LXXVII. THE BURNING OF COLUMBIA…

LXXVII. THE BURNING OF COLUMBIA

“It has pleased God,” says the writer in the “Daily Phœnix,” already quoted, “to visit our beautiful city with the most cruel fate which can ever befall states or cities. He has permitted an invading army to penetrate our country almost without impediment; to rob and ravage our dwellings, and to commit three fifths of our city to the flames. Eighty-four squares, out of one hundred and twenty-four which the city contains, have been destroyed, with scarcely the exception of a single house. The ancient capitol building of the State—that venerable structure, which, for seventy years, has echoed with the eloquence and wisdom of the most famous statesmen—is laid in ashes; six temples of the Most High God have shared the same fate; eleven banking establishments; the schools of learning, the shops of art and trade, of invention and manufacture; shrines equally of religion, benevolence, and industry; are all buried together, in one congregated ruin. Humiliation spreads her ashes over our homes and garments, and the universal wreck exhibits only one common aspect of despair.”

Columbia, the proud capital of the proudest State in the Union,—who ever supposed that she could be destined to such a fate? Who ever imagined that in this way that fine bird, secession, would come home to roost?

Almost until the last moment the people of South Carolina, relying upon the immense prestige of their little State sovereignty, even after the State was invaded, believed that the capital was safe. Already, during the war, thousands of citizens from Charleston and other places, in order to avoid the possibility of danger, had sought the retirement of its beautiful shady streets and supposed impregnable walls. The population of Columbia had thus increased, in two or three years, from fourteen thousand to thirty-seven thousand. Then Sherman appeared, driving clouds of fugitives before him into the city. Still the inhabitants cherished their delusion, until it was dispelled by the sound of the Federal cannon at their gates. The Confederate troops fell back into the city, followed by bursting shells.

Then commenced the usual scenes of panic. “Terrible was the press, the shock, the rush, the hurry, the universal confusion—such as might naturally be looked for, in the circumstances of a city from which thousands were preparing to fly, without previous preparations for flight, burdened with pale and trembling women, their children and portable chattels, trunks and jewels, family Bibles and the lares familiares. The railroad depot for Charlotte was crowded with anxious waiters upon the train, with a wilderness of luggage, millions, perhaps, in value, much of which was left finally and lost. Throughout Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, these scenes of struggle were in constant performance. The citizens fared badly. The Governments of the State and of the Confederacy absorbed all the modes of conveyance. Transportation about the city could not be had, save by a rich or favored few. No love could persuade where money failed to convince, and SELF, growing bloated in its dimensions, stared from every hurrying aspect, as you traversed the excited and crowded streets. In numerous instances, those who succeeded in getting away, did so at the cost of trunks and luggage; and, under what discomfort they departed, no one who did not see can readily conceive.”[19]

Numbers of the poorer classes took advantage of this confusion to plunder the city. On Friday morning, they broke into the South Carolina Railroad Depot, which was “crowded with the stores of merchants and planters, trunks of treasure, innumerable wares and goods of fugitives, all of great value. It appears that among its contents were some kegs of powder. The plunderers paid, and suddenly, the penalties of their crime. Using their lights freely and hurriedly, they fired a train of powder leading to the kegs.” A fearful explosion followed, destructive to property and life.[1]

Early on Friday the Confederate quartermaster and commissary stores were thrown open to the people. Old men, women, children, and negroes, loaded themselves with plunder. Wheeler’s cavalry rushed in for their share, and several troopers were seen riding off “with huge bales of cotton on their saddles.”[20]

The same day—Friday, February 17th—Sherman entered Columbia. To the anxious mayor he said: “Not a finger’s breadth of your city shall be harmed. You may lie down and sleep, satisfied that your town will be as safe in my hands as in your own.” That night Columbia was destroyed.

It is still a question, who is responsible for this calamity. General Sherman denies that he authorized it, and we are bound to believe him. But did he not permit it? or was it not in his power at least to have prevented it? General Howard is reported to have said to a clergyman of the place, that no orders were given to burn Columbia, but the soldiers had got the impression that its destruction would be acceptable at head-quarters. Were the soldiers correct in their impression?

A member of General Sherman’s staff speaks thus of the origin of the fire:—

“I am quite sure that it originated in sparks flying from the hundreds of bales of cotton which the Rebels had placed along the middle of the main street, and fired as they left the city. Fire from a tightly compressed bale of cotton is unlike that of a more open material, which burns itself out. The fire lies smouldering in a bale of cotton long after it appears to be extinguished; and in this instance, when our soldiers supposed they had extinguished the fire, it suddenly broke out again with the most disastrous effect.

“There were fires, however, which must have been started independent of the above-named cause. The source of these is ascribed to the desire for revenge from some two hundred of our prisoners, who had escaped from the cars as they were being conveyed from this city to Charlotte, and with the memories of long sufferings in the miserable pens I visited yesterday on the other side of the river, sought this means of retaliation. Again it is said that the soldiers who first entered the town, intoxicated with success and a liberal supply of bad liquor, which was freely distributed among them by designing citizens, in an insanity of exhilaration set fire to unoccupied houses.”[21]

It is also probable that fires were set by citizen marauders. But is this the whole truth with regard to the burning of Columbia?

I visited the place nearly a year after its great disaster, when the passions of men had had time to cool a little. Through the courtesy of Governor Orr I made acquaintance with prominent and responsible citizens. To these gentlemen—especially to Mr. J. G. Gibbes, the present mayor of the city—I am indebted for the following statements and anecdotes.

Early in the evening, as the inhabitants, quieted by General Sherman’s assurance, were about retiring to their beds, a rocket went up in the lower part of the city. Another in the centre, and a third in the upper part of the town, succeeded. Dr. R. W. Gibbes, father of the present mayor, was in the street talking, near one of the Federal guards, who exclaimed, on seeing the signals, “My God! I pity your city!” Mr. Goodwyn, who was mayor at the time, reports a similar remark from an Iowa soldier. “Your city is doomed! These rockets are the signal!” Immediately afterwards fires broke out in twenty different places.

The dwellings of Secretary Trenholm and General Wade Hampton were among the first to burst into flames. Soldiers went from house to house, spreading the conflagration. Fireballs, composed of cotton saturated with turpentine, were thrown in at doors and windows. Many houses were entered, and fired by means of combustible liquids poured upon beds and clothing, and ignited by wads of burning cotton, or matches from a soldier’s pocket. The fire department came out in force, but the hose-pipes were cut to pieces and the men driven from the streets. At the same time universal plundering and robbery began.

The burning of the house of Dr. R. W. Gibbes,—an eminent physician, well-known to the scientific world,—was thus described to me by his son:—

“He had a guard at the front door; but some soldiers climbed in at the rear of the house, got into the parlor, heaped together sheets, poured turpentine over them, piled chairs on them, and set them on fire. As he remonstrated with them, they laughed at him. The guard at the front door could do nothing, for if he left his post, other soldiers would come in that way.

“The guard had a disabled foot, and my father had dressed it for him. He appeared very grateful for the favor, and earnestly advised my father to save his valuables. The house was full of costly paintings, and curiosities of art and natural history, and my father did not know what to save and what to leave behind. He finally tied up in a bedquilt a quantity of silver and gems. As he was going out of the door,—the house was already on fire behind him,—the guard said, ‘Is that all you can save?’ ‘It is all I can well carry,’ said my father. ‘Leave that with me,’ said the guard; ‘I will take charge of it, while you go back and get another bundle.’ My father thought he was very kind. He went back for another bundle, and while he was gone, the guard ran off with his lame leg and all the gems and silver.”

