A. J. GERRITSON, Publisher.}
18ir3•e6c311 ,7
HON. EDGAR COWAN, OF PA.,
IN THE U. 8. SENATE, JUNE 6, 1866
The Senate, - as in Committee of the
Whole, having under consideration the
joint resolution•(l3. R. No. 127) propos
ing an amendment to the Constitution of
the United States—
Mr. COWAN said :
Mr. President : I have a word to say.
lam not exactly in the category of my
honorable friend from Ohio. I do not
wear the - harness 6frcaudaS on this occas
ion, or indeed upon any other. lam op
posed to any alteration of the Constitu
tion in this point, because to me that is
vital. But lam going to vote for the
proposition
, i3f the Senator from Wiscon
sin because I think it better than the orig
inal proposition and not worse.
It does seem to me there are extraor
dinary notions of- political power here,
what constitutes it, where it is vested,
and how it is wielded. What conceiva
ble difference can it make to a citizen of
Pennsylvania as to how Ohio distributes
her political power ? What conceivable
interest has the honorable Senator from
Ohio, or a Senator from any other State,
to say to us whom we shall allow to vote
and whom we shall net allow P 'They do
not pretend that they have a right to say
to us whom we shall elect and whom we
shall not elect; and is not the electorjust
as much the choice o the community as
an officer is the clinic of it, except that
the electors are chose by a class and de
scribed by a general designaticn, where
as the officer is chosen by name to per
form certain functions.
Mr. President, to touch, to venture np.:
on that ground is to revolutionize the
whole frame and texture of the.system of
our Government; to turn it over ; to vio
late our own canons. What is the guar
antee of the United Stmes,to the-several
States' is.that theyshall have a re
publican form of government. Now we
are told that a Reppblic,an .form of gov
ernment is' this, that, and the other. One
man says it is " universal suffrag e ;" ano
ther says it is " universal ma nhood suf
frage," sit -, as to throw . ottt the- ladies ;
another says it is "Ilniversal white Sur;
trage," ana so on. Who :can agree as to
what a republican form of government is?
If gentlemen had read the original text
and the approved commentaries thereon
they would have found that the guaran
tee was such a form of government as the
Slate itself should make. The State is
the judge of the republican form of gov
ernment, and not the citizens of the other
States.
Then, if a State has the right to form
i'.,s own government,. and that is the re
publican - form, by what right can one of
the other States, or two - of them, or ten
of them, or three fourths of them, if yon
please, venture to introduce into the State
a power from without in order to control
its distribution of political power ? If the
effect of any such extra action upon a
State w0314,J e 1,0 deprive...it of.. portion
of its weight in-the l:Tninit; that is a vio
latiep of the original corn pact is a, vio
lation:of the very itistrament upoii which
the. Unionwas foimed; it is putting' the
torch to the very .fabric you wish to, pre
serve; it is putting a mine under the ve
ry builditig,yott wish to secure.
Are you to pre:serv,e - these Btates if you
are to regulate the weightfiereafter ,-they
are to have in the Union ? Can half a
dozen, or a dOzen, or two dozen of these
States undertake to shear of their politi
cal power the other States ? Can yon vi
olate your own guarantee ? When yon
say that, nobody .else shall :deprive these
States of the right, of making their own
government and distributing their own
power as they please, can you do it? Can
the guarantor himself with impunity vio
late his own guarantee ? _
Mr. President“ had intended to make
somemore extended tlemarkscinAllistoil-,
ie; and `am on theiloor "titiw I May
just as well say at this time what I have
to say on the general subject. It is per
fectly clear,-I -
should thiuk,,to.- all wise
people that the basis - of repreientation,or
the measure of political power and that
which adjusts it among the States,should
beluamptbing fixed; • certainoletermined:
You cannot make a flexible standard.—
Yodiaitnot •make a standard that is 83
inches to day, and 38, to-morrow, and the
next day 40. You cannot allow a State
to open and"ahnt •her valves and admit
power or expel it at wilL You propose
to say_not. do- R.,yvin
things she not 'belie but a certain
amount of power. Suppose she wants
power: - ''She is' made- the -- arbiter of the
power she shall, have in the,U,nion. Sup
pose she chtiielei-to exolude what
then ? Here we have a constantly shift
ing panorama 'upon 'Aloft '4lO-ntit see
hew it, is possible that an apportionment.
