Judiciary, to whom was referred the bill (H. R. No.

595) to amend an act entitled "An act for the punishment of crimes in the District of Columbia," approved March 2, 1831, have instructed me to report it back without amendment, and recommend its passage. As it is but a short bill and it will take but a moment to consider it, and as I presume there will be no objection to it, I ask the unanimous consent of the Senate to consider it at the present time.

There being no objection, the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, proceeded to consider the bill, which proposes to amend the second section of an act for the punishment of crimes in the District of Columbia, approved March 2, 1831, so as to read as follows:

That every person duly convicted of manslaughter, or of any assault with intent to kill, shall be sentenced to suffer imprisonment and labor, for the first offense, for a period not less than two nor more than eight years, and for the second offense, for a period not less than six nor more than fifteen years.

The bill was reported to the Senate without amendment, ordered to a third reading, read the third time, and passed.

ADAMS EXPRESS COMPANY.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I move to take up Senate bill No. 337 for consideration.

The motion was agreed to; and the bill (S. No. 337) authorizing the payment to the Adams Express Company of the amount of certain Treasury notes destroyed or irrecoverably lost while in their custody was read a second time, and considered as in Committee of the Whole. It proposes to authorize the Secretary of the Treasury* to pay to the Adams Express Company the sum of $22,080, being the amount of certain United States Treasury notes, commonly called legaltender notes, destroyed or irrecoverably lost while in the custody of the company, the same having been placed by them in an iron safe and shipped from New York on board of the steamer Bio Bio, which steamer, after being partially burned, sunk beneath the water in front of the levee at New Orleans, on the 22d of March, 1863, carrying down with her the iron safe and contents. But this payment is not to be made until the company shall execute to the United States a bond, with security, to be approved by the Secretary of the Treasury, conditioned to indemnify the United States against all loss, cost, or damage incurred by reason of the payment, and that if the safe shall be hereafter recovered or brought to land the company shall repay to the United States this sum of money.

The bill was reported to the Senate without amendment.

Mr. DAVIS. I should like to know what evidence there is in this case that the Treasury notes were lost, and what evidence there is of their amount. Let the report be read.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. The testimony in the case is very full and I think conclusive as to all the points that are raised by it. An abstract of it is set forth in the report; but the facts are simply these: the Adams Express Company shipped on board this steamer for their customers a large amount of Treasury notes, much larger than those they claim embraced in the bill. The vessel proceeded on her voyage, the bills being in an iron safe inclosed in an iron-strapped wooden box, and at Havana the box and safe were moved from between decks to the lower hold of the steamer. She arrived at New Orleans during the night of the 21st of March, and early the next morning was found to be on fire. Efforts were made to extinguish the fire, but before they succeeded the vessel, owing to the burning of her hawsers, slid from the levee into deep water and sunk. Diving bells were immediately employed, and they persevered in their efforts for some six or seven weeks; but owing to the accumulation of sand over the vessel they were unable to recover anything except some few pieces of machinery. Nothing, I believe, was got out of her.

The evidence on these points is full and conclusive, as I have already remarked, and shows that these notes are there in deep water, and owing to the character of that river, and the rapid formation of these sand-bars, are probably irrecoverable on that account. But beyond that, they have now been under the water some twenty months, and that would insure their destruction, I think, in the position in which they are. It will be observed that in the bill which the Committee on Finance have reported they have provided that these par