One of Mr. Gibbes’s neighbors, a widow lady, had an equally conscientious guard. He said to her, “I can guard the front of the house, but not the rear; and if you have anything valuable buried you had better look after it.” She threw up her hands and exclaimed, “O, my silver and my fine old wine, buried under that peach-tree!” The guard immediately called a squad of men, and told them to respect the widow lady’s wine and silver, buried under that peach-tree. He went with them, and they dug a little to see if the treasures were safe. Finding the wine, they tasted it to see if it merited the epithet “fine old.” Discovering that it did, they showed their approbation of her good sense and truthfulness by drinking it up. They then carried off the silver.

The soldiers, in their march through Georgia, and thus far into South Carolina, had acquired a wonderful skill in finding treasures. They had two kinds of “divining-rods,” negroes, and bayonets. What the unfaithful servants of the rich failed to reveal, the other instruments, by thorough and constant practice, were generally able to discover. On the night of the fire, a thousand men could be seen, in the yards and gardens of Columbia, by the glare of the flames, probing the earth with bayonets. “Not one twentieth part of the articles buried in this city escaped them,” Mr. Gibbes assured me.

The fire was seen at immense distances. A gentleman living eighty-five miles north of Columbia, told me he could see to read in his garden that night by the light it gave.

The dismay and terror of the inhabitants can scarcely be conceived. They had two enemies, the fire in their houses and the soldiery without. Many who attempted to bear away portions of their goods were robbed by the way. Trunks and bundles were snatched from the hands of hurrying fugitives, broken open, rifled, and then hurled into the flames. Ornaments were plucked from the necks and arms of ladies, and caskets from their hands. Even children and negroes were robbed.

Fortunately the streets of Columbia were broad, else many of the fugitives must have perished in the flames which met them on all sides. The exodus of homeless families, flying between walls of fire, was a terrible and piteous spectacle. I have already described a similar scene in a Reminiscence of Chambersburg, and shall not dwell upon this. The fact that these were the wives and children and flaming homes of our enemies, does not lessen the feeling of sympathy for the sufferers. Some fled to the parks; others to the open ground without the city; numbers sought refuge in the graveyards. Isolated and unburned dwellings were crowded to excess with fugitives. “On Saturday morning,” said Mayor Gibbes, “there were two hundred women and children in this house.”

Three fifths of the city in bulk, and four fifths in value, were destroyed. The loss of property is estimated at thirty millions. No more respect seems to have been shown for buildings commonly deemed sacred, than for any others. The churches were pillaged, and afterwards burned. St. Mary’s College, a Catholic institution, shared their fate. The Catholic Convent, to which had been confided for safety many young ladies, not nuns, and stores of treasure, was ruthlessly sacked. The soldiers drank the sacramental wine, and profaned with fiery draughts of vulgar whiskey the goblets of the communion service. Some went off reeling under the weight of priestly robes, holy vessels, and candlesticks.

Not even the Masonic and Odd Fellow lodges were spared. Afterwards tipsy soldiers were seen about the streets dressed up in the regalias of these orders. The sword of state, belonging to the Grand Lodge of South Carolina, a massy, curious, two-edged weapon, of considerable antiquity, was among the objects stolen.

The buildings and library of South Carolina College were saved.

Not much drunkenness was observed among the soldiers until after the sacking of the city had been some time in progress. Then the stores of liquors consumed exhibited their natural effect; and it is stated that many perished in fires of their own kindling.

Yet the army of Sherman did not, in its wildest orgies, forget its splendid discipline. “When will these horrors cease?” asked a lady of an officer at her house. “You will hear the bugles at sunrise,” he replied; “then they will cease, and not till then.” He prophesied truly. “At daybreak, on Saturday morning,” said Mayor Gibbes, “I saw two men galloping through the streets, blowing horns. Not a dwelling was fired after that; immediately the town became quiet.”

Robberies, however, did not cease with the night. Watches and money continued to be in demand. A soldier would ask a citizen the time. If the latter was so imprudent as to produce his watch, it was instantly snatched. “A very pretty watch that; I’ll take it, if you please,” was the usual remark accompanying the act.

One old gentleman who had purchased two watches for his grandchildren, lost one in this way. In his rage and grief he exclaimed, “You may as well take the other!” And his suggestion was cheerfully complied with.

Another sufferer said, “That watch will be good for nothing without the key. Won’t you stop and take it?” “Thank you,” said the soldier; and he went off, proudly winding his new chronometer.

A few saved their watches by the use of a little artifice. “What’s the time?” cried a soldier, stopping a ready-witted gentleman. “You’re too late; I was just asked that question,” was the opportune reply. Another looked up where the city hall clock stood until brought down by the fire, and replied to the question of time, “The clock has been burned, you see.”

The women of Columbia have the credit of exhibiting great courage and presence of mind, under these trying circumstances. Occasionally, however, they were taken by surprise. I have related how one lady lost her silver and fine old wine. Another was suddenly accosted by a soldier who thrust his revolver under her bonnet: “Your money! your watch!” “O, my soul!” she exclaimed, “I have no watch, no money, except what’s tied ’round my waist!” “I’ll relieve you of that,” said the soldier, ripping up her stays with his knife.

The soldiers were full of cheerful remarks about the fire. “What curious people you are!” said one, looking at the ruins. “You run up your chimneys before you build your houses.”

Although some of the guards were faithless, others—and I hope a majority of them—executed their trust with fidelity.

Some curious incidents occurred. One man’s treasure, concealed by his garden fence, escaped the soldiers’ divining-rods, but was afterwards discovered by a hitched horse pawing the earth from the buried box. Some hidden guns had defied the most diligent search, until a chicken, chased by a soldier, ran into a hole beneath a house. The soldier, crawling after, and putting in his hand for the chicken, found the guns.

A soldier, passing in the streets, and seeing some children playing with a beautiful little greyhound, amused himself by beating its brains out. Another soldier with a kinder heart, to comfort them, told them not to cry, and proposed to have a funeral over the remains of their little favorite. He put it in a box, and went to bury it in the garden, directly on the spot where the family treasures were concealed. The proprietor, in great distress of mind, watched the proceedings, fearful of exciting suspicion if he opposed it, and trembling lest each thrust of the spade should reveal the secret. A corner of the box was actually laid bare, when, kicking some dirt over it, he said, “There, that will do, children!” and hastened the burial. The soldier no doubt thought he betrayed a good deal of emotion at the grave of a lap-dog. The hole was filled up, but the danger was not yet over, for there was a chance that the next soldier who came that way might be attracted by the fresh-looking earth, and go to digging.

Some treasures were buried in cemeteries, but they did not always escape the search of the soldiers, who showed a strong mistrust of new-made graves.

It is curious to consider what has become of all the jewels and finery of which our armies robbed the people of the South. On two or three occasions gentlemen of respectability have shown me, with considerably more pride than I could have felt under the circumstances, vases and trinkets which they “picked up when they were in the army.” Some of these curiosities have been heard from by their rightful owners. A ring, worn by a lady of Philadelphia, was last summer recognized by a Southern gentleman, who remarked that he thought he had seen it before. “Very possibly,” was the reply; “it was given me by Captain ——, of General Sherman’s staff; and it was presented to him by a lady of Columbia for his efforts in saving her property.” But the lady of Columbia, who knew nothing of any such efforts in her behalf, avers that the gallant captain stole the ring.[22]

Mrs. Minegault, daughter of the late Judge Huger, of Charleston,—the same gentleman who was associated with Dr. Bollmann in the attempted rescue of Lafayette from the dungeons of Olmütz,—while on a visit to New York last summer, was one Sunday morning kneeling in Grace Church, when she saw upon the fair shoulders of a lady kneeling before her, a shawl which had been lost when her plantation, between Charleston and Savannah, was plundered by the Federals. Her attention being thus singularly attracted, she next observed on the lady’s arm a bracelet which was taken from her at the same time. This was to her a very precious souvenir, for it had been presented to her by her father, and it contained his picture. The services ended, she followed the lady home, and rang at the door immediately after she had entered. Asking to see the lady of the house, she was shown into the parlor, and presently the lady appeared, with the shawl upon her shoulders and the bracelet on her arm. Frankly the visitor related the story of the bracelet, and at once the wearer restored it to her with ample apologies and regrets. The visitor, quite overcome by this generosity, and delighted beyond measure at the recovery of the bracelet, had not the heart to say a word about the shawl, but left it in the possession of the innocent wearer.