bill earl 6o framed. however,.
is 'certain, fixed, determinate; a thing to
be counted every ten years,aud a thing to
be eneouragedrhecanse4 you. make pop
ulation the I:Cali - is - Of representation then
you encourage population; but if 'yeti
make voting the basis, or if you make
that the measure, then you encourage the
degradation of-the franchise.
I am willing, on the part of my own
State,: that she shall be the guardian of
the franchise within her limits. The peo
ple of our State are to be the judges of
the persons in our society who are fit and
proper to cast our ballots ; and we are
perfectly willing that all other States
shall enjoy that privilege, because we be
lieve that it is an inherent And essential
privilege in every State.
But what will be the result to us of the
proposition before the Senate ? We have
in Pennsylvania about one hundred Onus-
and negroes, and we have a Representa
tive in Congress based upon them. What
is to be the operation of this amendment?
Just •this ; your whip is held over Penn
sylvania, and you say to her that she must
either allow her negroes to vote or have
one member of Congress less. This is it;
and it comes with very bad grace from a
parcel of people who have no negroes
among them; and that I. think is the
worst feature in this business from one
end of it to the other.
Here are a parcel of States which have
DO negro population, and they are exceed
ingly anxious that the people who have
them should let them vote. What is that
their business ? We have never known
that they invited them that they might
get votes. The negro is now as free to
go to Massachusetts or to any other State
where he is allowed to vote as he is to
stay in Pennsylvania or anywhere else.—
If he insists upon this privilege, be has
the same right to go-after it that I have,
or that any other man has, and he can go
and get it.
If I do not like the laws of Pennsylva
nia and they do not suit me, and I have
not power and influence in the State to
mold them to suit my particular desire, I
can go to another State and another until
I suit myself. But why people who are
not interested in this thing, who have ev
erything to gain and nothing to lose by
it, can expect to maintain the Union by
insisting upon propositions of this kind I
confess is more than I can See.
This is not common jus ice in a com
mon, -ordinary transaction ; and I do not
know whether it would'be considered fair
even in a horse trade. The advantage is
all on, one side. It is like the Indian and
the white man dividing the possum and
the turkey. The white man said to the In
dian, "Now you take the possum and I
take the turkey, or if you do not like
that, I will take the turkey and you take
the possum." [Laughter.] " Why," said
the Indian,." you have not said turkey to
me once ;" and that is the way with this
constitutional amendment.
The States that have no negroes are to
shear the States that have negroes of the
political power they have according to the
fundamental law, according to the ancient
bargain . blade, and according to which
the Union exists, and which is in flu the
Union itself; that bargain which is bath
ed in the blood of two hundred thousand
American soldiers, for which we have sac
tificed six or eight thousand million dol
lars; that bargain now is to be amended
in its essentials, and to be amended for
the benefit of one section of the Union
who have everything to gain by it and
nothing to lose, and to the prejudice of
, the residue.
Mr. President, will the man who knows
the value of this Union to these States,
the man who loves it, who reveres it, and
who believes that it will make this coun
try the greatest republic on earth—will
be be guilty of unfairness ? And, sir,
whatia worso about it all, those Scats
which are to suffer most, and the States
within which it is to operate most hardly,
are not beard ; they are not, allowed to
come upon this floor and argue their case
although this is a tree country with a rep
sentative form of government, and as I
supposed, a republican form.
'Mr. President, I consider this-attempt
as dangerous to the peace of the Union as
the original doctrine of secession. Do
gentlemen suppose that the people of the
States affected will submit to this ? Let
me remind gentlemen of another thing.