I talked with some good Columbians who expressed the most violent hatred of the Yankees, for the ruin of their homes. Others took a more philosophical view of the subject. This difference was thus explained to me by Governor Orr’s private secretary, an intelligent young man, who had been an officer in the Confederate service:—

“People who were not in the war cannot understand or forgive these things. But those who have been in the army know what armies are; they know that, under the same circumstances, they would have done the same things.”[23]

I also observed that those whose losses were greatest were seldom those who complained most. Mayor Gibbes lost more cotton than any other individual in the Confederacy. Sherman burned for him two thousand and seven hundred bales, besides mills and other property. Yet he spoke of these results of the war without a murmur.

He censured Sherman severely, however, for the destitution in which he left the people of Columbia. “I called on him to relieve the starving inhabitants he had burned out of their homes. He gave us four hundred head of refuse cattle, but he gave us nothing to feed them, and a hundred and sixty of them died of starvation before they could be killed. For five weeks afterwards, twenty-five hundred people around Columbia lived upon nothing but loose grain picked up about the camps, where the Federal horses had been fed. A stranger,” he added, “cannot be made to understand the continued destitution and poverty of the people of this district. If a tax should now be assessed upon them of three dollars per head, there would not be money enough in the district to pay it. Ordinarily, our annual taxes in this city have been forty thousand dollars. This year they have dropped down to eighteen hundred dollars.”

South Carolina College is a striking illustration of the effect the war has had upon the institutions of learning at the South. Formerly it had about two hundred and fifty students; it has now but eighteen. The State appropriated annually sixty-five thousand dollars for its benefit; this year a nominal appropriation of eight thousand dollars was made, to pay the salaries of the professors, but when I was in Columbia they had not been able to get that. One, a gentleman of distinguished learning, said he had not had ten dollars in his possession since Sherman visited them.

Of the desolation and horrors our army left behind it, no description can be given. Here is a single instance. At a factory on the Congaree, just out of Columbia, there remained, for six weeks, a pile of sixty-five dead horses and mules, shot by Sherman’s men. It was impossible to bury them, all the shovels, spades, and other farming implements of the kind having been carried off or destroyed.

Columbia must have been a beautiful city, judged by its ruins. The streets were broad and well shaded. Many fine residences still remain on the outskirts, but the entire heart of the city, within their circuit, is a wilderness of crumbling walls, naked chimneys, and trees killed by the flames. The fountains of the desolated gardens are dry, the basins cracked; the pillars of the houses are dismantled, or overthrown; the marble steps are broken; but all these attest the wealth and elegance which one night of fire and orgies sufficed to destroy. Fortunately the unfinished new State House, one of the handsomest public edifices in the whole country, received but trifling injury.

Not much was doing to rebuild any but the business portion of the city. Only on Main Street were there many stores or shanties going up.

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Footnote 19:

Daily Phœnix.

Footnote 20:

Daily Phœnix.

Footnote 21:

Nichols’s Story of the Great March.

Footnote 22:

An officer taking his punch (they drink punch in the army when the coffee ration is exhausted) from an elegantly-chased silver cup, was saluted thus:—

“Halloa, captain, that’s a gem of a cup. No mark on it; why, where did you get it?”

“Ye-e-s! that cup? Oh, that was given me by a lady in Columbia for saving her households gods from destruction.”

An enterprising officer in charge of a foraging party would return to camp with a substantial family coach, well filled with hams, meal, etc.

How are you, captain? Where did you pick up that carriage?”

“Elegant vehicle, isn’t it?” was the reply; “that was a gift from a lady out here whose mansion was in flames. Arrived at the nick of time—good thing—she said she didn’t need the carriage any longer—answer for an ambulance one of these days.”

After a while this joke came to be repeated so often that it was dangerous for any one to exhibit a gold watch, a tobacco-box, any uncommon utensil of kitchen ware, a new pipe, a guard-chain, or a ring, without being asked if “a lady at Columbia had presented that article to him for saving her house from burning.”—Story of the Great March.

Footnote 23:

“The grass will grow in the Northern cities, where the pavements have been worn off by the tread of commerce. We will carry war where it is easy to advance—where food for the sword and torch await our armies in the densely populated cities; and though they (the enemy) may come and spoil our crops, we can raise them as before, while they cannot rear the cities which took years of industry and millions of money to build.”—Jeff Davis in 1861—Speech at Stevenson, Ala.

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LXXVIII. NOTES ON SOUTH CAROLINA

At a distance from the Sea Islands, the free-labor system in South Carolina, was fast settling down upon a satisfactory basis. General Richardson, commanding the Eastern District of the State,—comprising all the districts east of the Wateree and Santee, except Georgetown and Horry, on the coast,—assured me that there was going to be more cotton raised in those districts this year than ever before.

In the districts west of the Wateree, the soil is not so well adapted to cotton, and the country abounds in ignorant small planters and poor whites. A planter of the average class, in York District, said to me: “The people of this country formerly lived on nigger-raising. That was the crop we depended on. If we could raise corn and pork enough to feed the niggers, we did well. Now this great staple is tuk from us.”

The planters here love to dwell upon the advantages they derived from that crop. One said to me; “Let a young man take three likely gals, set ’em to breedin’ right away, and he mought make a fortune out on ’em, ’fore he was old. But them times is past.”

The winds of freedom had scarcely reached the more remote western districts. A planter of Union District told me that he was hiring good men for twenty-five dollars a year. “Heap on ’em, round here, just works for their victuals and clothes, like they always did. I reckon they’ll all be back whar they was, in a few years.”

The South Carolina lands and modes of culture are not well adapted to corn. A rotation of crops is deemed necessary to keep the soil in a condition to raise it successfully. The decay of cotton seed and waste cotton is its best fertilizer. During the war, when little cotton was raised, planters became alarmed at the yearly decrease of the corn crop. The average yield, throughout the State, the first year, was fifteen bushels to the acre; the second, twelve bushels; the third, nine bushels; and the fourth, six bushels.

Before the war, the city of Charleston exported annually one hundred and twenty-five thousand tierces of rice. This year, it is importing rice of an inferior quality from the West Indies. This fact indicates the condition of that culture. Yet in the face of it, rice-planters were raising the price of their lands from fifty dollars an acre, for which they could be bought before the war, to one hundred dollars.

As the rice plantations are confined to the tide-water region, where the fields can be flooded after sowing, their present prospects were more or less embarrassed by the knotty Sea-Island question. “If our people this year make one sixth of an average rice-crop,” said Governor Orr, “they will be fortunate, and they will be doing well. In old times, our annual crop brought upwards of three and a half million dollars, when rice was only five cents a pound.”

The railroads of South Carolina were nearly worn out during the war. All sorts of iron were used to keep them in repair; and the old rolling-stock was kept running until it was ready to fall to pieces. Then Sherman came. The South Carolina Road, wealthy before the war, was relaying its torn-up track and rebuilding its extensive trestle-work and bridges, as fast as its earnings would permit. The branch to Columbia was once more in operation; but, on the main road to Augusta, travel was eked out by a night of terribly rough staging.

The finances of South Carolina were at a low ebb. Governor Orr told me that there had not been a dollar in the State treasury since his inauguration. The current expenses of the war were mostly met by taxation; and the annual interest on the foreign debt of two and a half millions had been promptly paid, up to July, 1865, by the exportation of cotton. The State bank was obliged to suspend its operations, but the faith of the State was pledged for the redemption of the bills. The other banks had been ruined by loans made to the Confederate government. Their stock had been considered the safest in the market, and the property of widows and orphans was largely invested in it. The estates of the stockholders, liable for double the amount of the bills issued, were insufficient to redeem them. In January, 1866, two National Banks had been organized in the State.

The aggregate of debts, old and new, in South Carolina, were estimated to be worth not more than twenty-five per cent. of their par value.

South Carolina had suffered more than any other State by the Sale of lands for United States taxes, during the war. I heard of one estate, worth fifteen thousand dollars, which had been sold for three hundred dollars. Governor Orr instanced another, the market value of which was twenty-four thousand dollars, which was bought in by the government for eighty dollars. Such was the fate of abandoned coast lands held by the United States forces. Their owners, absent in the interior, were in most instances ignorant even of the proceedings by which their estates were sacrificed. In this way, according to the governor, “the entire parish of St. Helena, and a portion of St. Luke’s, have completely changed hands, and passed either into the possession of the government, or of third parties.”

The prevalence of crime in remote districts was alarming. I was assured by General Sickles that the perpetrators were in most cases outlaws from other States, to which they dared not return. Union soldiers and negroes were their favorite victims. They rode in armed bands through the country, defying the military authorities. The people would not inform against them for fear of their vengeance. Many robberies and murders of soldiers and freedmen, however, were unmistakably committed by citizens.

Much ill-feeling had been kept alive by United States treasury agents, searching the country for Confederate cotton and branded mules and horses. Many of these agents, as far as I could learn, both in this and in other States, were mere rogues and fortune-hunters. They would propose to seize a man’s property in the name of the United States, but abandon the claim on the payment of heavy bribes, which of course went into their own pockets. Sometimes, having seized “C. S. A.” cotton, they would have the marks on the bales changed, get some man to claim it, and divide with him the profits. Such practices had a pernicious effect, engendering a contempt for the government, and a murderous ill-will which too commonly vented itself upon soldiers and negroes.

I found in South Carolina a more virulent animosity existing in the minds of the common people, against the government and people of the North, than in any other State I visited. Only in South Carolina was I treated with gross personal insults on account of my Northern origin.

There is notwithstanding in this State a class of men whom I remember with admiration for their courteous hospitality and liberal views. Instead of insulting and repelling Northern men, they invite them, and seem eager to learn of them the secret of Northern enterprise and prosperity. Their ideas, although not those of New-England radicals, are hopeful and progressive. Considering that they have advanced from the Southern side of the national question, their position is notable and praiseworthy. This class is small, but it possesses a vital energy of which great results may be predicted. From it the freedmen have much to hope and little to fear. It is not so far in advance of the people that it cannot lead them; nor so far behind the most advanced sentiment of the times that we may not expect them soon to come up to it.

Foremost among this class is Governor Orr,—almost the only man in South Carolina who seemed to me prepared to consider dispassionately the subject of universal suffrage. The color of the negro’s skin, he said, was no good reason for keeping the ballot out of his hand. “In this country, suffrage is progressive; and when the colored people are prepared for it, they will have it.” A large proportion of the freedmen, he felt sure, would become industrious and respectable citizens. As an instance of the capacity and fidelity shown by many of their race, he gave an account of one of his own slaves.

“He is by trade a carpenter, and a first-class workman. He was the son of his original owner, who emancipated him by his will, and gave him, with his liberty, a mule, a saddle, a set of tools, and some money. One of the heirs of the estate was the executor of the will. Finding Henry a very valuable man, he looked for some legal flaw by which the will could be broken. There was a law of South Carolina designed to prevent slave-owners from emancipating old worn-out servants, and thus converting them into public paupers. It required the master, before freeing his servant, to make a certain statement, under oath, that the said servant was capable of self-support. This formality had been neglected in Henry’s case; and the court decided that he must remain a slave. When the fact was made known to him, he said to the executor, ‘If the court has so decided, I suppose I must abide by the decision. It is unjust, but I submit to it. But I will never serve you. I have lost all confidence in you, and all respect for you; and the best thing you can do is to sell me.’ The executor was so impressed by this declaration, that he told him to go and choose his future master. He came to me, and entreated me to buy him. I finally consented to do so, and paid his price,—fifteen hundred dollars.

“He lived as my slave until the close of the war; and all the time his patience under his great wrong was wonderful. He never complained; and he served me with the most conscientious fidelity. By overwork, he earned two hundred dollars a year, which he spent upon his family. I had bought him a set of tools worth five hundred dollars, and scientific books worth one hundred, which I gave him when we parted. He has wit and education enough to understand the books, I assure you. He is now doing business in Columbia. He might become wealthy, but he is too generous. He will not spend his earnings foolishly, but he will share whatever he has with his people. If I was in want, he would give me his last dollar.”

There were in January fifty freedmen’s schools in operation in South Carolina, with one hundred and twenty teachers, and ten thousand pupils. The New-England Freedmen’s Aid, and the National Freedmen’s Association, had each about fifty teachers in the field. The Boston teachers in Charleston get forty-five dollars a month, and pay their own expenses. At other points, where expenses are less, they get thirty-five dollars. The average yearly cost of each teacher to the associations is six hundred dollars.

The American Missionary Association, the Pennsylvania Freedmen’s Relief, and the Friends’ Freedmen’s Association, had also teachers in the field.

The State superintendent of freedmen’s schools spoke in high praise of the school in the Normal school building, at Charleston. The principal was a colored man who had been educated at his own expense at the University of Glasgow. Another teacher was a colored girl, who had taught a free colored school in Charleston during the war,—paying half her income to a white woman for sitting and sewing in the school-room, and appearing as the teacher, when it was visited by the police.

“This woman’s pupils,” said Mr. Tomlinson, “draw maps, and do everything white girls of twelve and sixteen years do, in ordinary advanced schools.” General Richardson of the Eastern District, had set a number of old soldiers, unfit for military duty, to teaching the freedmen.

There was not much active opposition shown to the schools in the State, nor yet much encouragement. Only here and there an enlightened planter saw the necessity of education for the negroes, and favored it.

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LXXIX. THE RIDE TO WINNSBORO’

For a distance of thirty miles north of Columbia, I had an interesting experience of staging over that portion of the Charlotte and South Carolina Railroad destroyed by Sherman. Much of the way the stage route ran beside or near the track. Gangs of laborers were engaged in putting down new ties and rails, but most of the old iron lay where our boys left it.

It was the Seventeenth Corps that did this little job, and it did it well. It was curious to note the different styles of the destroying parties. The point where one detail appeared to have left off and another to have begun was generally unmistakable. For a mile or two you would see nothing but hair-pins, and bars wound around telegraph posts and trees. Then you would have corkscrews and twists for about the same distance. Then came a party that gave each heated rail one sharp wrench in the middle, and left it perhaps nearly straight, but facing both ways. Here was a plain business method, and there a fantastic style, which showed that its authors took a wild delight in their work.

Early in the morning I rode with the driver, in the hope of learning something of him with regard to the country. But he proved to be a refugee from East Tennessee, where he said a rope-noose was waiting for him. An active Rebel, he had been guilty of some offences which the Union men there could not forgive.

Finding him as ignorant of the country as myself, I got down, and took a seat inside the coach. Within, an animated political discussion was at its height. Two South Carolinians and a planter from Arkansas were dissecting the Yankees in liveliest fashion; while a bitter South Carolina lady and a good-natured Virginian occasionally put in a word.