The Republican party existed over half
the Union. It existed as a party north of
Mason and Dixon's line. ,It was a minor
ity party. When Dir.
r. Lincoln was elect
ed in 1860 there was a majority on the
popular vote- of more than nine hundred
and thirty thousand against him. He
was elected tinder the forms of the Con
stitution, and was really and lawfully the
President of the United States; but un
der the workings of 'the Constitution it
did so happen that there was that majori
ty against him. In the States north of
Mason and Dixon's line the majority for
Mr. Lincoln, at the last, presidential elec
tion, was' about four hundred thousand, I
believe:.l , At At: any rate nobody can deny
that yeti nearly pa° halfuf thfi North be
long to the' D6mocratiC Tarty. There,
too, snppose, you`May Consider'that the
people of the South now belong, because
your destiniesare iii•theiribands. They
will inevitably .sit in judgmenv upon you
here in ads gbamber , . Thq will mete, ant',
to" you, if - you are uarefulo,hi tiatM3
measure you try to mete o u t to thenk.4-'
Now, I warn iny Sesatora that ;we
cannot afford this With this forth of goir
ernrnent,of oars..
jiad.'Wepot -better jtaed tipan-ilieVon
siitutiOP WC it is;_where our fathera 'put . it
that- COnstitution which we enforced: at
MONTROSE, PA., TUESDAY, JULY 3, 1866.
such cost ? Think of partners after a dif
ficulty, one trying to compel, and to com
pel under 'threats, the insertion of a new
clause into the original articles of partner
ship. But. can we compel it; and if we
cannot compel it, what then ? You know
what it cost us to compel obedience to
the Constitution as it is. You cannot
compel obedience to the Constitution as
it. is not. You could compel obedience to
a Constitution that was the law of the
land, but you cannot compel obedience to
a Constitution that is not the law of the
land.
Mr. President, I am for dealing fairly.
In the first place, as I have said before on
this floor, I trust the American people ev
eiywhere. Why ? I trust theta because
they are the foundation on which this
structure is built, ; and to say that they
are to be punished into the proper shape
or driven into the proper shape is to say
that the whole rests upon a quicksand--
rests upon a foundation which is distrust
ed, which begins to show cracks in the
walls already if these things be true. I
trust the people North. I trust the peo
ple South. I trust the people of all par
ties. Why not? Why is it that the
South will sustain the Union now ? Be
cause it is her interest to sustain it. Why
is it that we sustain it? Is it because we
arrogate to ourselves superior virtue ?
Has the grace of God been more liberally
bestowed on us than on our brethren ? Is
that the pretense? We may be wiser,
but surely I think nobody can say of the
people or any part of the people that we
are more honest.
Trusting the people, then, the people
must be trusted everywhere, and what
we do especially must he fair. It is a
characteristic of our race, and one which
has marked it for long ages, that there
must be fair play. No man of our race
will interfere even in his brother's quar
rel in a fair contest. We must play fair.
What have we been playing fur? We
have been playing fbr the Union and the
Constitution. What is the attempt now
after we have won ? It is to say that we
will have neither except upon terms.—
Terms with whom ? Terms with the ve
ry men we have been struggling with for
years in order to compel them to assent
to our terms—the Constitution and the
Union.
say again that we mast be fair. We
must allow the States the rights which
they reserved to themselves when they
made this compact, and especially must
we allow to them the essential rights, the
rights that underlie the whole fabric,that
are the basis of the whole structuee, the
first of whiCh is the right to regulate their
own domestic concerns.
Have we forgotton our own platform ? I
Let gentlemen who talk about party fidel- '
ity recur to the platform of Chicago in
1860; recur if you pleaSe to your Balti
more platform of 1864 ; and then you will
see Who are faithful to the original doc
trines of the party and who are not.—
Shall we undertake to say that we will
regulate the ballot all over the United
States, remodel the whole affair, redistri
bute the political power, and we do this
right in the face of our own law ?
Who passed theaet' of the 4th of March
1862 ? Who voted for it in this chamber
and in the other ? Nobody gainsaid it ;
nobody thought of gainsaying it. And
yet that law in force to-day is violated,
trampled under foot and disregarded. By
whom ? •By us. We who fought for the
Constitution and the law ; we who pro:
clainied ourselves those who would see it
enforced at all hazards violate it ; we, in
the face of onr own law, to-day refuse to
hear the people we'are legislating for up
on our floors.
, That law gives to the Southern States,
eleven of them, I believe fifty-eight mem
bers, and they have not one, and you
have not the poor apology that is stuck
into this amendment to the Constitution
here, OM. these members- engaged in re
bellion, beeanse the fact is that a great
many of them did not ; a great many of 1
them engaged to suppress it ; some of
them shed thoir blood in that attempt,
and some of them struggled through all
manner of difficulties to be true and faith
full and yet they are excluded; they are
not allowed to say a word here for their
fellow citizens. And this is fair ! This t
is the way to deal with a partner ! This
is the way to deal with men with whom
you expect to live in peace and unity
coming centuries ! , What is it all about?
Where is the difficulty about it? Are
they strOnger. than you-? Are you afraid
in the other house, with one hundred
and eighty-three members now, that you
cannot manage fifty-eight ? Are we ,
afraid here with fifty Senators that we
cannot manage twenty-two.
Mr. Presidnt, the disguise which cov.
era this proposition is too transparent, Asj
I said before, the Republicap i party,was
minority party. Its policy immediately
upon attaining to power was to make it- ,
self a national party ; was to throw out
its lines and set its stakes in every lam- .
ter of the Union. Let, it. penetrate IMO
every hamlet from Maine, to (korgia,from
North Carolina to California. Let a net
win*" ot both partiekrainify,eVerywhere,
spread ',over the, country, and thee, you
may have A :Union ; and l'inay remark
that, the binding efrteacy, the cement of
th e tie lartica jp s ti3rwcien like a t net
work all over tlietOnntry, will contribute
a hundred times more to keep it together
than any other device, or even the Con
stitution itself. When this was violated
what was the consequence? Wben
there ceased to• be two parties all
over the length and breadth of it, what
had yon thee ? Rebellion ; and rebellion
will follow it inevitably, not only now,
but in all time to come.
Strike a line north of Permsylvania,and
elect a President against the will of every
body north of the north line of Pennsyl
vania, or, in other words, go into an elec
tion and beat every man north of that
line, and a rebellion is inevitable. You
have the same difficulty that we encoun
tered in 1860.
The election of Mr. Lincoln beat every
man south of Mason and Dixon's line, or
nearly so. All parties and all factions
were opposed to him. All had pledged
themselves against him, and after the
campaign waxed hot nod the blood boil'd
they had pledged themselves to resist ;
they were bound before the crisis came,
and how could they prevent it? Thous
ands no doubt regretted it, but their lips
were sealed. Thousands were unwilling
to act, but still, under the influence of this
mortification, they did act. It is a mor
tification, you observe, that reaches ev
erybody ; it reaches men, women, and
children ; it goes everywhete, and howev
er trifling it may appear to a wise man
and a cool man, yet it affects the people,
and affects them in a most tender and vi
tal point, and they resent it. I say again
that if under the same circumstances a
candidate was to be elected who-would
beat all New England and New York,
they would not submit, in my judgment.
Then I say it was the business of the
Republican party to extend itself upon
sonic common platform, not the platform
of fairness exactly in the distribution of
political power, because the Constitution
was not based upon fairness in that res
pect. There was nothing fair in the pro
' vision that Rhode Island and Delaware
should each have two Senators, and Penn
sylvania and New. York each only two.
It was net built upon the principle of
equality originally. Still we ought to
stand upon it and maintain it ; and in or
der to do that there should have been no
going away from the original doctrine.—
W 6 should have stood upon it and strict
ly and literally enforced it, and we should
have had a right to enforce it, and could
have enforced it in the face of the civil
ized world and bad the civilized world
with us.