It was some time before I was recognized as a representative of all that was mean and criminal in the world. At length something I said seemed to excite suspicion; and the Arkansan wrote something on a card, which was passed to every one of the company except me. An alarming hush of several minutes ensued. It was as if a skeleton had appeared at a banquet. The abuse of the Yankees was the banquet; and I was perfectly well aware that I was the skeleton. At last the awful silence was broken by the Arkansan.

“What is thought of negro suffrage at the North?”

The question was addressed to me. I replied that opinion was divided on that subject; but that many people believed some such security was necessary for the freedmen’s rights. “They do not think it quite safe,” I said, “to leave him without any voice in making the laws by which he is to be governed,—subject entirely to the legislation of a class that cannot forget that he was born a slave.”

“I believe,” said one of the South Carolinians, “all that is owing to the lies of the newspaper correspondents travelling through the South, and writing home whatever they think will injure us. I wish every one of ’em was killed off. If it wasn’t for them, we should be left to attend to our own business, instead of being ridden to death by our Yankee masters. It isn’t fair to take solitary instances reported by them, as representing the condition of the niggers and the disposition of the whites. Some impudent darkey, who deserves it, gets a knock on the head, or a white man speaks his mind rather too freely to some Yankee who has purposely provoked him, and a long newspaper story is made out of it, showing that every nigger in the South is in danger of being killed, and every white man is disloyal.”

“Certainly,” I said, “isolated cases do not represent a whole people. But the acts of a legislative body may be supposed to represent the spirit and wishes of its constituents. We consider the negro code enacted by your special legislature simply abominable. It is enough of itself to show that you are not quite ready to do the freedmen justice. Your present governor appears to be of the same opinion, judged by his veto of the act to amend the patrol laws, and his excellent advice to your representatives who passed it. You are wholly mistaken, my friend, in supposing that the people of the North wish anything of you that is unnecessary, unreasonable, or unjust. They may be mistaken with regard to what is necessary, but they are honest in their intentions.”

“All we want,” said the South Carolinian, “is that our Yankee rulers should give us the same privileges with regard to the control of labor which they themselves have.”

“Very well; what privileges have they which you have not?”

“In Massachusetts, a laborer is obliged by law to make a contract for a year. If he leaves his employer without his consent, or before the term of his contract expires, he can be put in jail. And if another man hires him, he can be fined. It is not lawful there to hire a laborer who does not bring a certificate from his last employer. All we want is the same or a similar code of laws here.”

“My dear sir,” said I, “all any man could wish is that you might have just such laws here as they have in Massachusetts. But with regard to the code you speak of, it does not exist there, and it does not exist in any Northern State with which I am acquainted. There is nothing like it anywhere.”

“How do you manage without such laws? How can you get work out of a man unless you compel him in some way?”

“Natural laws compel him; we need no others. A man must work if he would eat. A faithful laborer is soon discovered, and he commands the best wages. An idle fellow is detected quite as soon; and if he will not do the work he has agreed to do, he is discharged. Thus the system regulates itself.”

“You can’t do that way with niggers.”

“Have you ever tried? Have you ever called your freedmen together and explained to them their new condition? A planter I saw in Alabama told me how he managed this thing. He said to his people, ‘If you do well, I shall want you another year. The man who does best will be worth the most to me. But if you are lazy and unfaithful, I shall dismiss you when your contracts are ended, and hire better men. Do you know why some overseers are always wandering about in search of a situation?’ ‘Because nobody wants ’em,’ said the negroes. ‘Why not?’ ‘Because they a’n’t good for their business.’ ‘Why did I keep John Bird only one year?’ ‘Because, soon as your back was turned, he slipped off to a grocery, or went a-fishing.’ ‘And why did I keep William Hooker eight years, and increase his salary every year?’ ‘Because he stuck by and always looked after your interest.’ ‘Now,’ said the planter, ‘you are in the condition of these overseers. You can always have good situations, and your prospects will be continually improving, if you do well. Or you may soon be going about the country with bundles on your backs, miserable low-down niggers that nobody will hire.’ In this way he instructed and encouraged the freedmen; and he assured me they were working better than ever. But by your serf-codes you would crush all hope and manhood out of them.”

“Well, there may be something in all that. I can’t say, for I never thought of trying but one way with a nigger. But nigger suffrage the South a’n’t going to stand anyhow. We’ve already got a class of voters that’s enough to corrupt the politics of any country. I used to think the nigger was the meanest of God’s creatures. But I’ve found a meaner brute than he; and that’s the low-down white man. If a respectable man hires a nigger for wages, one of those low-down cusses will offer him twice as much, to get him away. They want him to prowl for them. A heap of these no-account whites are getting rich, stealing cotton; they’re too lazy or cowardly to do it themselves, so they get the niggers to do it for ’em. These very men hold the balance of political power in this district. They’ll vote for the man who gives ’em the most whiskey. Just before the war, at an election in Columbia, over a hundred sand-hillers sold their votes beforehand, and were put into jail till the polls opened, and then marched out to vote.”

“By what right were they put in jail?”

“It was in the bargain. They knew they couldn’t be trusted not to sell their votes to the next man that offered more whiskey, and they like going to jail well enough, if they can go drunk. Make the niggers voters, and you’ll have just such another class to be bought up with whiskey.”

“It seems to me more reasonable,” I replied, “to suppose that the franchise will elevate the negro; and by elevating him you will elevate the white man who has been degraded by the negro’s degradation. Some of both races will no doubt be found willing to sell their votes, as well as their souls, for whiskey; but that is no more a reason why all blacks should be deprived of the right of suffrage, than that all whites should be.”

This is a specimen of the talk that was kept up during the day.

We stopped to dine at a house, where I was told by a young lady that the Yankees were the greatest set of rogues, and that some passed there every day.

“Is it possible!” I said. “Are you not afraid of them?”

“I have nothing whatever to do with them. I should be ashamed to be seen talking with one.”

“Then be careful that no one sees you now.”

“You are not a Yankee!” she exclaimed.

“Yes,” said I, “I am one of that set of rogues.”

“I am very sorry to hear it, for I had formed a more favorable opinion of you.”

Only the good-natured Virginian went in with me to the dining-room. The lady of the house, sitting at the table with us, soon began to talk about the Yankees. “They often dine here,” she said. “But I have nothing to say to them. As soon as I know who they are, I go out of the room.” She was very sociable; and when I informed her at parting that she had been entertaining a Yankee, she appeared confused and incredulous.

Such was the spirit commonly shown by the middle class of South Carolinians. But I remember some marked exceptions. Late in the afternoon we stopped at a place which a sturdy old farmer said was Ridgeway before Sherman came there: “I don’t know what you’d call it now.”

“If the devil don’t get old Sherman,” said one of my travelling companions, “there a’n’t no use having a devil.”

“We did it ourselves,” said the farmer. “We druv the nail and the Yankees clinched it.”

In the coach, the South Carolinians had just been denying that any outrages were committed on the freedmen in that part of the country. So I asked this man if he had heard of any such.

“Heard of ’em? I hear of ’em every day. I’m going to Columbia to-night to attend the trial of one of my neighbors for shooting a negro woman.”

“You must expect such things to happen when the niggers are impudent,” observed one of my companions.

“The niggers a’n’t to blame,” said the farmer. “They’re never impudent, unless they’re trifled with or imposed on. Only two days ago a nigger was walking along this road, as peaceably as any man you ever saw. He met a white man right here, who asked him who he belonged to. ‘I don’t belong to anybody now,’ he says; ‘I’m a free man.’ ‘Sass me? you black devil!’ says the white fellow; and he pitched into him, and cut him in four or five places with his knife. I heard and saw the whole of it, and I say the nigger was respectful, and that the white fellow was the only one to blame.”

“What became of the negro?”

“I don’t know; he went off to some of his people.”

“And what was done with the white man?”

“Nothing. There’s nobody to do anything in such cases, unless the nigger goes all the way to the Freedmen’s Bureau and makes a complaint. Then there’s little chance of getting the fellow that cut him.”