But that opportunity was neglected ;
the Republican party did not do that ;
and then it was driven to the miserable
shift of either taking to itself as allies the
negroes of the South, or what ? Depriv
ing the South of the political power, which
she enjoyed by virtue of the negroes. Do
you think the world does not understand
this? Do you think the people do not
understand why this is ? Do you think
you can delude the people with the idea
this is honest on our part ; that i it is fair
on our part, and that, it is what we really
mean ?
I tell gentlemen Wiley think so they are
mistaken. The people understand this
exactly. Do you believe the people want,
the mass of the Republican party want,
such allies as those in the South ? Do
you believe they want to rely upon the
aid they can get from negro suffrage in
the South to hold the balance of power in
this Republic? Go to Pennsylvania, go
to Illinois and ask them.
When Pennsylvania, with her hundred
thousand negroes, refuses them suffrage,
Wby is it? And if she refuses to allow
you to intermeddle With it, why is it ?
Do you pretend that you are improving
the suffrage, do you pretend that you are
making the institutions of the country
more secure when you insist upon this?
Who does so in the face of the civilized
world ? Are you bringing to the councils
of the country more wisdom, more inde
pendence, more virtue? Nobody pretends
it. Do you allow negroes to vote your
selves? You allow it partially in Ngw
York—a kind of emasculated suffrage
there ; you allow it partially in Massa
cbusetts ; absolutely nowhere ; and yet
you stand here and crack your whip over ,
the heads of the Southern States which
have millions ofnegroes in them, and you
say they must let theirs vote when you
will not let yours.
Mr. WILSON. They have the right of
voting, absolutely, in Massachusetts.
Mr. Coivmr. " Absolutely" if•they can
read the Constitution.
Mr. WILSON, The same as white men.
Mr. COWAN. Then it is not absolute
even for a white man. That is the
liber
alityof the reformers of the present 'age.
After all this talk-of. political power and
how it ought to be divided among men,
how every man great and small, wise and
foolish, should have his share of it, a poor
devil who cannot write has none at all in
Massachusetts. The honorable Senator
frotp Ohio ought to have been reminded
of that; ,
Mr.. AnnoNy. Colored men in our
State, vote on the same terms with white
people.
Mr. p r i F ,, * . Exactly. Yon put your
restraints net, only upon , negroes, but, pp
on whites ; but where itk the xestraint tO
be put-on the ir oPle:down South ? • Xtatt,
do not put any limitation there. , yop, do
not say to them, "if you let the literary
negroes vote you may have all represent
e I."
Mr. MORRILL. Suffrage is absolute in
my State—unlimited I may say.
• Mr. COWAN. I congratulate the honor
able Senator upon it; and now all I wish
is that he would go down to the Freed
men's Bureau—l believe the transporta
tion is free—and ship up a hundred thou
sand negroes to Maine ; I have no doubt
they would be well treated. Then these
philanthropic people would have an op
portunity to exercise their skill. They
would have an opportunity there to edu
cate them and develop them, and they
would see after a while exactly what
they could get out of them.
If that were done, I could understand
the philosophy of a movement like this.
I believe I should agree to almost any
new proposition if sufficient evidence was
given to me that the people who urged it
were honest in their designs, and had not
some covert advantage which they ex
pected lurking behind it. If Massachu
setts had as many negroes as South Car
olina, I could well understand her advo
cacy of this as being from the purest, mo
tives; but when I find her saying " You
take the possum and I will take the tur-
I key, or I will take the turkey and you
take the possum," I do not understand
that kind of talk to be fair.
And, Mi. President, I am opposed on
principle to meddling with this matter. I
am opposed to it on the ground that to
me it looks to be unjust, unfair, taking an
unfair advantage of people at an improp
er time.