Three miles further on, we reached a point to which the railroad had been repaired, and took the cars for Winnsboro’. While we were waiting by moonlight in the shelterless and stumpy camping-ground which served as a station, one of my South Carolina friends said to me: “We may as well tell the whole truth as half. The Yankees treated us mighty badly: but a heap of our own people followed in their track and robbed on their credit.”

On the train I found a hotel-keeper from Winnsboro’ drumming for customers. He was abusing the Yankees with great violence and passion until he found that I was one. After that he kept remarkably quiet, and even apologized to me for his remarks, until I told him I had concluded to go to the house of a rival runner. Thereupon he broke forth again.

“They’ve left me one inestimable privilege—to hate ’em. I git up at half-past four in the morning, and sit up till twelve at night, to hate ’em. Talk about Union! They had no object in coming down here, but just to steal. I’m like a whipped cur; I have to cave in; but that don’t say I shall love ’em. I owned my own house, my own servants, my own garden, and in one night they reduced me to poverty. My house was near the State House in Columbia. It was occupied by Howard’s head-quarters. When they left, they just poured camphene over the beds, set ’em afire, locked up the house, and threw away the key. That was after the burning of the town, and that’s what made it so hard. Some one had told ’em I was one of the worst Rebels in the world, and that’s the only truth I reckon, that was told. I brought up seven boys, and what they hadn’t killed was fighting against ’em then. Now I have to keep a boarding-house in Winnsboro’ to support my wife and children.”

At Winnsboro’ I passed the night. A portion of that town also had been destroyed; and there too Sherman’s “bummers” were said to have behaved very naughtily. For instance: “When the Episcopal church was burning, they took out the melodeon, and played the devil’s tunes on it till the house was well burned down: then they threw on the melodeon.”

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LXXX. A GLIMPSE OF THE OLD NORTH STATE

The next day I entered North Carolina.

Almost immediately on crossing the State line, a change of scene was perceptible. The natural features of the country improved; the appearance of its farms improved still more. North Carolina farmers use manures, and work with their own hands. They treat the soil more generously than their South Carolina neighbors, and it repays them.

That night I passed at the house of a Connecticut man, in a country village,—a warm and comfortable New-England home transported to a southern community,—and went on the next day to Raleigh.

At Raleigh I found the Legislature,—composed mostly of a respectable and worthy-looking yeomanry—battling over the question of negro testimony in the civil courts; spending day after day in the discussion of a subject which could be settled in only one way, and which ought to have been settled at once. One member remarked outside: “I’ll never vote for that bill unless driven to it by the bayonet.” Another said: “I’m opposed to giving niggers any privileges.” These men represent a large class of North Carolina farmers; but fortunately there is another class of more progressive and liberal ideas, which are sure at last to prevail.

The business of Raleigh was dull, the money in the country being exhausted. A few Northern men, who had gone into trade there, were discouraged, and anxious to get away.

“So great is the impoverishment of our State,” Governor Worth said to me, “that a tax of any considerable amount would bring real estate at once into the market.” Among other causes, the repudiation of the entire State debt contracted during the war, had contributed to destroy the resources of the people. The middling and poorer classes had invested nearly all their surplus means in State treasury notes, which became worthless. The cause of education suffered with everything else. The University of North Carolina had all its funds invested in the banks; “Repudiation killed the banks,” said Governor Worth, “and the banks killed the University.” A million dollars of the common-school fund went the same way.

North Carolina, like several of her Southern sisters, had passed a stay law, which threatened a serious injury to her interests. By preventing the collection of debts, it destroyed credit, of which the people, in their present condition, stand so much in need. Although unconstitutional and impolitic, so great was the popularity of this law, that the ablest politicians feared to make an effort for its repeal.

By one of its provisions, a mortgage inures to the benefit of all the creditors of the mortgagor. Many large estates were, necessarily, to be broken up; and the best thing that could happen, for them and for the community, was, that they should fall into the hands of small farmers; but, in consequence of this curious law, the owners would not sell to these men, except for cash, which was lacking.

These Southern stay laws, I may here mention, do not touch the rights of a Northern creditor, who can bring his suit in United States courts, which ignore them.

The Northern men in the State were mostly settled on cotton plantations in the eastern counties. There were also many engaged in the turpentine and lumber business in the southern part, and along the coast. In the central and western parts there were almost none.

Of the extensive rice plantations of the tide-water region, but few were in operation, owing to the great outlay of capital necessary to carry them on. To seed them alone involves an expense of ten dollars an acre. Yet, from the representations of Northern men who had gone to rice planting, I am satisfied that here is an opening for very profitable investments.

The small farmers of North Carolina are a plain, old-fashioned, upright, ignorant class of men. Mr. Best, Secretary of State, told me that forty-five per cent. of those who took the oath of allegiance in Green County, where he administered it, made their marks. “Yet many of these are men of as strong sense as any in the State,” he added; “and they were generally Union men.”

The freedmen throughout the central and northern part of the State, had very generally made contracts, and were at work. In the southern part, fewer contracts had been made, in consequence of the inability of the large planters to pay promptly. “When paid promptly, the freedmen are everywhere working well,” I was assured by the officers of the Bureau. The rate of wages varied from five to ten dollars a month.

There were in the State one hundred teachers, supplied by the benevolent societies of the North. Their schools, scattered throughout the State, were attended by eight thousand five hundred colored pupils.

Cases of robberies, frauds, assaults, and even murders, in which white persons were the agents and freed people the sufferers, had been so numerous, according to the State Commissioner, “that no record of them could be kept; one officer reporting that he had heard and disposed of as many as a hundred and eighty complaints in one day.” Owing to the efforts of the Bureau, however, the number was fast decreasing.

From Governor Worth, I received a rather sorry account of the doings of Sherman’s “bummers” in this State. Even after the pacification they continued their lawless marauding. “They visited my place, near Raleigh, and drove off a fine flock of ewes and lambs. I was State Treasurer at the time, and having to go away on public business, I gave my negroes their bacon, which they hid behind the ceiling of the house. The Yankees came, and held an axe over the head of one of the negroes, and by threats compelled him to tell where it was. They tore off the ceiling, and stole all the bacon. They took all my cows. Three cows afterwards came back; but they recently disappeared again, and I found them in the possession of a man who says he bought them of these bummers. I had a grindstone, and as they couldn’t carry it off, they smashed it. There was on my place a poor, old, blind negro woman,—the last creature in the world against whom I should suppose any person would have wished to commit a wrong. She had a new dress; and they stole even that.

“I was known as a peace man,” said the Governor, “and for that reason I did not suffer as heavily as my neighbors.” He gave this testimony with regard to that class which served, but did not honor, our cause: “Of all the malignant wretches that ever cursed the earth, the hangers-on of Sherman’s army were the worst;” adding: “It can’t be expected that the people should love a government that has subjugated them in this way.”

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LXXXI. CONCLUSIONS

I made but a brief stay in North Carolina, but passed on homeward, and reached the beautiful snowy hills and frosted forests of New England early in February.

It now only remains for me to sum up briefly my answers to certain questions which are constantly put to me, regarding Southern emigration, the loyalty of the people, and the future of the country.

The South is in the condition of a man recovering from a dangerous malady: the crisis is past, appetite is boundless, and only sustenance and purifying air are needed to bring health and life in fresh waves. The exhausted country calls for supplies. It has been drained of its wealth, and of its young men. Capital is eagerly welcomed and absorbed. Labor is also needed. There is much shallow talk about getting rid of the negroes, and of filling their places with foreigners. But war and disease have already removed more of the colored race than can be well spared; and I am confident that, for the next five or ten years, leaving the blacks where they are, the strongest tide of emigration that can be poured into the country will be insufficient to meet the increasing demand for labor.