Is this a time to amend the Constitu-
tion ? I ask honorable Senators if in their
opinion this is a time when the Constitu
tion can be amended well and properly,
because, as I understand it, if we are to
amend the Constitution, we must amend
it. in such a way as to be satisfactory to
the people everywhere; not merely to the
people of Massachusetts or Michigan, but
to the people of Georgia and Louisiana—
to the people of all the States. Does any
man want an amendment to theConstitu-
Lion forced through here under circum
stances of this kind, against people who
are unable to resist, against people whom
you will not hear, and in the face of a nu
merical majority in the country against
you ? Do you suppose that is going to
be beneficial ? I ask in all sober earnest
ness, is there anybody who supposes that
that will be for the benefit of the country?
Again, suppose you pass this amend
ment to the Constitution, and suppose
the southern States either for the pur
pose of getting themselves into line with
you or for the purpose of increasing their
political power under it, should admit the
negro to the franchise, will your children
and your homes, and your governments
be the more secure for that ? What is
the difficulty under which you labor to
day P Is it that you have not voters en
ough ? Is it that the food upon which
the demagogue fattens has grown scarce
and he has grown thin ? Or is it the re
verse P Is it not because demagoguism
is rife everywhere; and is not demagogu
ism rife just in proportion as you furnish
it the material upon which to work ?
Degrade your franchise, put it down in
the hands of men who have no intelli
gence, no virtue, and, what is worst of all,
no independence—put it into the hands
of men who have nothing to hope from it
except so far as they can use it for cor
rupt purposes, and shall we be safer, then,
I ask ? Do you suppose that the people
of the States in which there are negroes
will send you more intelligent, more learn
ed, more virtuous, and more independent
Senators and Representatives here if you
make this change than they would with
out ?
Mr. Wilson. They will send more loy
al men.
Cowan.Mr. '" Loyal." What is "loy
al ?" I ask Massachusetts what is "loy
al ?" What is the meaning of the word?
A fellow that votes with you 1 That is
like the chap defining " orthodox"—"or
thodox is the way I believe; heterodox Is
isithe way the other man believes." "Loy
al" means an abolitionist, I suppose. At
least I find that everybody who does not
happen to be an abolitionist or tarred
with that stick, is said to be disloyal.
Loyalty, Mr. President, is a very simple
word. Loyalty means obedience to the
laws. It means legality. Legalis meant
law as well sales meant it. When a man
alleges his loyalty to me, let me see his
reverence for the Constitution and the
laws. Show me a man who disregards
either; show me a man who does not be
lieve in the Constitution whit brought
this country to such a pitch of prosperity
for seventy five. years and made us so
great and so happy a people; show me a
man that lays sacrilegious hands upon
that instrument, especially when I know
that half the time he does not understand
it and that he.never read a commentary
upon it in his life; show me that man, and
I show you one who is-not •loyal. Show .
me a man ivho foratemporary advantage,
either for , himself or his party, would set,
a foot upon one of his country's laws,. and
ho is not, loyal. ' . •
It is time 'we were beginning . to udder
stand tho meaning of words
ni,tbis coun
try. It is time, now that the wai• is over,
when passion has sal:m*4l, and wium Fes
son ought to come and resume her
throne, that we ourselves should be rea-
I VOLUME XXIII, NUMBER 27.
sonable. Let ns look 'at this in the light
of the past; let us look at it calmly and
coolly as we survey it in bygone thou
sands of years, not. as it looks to the eye
blood shot with passion, red with a„ rage
that is hardly dying out. Let the lower .
stock indulge in passion if it is to be in 7,
dulged in; but here in this the highest fci-
rum of the nation; here where, if - any;
where, there should be justice and fair-'
ness, and that broad view river the whole
country which takes it all in arid whiCh
considers all the people as the people, vir
tuous, intelligent, independent enough to
govern the country; let us here be rea
sonatle, and especially let us know the
meaning of our words.