Northern enterprise, emancipation, improved modes of culture, and the high prices of cotton, rice, sugar, and tobacco, cannot fail to bring about this result. The cotton crop, if no accident happens to it, will this year reach, I am well satisfied, not less than two million bales, and bring something like two hundred and fifty million dollars,—as much as the five million bales of 1859 produced. Next year it will approximate to its old average standard in bulk, and greatly exceed it in value; and the year after we shall have the largest cotton crop ever known. Meanwhile the culture of rice and sugar will have fully revived, and become enormously profitable. Nor will planting alone flourish. Burned cities and plantation-buildings must be restored, new towns and villages will spring up, old losses must be repaired, and a thousand new wants supplied. Trade, manufactures, the mechanic arts, all are invited to share in this teeming activity.

Particular location the emigrant must select for himself, according to his own judgment, tastes, and means. Just now I should not advise Northern men to settle far back from the main routes of travel, unless they go in communities, purchasing and dividing large plantations, and forming societies independent of any hostile sentiment that may be shown by the native inhabitants. But I trust that in a year or two all danger of discomfort or disturbance arising from this source will have mostly passed by.

The loyalty of the people is generally of a negative sort: it is simply disloyalty subdued. They submit to the power which has mastered them, but they do not love it; nor is it reasonable to expect that they should. Many of them lately in rebellion, are, I think, honestly convinced that secession was a great mistake, and that the preservation of the Union, even with the loss of slavery, is better for them than any such separate government as that of which they had a bitter taste. Yet they do not feel much affection for the hand which corrected their error. They acquiesce quietly in what cannot be helped, and sincerely desire to make the best of their altered circumstances.

There is another class which would still be glad to dismember the country, and whose hatred of the government is radical and intense. But this class is small.

The poor whites may be divided into three classes: those who, to their hatred of the negro, join a hatred of the government that has set him free; those who associate with the negro, and care nothing for any government; and those who, cherishing more or less Union sentiment, rejoice to see the old aristocracy overthrown.

Except in certain localities, like East Tennessee, positive unconditional Union men are an exceedingly small minority. But they are a leaven which, properly encouraged, should leaven the whole lump of Southern society. Upon the close of hostilities, these men who, for near five years suffered unrelenting persecution, rose temporarily to a position of influence which their conduct had earned. Secession saw with dismay that to this class the first place in the future government of the country rightfully belonged. Their old neighbors, who had so long done evil to them continually, or given them only dark looks, now shrank sullenly out of their sight, or openly courted their smiles. A professed Union sentiment blossomed everywhere; lives, that had all along been thistles, now bore a plentiful harvest of figs. This was a hopeful state of things. It is better, as an example to a community, that goodness should receive insincere homage, than none at all; and that men should assume a virtue if they have it not. But as soon as it was seen that the muttering thunder-cloud of retribution was passing by with nothing but sound, and that loyal men were not to have the first, nor even the second or third or fourth place, in the government of the lately rebellious States, they sank to their former position. What is needed now is to cause this class, and the principles they represent, to be permanently respected.

The mere utterance of disloyal sentiments need not alarm any one. It is often sincere; but it is sometimes mere cant, easily kept in vogue, by newspapers and politicians, among a people who delight in vehement and minatory talk, for the mere talk’s sake.

Of another armed rebellion not the least apprehension need be entertained. The South has had enough of war for a long time to come; it has supped full of horrors. The habiliments of mourning, which one sees everywhere in its towns and cities, will cast their dark shadow upon any future attempt at secession, long after they have been put away in the silent wardrobes of the past. Only in the case of a foreign war might we expect to see a party of malignant malcontents go over to the side of the enemy. They would doubtless endeavor to drag their States with them, but they would not succeed. Fortunately those who are still so anxious to see the old issue fought out, are not themselves fighting men, and are dangerous only with their tongues.

Of unarmed rebellion, of continued sectional strife, stirred up by Southern politicians, there exists very great danger. Their aims are distinct, and they command the sympathy of the Southern people. To obtain the exclusive control of the freedmen, and to make such laws for them as shall embody the prejudices of a late slave-holding society; to govern not only their own States, but to regain their forfeited leadership in the affairs of the nation; to effect the repudiation of the national debt, or to get the Confederate debt and the Rebel State debts assumed by the whole country; to secure payment for their slaves, and for all injuries and losses occasioned by the war; these are among the chief designs of a class who will pursue them with what recklessness and persistency we know.

How to prevent them from agitating the nation in the future as in the past, and from destroying its prosperity, is become the most serious of questions. If you succeed in capturing an antagonist who has made a murderous assault upon you, common sense, and a regard for your own safety and the peace of society, require at least that his weapons, or the power of using them, should be taken from him. These perilous schemes are the present weapons of the nation’s conquered enemy; and does not prudent statesmanship demand that they should be laid forever at rest before he walks again at large in the pride of his power?

All that just and good men can ask, is this security. Vindictiveness, or a wish to hold the rebellious States under an iron rule, should have no place in our hearts. But if the blood of our brothers was shed in a righteous cause,—if for four years we poured out lives and treasures to purchase a reality, and no mere mockery and shadow,—let us honor our brothers and the cause by seeing that reality established. If treason is a crime surely it can receive no more fitting or merciful punishment than to be deprived of its power to do more mischief. Let peace, founded upon true principles, be the only retribution we demand. Let justice be our vengeance.

It was my original intention to speak of the various schemes of reconstruction claiming the consideration of the country. But they have become too numerous, and are generally too well known, to be detailed here. The Southern plan is simple; it is this: that the States, lately so eager to destroy the Union, are now entitled to all their former rights and privileges in that Union. Their haste to withdraw their representatives from Congress, is more than equalled by their anxiety to get them back in their seats. They consider it hard that, at the end of the most stupendous rebellion and the bloodiest civil war that ever shook the planet, they cannot quietly slip back in their places, and, the sword having failed, take up once more the sceptre of political power they so rashly flung down. Often, in conversation with candid Southern men, impatient for this result, I was able to convince them that it was hardly to be expected, that the government, emerging victorious from the dust of such a struggle, and finding its foot on that sceptre, should take it off with very great alacrity. And they were forced to acknowledge that, had the South proved victorious, its enemies would not have escaped so easily.

This plan does not tolerate the impediment of any Congressional test oath. When I said to my Southern friends that I should be glad to see those representatives, who could take the test oath, admitted to Congress, this was the usual reply:—

“We would not vote for such men. We had rather have no representatives at all. We want representatives to represent us, and no man represents us who can take your test oath. We are Rebels, if you choose to call us so, and only a good Rebel can properly represent us.”

This is the strongest argument I have heard against the admission of loyal Southern members to Congress. And if the white masses of the lately rebellious States are alone, and indiscriminately, to be recognized as the people of those States, it is certainly a valid argument.

“It is enough,” they maintained, “that a representative in Congress takes the ordinary oath to support the government; that is a sufficient test of his loyalty;”—forgetting that, at the outbreak of the rebellion, this proved no test at all.

Such is the Southern plan of reconstruction. Opposed to it is the plan on which I believe a majority of the people of the loyal States are agreed, namely, that certain guaranties of future national tranquillity should be required of those who have caused so great a national convulsion. But as to what those guaranties should be, opinions are divided, and a hundred conflicting measures are proposed for the settlement of the difficulty.

For my own part, I see but one plain rule by which our troubles can be finally and satisfactorily adjusted; and that is, the enactment of simple justice for all men. Anything that falls short of this falls short of the solution of the problem.

The “Civil Rights Bill,”—enacted since the greater portion of these pages were written,—is a step in the direction in which this country is inevitably moving. The principles of the Declaration of Independence, supposed to be our starting-point in history, are in reality the goal towards which we are tending. Far in advance of our actual civilization, the pioneers of the Republic set up those shining pillars. Not until all men are equal before the law, and none is hindered from rising or from sinking by any impediment which does not exist in his own constitution and private circumstances, will that goal be reached.