Mr. President, I have another objec
tion to this measure, and that is to that
section which imposes a punishment upon
people who have not been heard and who
have not been tried and who have not
been convicted according to law. if there
is one thing above every other thing ne
cessary to the maintenance of personal
liberty—l mean your liberty, my liberty,'
and the liberty of every man, great and
small, noble and ignoble—it is that no
man shall be condemned until he is heard.
Who could have dreamed that men edu
cated as we 'have been, impregnated as
we ought to be with the love of English
literature, English law, and English his
tory, could stand here for one moment
and sanction a proposition of this kind,
and particularly when we look back and
see the consequences which fell upon them
from their bills of attainder; and their bills
of attainder were—well, I was going to
say they were right compared to this,
but that is not the word; they were not
the one thousandth part as reprehensible
1 as this, because when they undertook to
1 inflict punishment through the medium of
I the Legislature, they took the criminal
and named him by name. ' they described
! him, so that be could be known; they did
I not attempt to throw a drag net over the .
I whole country and to sweep in thousands
of people and ostracize them, or punish
them, make them eternal enemies.
Mr. President, if I wanted to sow the
seeds of another rebellion, if I wanted to
plant that fatal upas in this country,
would do it by means of just such a clause
as that which deprives all men of the
right to hold office who ever took an oath
to support the Constitution of the United
States, and that without hearing them,
without inquiring how they engaged in
the rebellion, whether they were comman
ded in by a superior authority that they .
could not resist, whether they were forc
ed in by actual physical force, whether
they were deluded in, or how they got in.
What, sir, punish such people I have
no word that will convey my sense.of the
impropriety and impolicy, to say no worse,
of such a provision as that.
When I reflect upon the conduct of this
Government toward those men at the
very time it should have been on the
ground to rescue them, I am more and
more astonished at our own folly in utter
ing a word upon such a subject: They
owed allegiance to this Government. Did
it owe them nothing ? It, owed them
protection. Did it protect them ? What
did it do ? Many of the Senators within,
the sound of my voice know that on the
4th day of March, 1861,.when we came
here, the United States, the great protee
tor of the people, the sovereign authority
of the land, that to which they all looked,
and had a right to look, to preserve them
their freedom of opinion at least upon sub
jects of this kind—that Government waS'
that day ignominiously out of posseision
of seven States of the Union; had its feet
on but two points in those States,
lieve, Pickena and Sumner. 'nose' were'
the only two points in 'the . seven States'
that were held; and held how -2 'So far:
from being' able to protect the people,.
those places were scarcely able to protect
themselves, and Sumter certainly was, not.
Did we go to the rescue ? Did the
Government go add fulfill its part.of the
contract ? Did it give themproteCticin ?
History answers. No, sir,
they were al
lowed to be driven into that vortex of re
bellion, nobody to stand between them;
and the current that was sweeping every.,.
thing with it. They were in, and now t ,
because they were in and because•t,hey
were in on account of the neglect of, this.
Government to give them the , protection;.
they deserved, they urn to be punished.,
It is time we looked at it. - Why sluing ,
we not look at it ? Are we afraid to look
it in the face? Are we afraid too right?
Can we not now " be just and . fear not ?"
Mr. President, let me suppose a.case. •
An old man lives in the, South, and old
Whig if you please, struggling for the
last thirty years against secession,,fig.ht
ing it in all its Shapes from nullification
down, voting for Bell "aud Everett, if yon
please, in 1869, or voting for Mr. Douglas,. ,
because I suppose that, everybody admits
that those who thou voted for- those men
were not disuniOnists, were not secessiod-•
ists. ..•
That old man sits there Surrounded
his family and surrounded by , .
slaves that were born beside hinl;lliiltes'
,perhaps that his Own mother ntirtiO•when' ,
she nursed ;him; slaves' thtit 'l6vedr'
slavesthat he waslind to; and - illift.ei that
to day would go- to him - fort 'a • faimir-inr
haps far sooner than to . 11iiyliodr , else..
There he is, surrounded by - his' sons iital
his daughters. In December,: 1860, a '