Soon or late the next step is surely coming. That step is universal suffrage. It may be wise to make some moral or intellectual qualification a test of a man’s fitness for the franchise; but anything which does not apply alike to all classes, and which all are not invited to attain, is inconsistent with the spirit of American nationality.

But will the Southern people ever submit to negro suffrage? They will submit to it quite as willingly as they submitted to negro emancipation. They fought against that as long as any power of resistance was in them; then they accepted it; they are now becoming reconciled to it; and soon they will rejoice over it. Such is always the history of progressive ideas. The first advance is opposed with all the might of the world until its triumph is achieved; then the world says, “Very well,” and employs all its arts and energies to defeat the next movement, which triumphs and is finally welcomed in its turn.

At the close of the war, the South was ready to accept any terms which the victorious government might have seen fit to enforce. The ground was thoroughly broken; it was fresh from the harrow; and then was the time for the sowing of the new seed, before delay had given encouragement and opportunity to the old rank weeds. The States had practically dissolved their relations to the general government. Their chief men were traitors, their governors and legislators were entitled to no recognition, and a new class of free citizens, composing near half the population, had been created. If, in these changed circumstances, all the people of those States had been called upon to unite in restoring their respective governments, and their relations to the general government, we should have had a simple and easy solution of the main question at issue. Our allies on the battle-field would have become our allies at the ballot-box, and by doing justice to them we should have gained security for ourselves.

But are the lately emancipated blacks prepared for the franchise? They are, by all moral and intellectual qualifications, as well prepared for it as the mass of poor whites in the South. Although ignorant, they possess, as has been said, a strong instinct which stands them in the place of actual knowledge. That instinct inspires them with loyalty to the government, and it will never permit them to vote so unwisely and mischievously as the white people of the South voted in the days of secession. Moreover, there are among them men of fine intelligence and leading influence, by whom, and not by their old masters, as has been claimed, they will be instructed in their duty at the polls. And this fact is most certain,—that they are far better prepared to have a hand in making the laws by which they are to be governed, than the whites are to make those laws for them.

How this step is now to be brought about, is not easy to determine; and it may not be brought about for some time to come. In the mean while it is neither wise nor just to allow the representation of the Southern States in Congress to be increased by the emancipation of a race that has no voice in that representation; and some constitutional remedy against this evil is required. And in the mean while the protection of the government must be continued to the race to which its faith is pledged. Let us hope not long.

The present high price of cotton, and the extraordinary demand for labor, seem providential circumstances, designed to teach both races a great lesson. The freedmen are fast learning the responsibilities of their new situation, and gaining a position from which they cannot easily be displaced. Their eagerness to acquire knowledge is a bright sign of hope for their future. By degrees the dominant class must learn to respect those who, as chattels, could only be despised. Respect for labor rises with the condition of the laborer. The whites of the South are not by choice ignorant or unjust, but circumstances have made them so. Teach them that the laborer is a man, and that labor is manly,—a truth that is now dawning upon them,—and the necessity of mediation between the two races will no longer exist.

Then the institutions of the South will spontaneously assimilate to our own. Then we shall have a Union of States, not in form only, but in spirit also. Then shall we see established the reality of the cause that has cost so many priceless lives and such lavish outpouring of treasure. Then will disloyalty die of inanition, and its deeds live only in legend and in story. Then breaks upon America the morning glory of that future which shall behold it the Home of Man, and the Lawgiver among the nations.

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LXXXII. [24] THE WORK OF RESTORATION

A Year later.—Hopes disappointed.—Position of the Whites of the South.—Treatment of Southern Unionists, Black and White.—Sections where the Hostility was most intense.—Honorable and Noble Exceptions to this State of Feeling.—The most Noisy Supporters of the Lost Cause.—The Effect of President Johnson’s Course in stimulating this Hostility.—Review of his Course so far as it relates to Reconstruction.—Interviews with Southern Men.—Organization of Provisional Governments.—Specimens of the Men appointed by him as Governors.—Defiance of Congress in Advance.—Assurances to South Carolina.—Democratic Conventions indorsing the President’s Policy.—The Message of December, 1865.—Opposition to Congress.—His “White-washing Message.”—Veto of the First Freedmen’s Bureau Bill.—The 22d of February Speech.—Veto of the Civil Rights Bill.—Its Passage over the Veto.—Provisions of the Bill.—The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution.—What it was.—Veto of the Second Freedmen’s Bureau Bill.—Passage over the Veto.—Its Provisions.—Admission of Tennessee.—Mr. Johnson signs the Resolution, but protests.—The Memphis Riot.—The New Orleans Massacre.—Mr. Johnson responsible for them.—General Sheridan’s Account of it.—The Philadelphia Convention.—Its Tears.—It proves a Failure.—Mr. Johnson weeps.—Mr. Johnson’s Speeches.—Reply to the Philadelphia Committee.—“Congress hanging on the Verge of the Government.”—“Swinging round the Circle.”—Disgraceful Conduct of Mr. Johnson.—Billingsgate in his Speeches.—Wearisome Platitudes.—The Effect they had on the Elections of 1866.

The hopes expressed by the writer in the preceding chapter were not destined to realize a speedy fruition. The uncertainties arising from the somewhat sudden change in President Johnson’s policy, and the hesitancy manifested by Congress in the adoption of a fixed policy of reconstruction, were already, when that chapter was written, beginning to bear their legitimate fruit. The Southern whites who had participated actively or passively in the Rebellion, and who, when the war closed, were ready to submit without murmuring to such terms as the conquering party saw fit to prescribe, had already begun to put on the airs of equals or superiors, and to dictate the terms on which they would come back into the Union. They scouted the idea that negroes had any rights which whites were bound to respect, or that they themselves had by their rebellion forfeited any rights or powers which they had formerly enjoyed. In short, they insisted upon the statu quo ante bellum as their rightful position. While maintaining that it was their right and privilege to honor the graves and memories of the rebel leaders and soldiers who had fallen during the war, and to glorify the living generals and other officers, who had fought for what they fondly called the Lost Cause, they were intolerant of any honors being paid to the Union dead in the South, or any mention of living Union generals, unless accompanied with some scurrilous epithet. A Southern man or woman who had been loyal to the Union during the war, was an object of bitterest hate. If colored, he was shot down, hung, or beaten to death at the first opportunity, and there were always enough “lewd fellows of the baser sort,” ready for this work. If a white man, his cattle were killed, his horses stolen, his poultry carried off, his barns were burned, and jokes, about their being struck by lightning on a clear night, were whispered; his crops were destroyed, and he was warned to leave the neighborhood. These were common occurrences in the country. In the towns, it was not quite so bad, except when the mob element was roused to activity, because the number of loyal Union men there was larger, and they were able to protect each other, to some extent.

In some sections this bitterness toward Union men was much more intense than in others. In the interior of Louisiana, in Texas, in Southern Alabama, in considerable sections of Mississippi, in Southern Georgia, and along the coast in the vicinity of Charleston, S. C., and in the neighborhood of Richmond, Petersburg, and Norfolk, Virginia, it was specially rife. West Tennessee too had its full share of it, and Kentucky was the most rebellious State in or out of the Union.

It should be remarked, too, that this bitterness did not pervade all classes, even among those who had formerly participated in the Rebellion. The men who had fought most bravely for the South were, very generally, disposed to accept reasonable terms from the victors. They had fought well, but they had been whipped, and there was nothing left but submission, and the endeavor to restore to the South its lost prosperity. In this view of the case, Lieutenant-Generals Longstreet and Johnston, and Major-Generals Forrest, Jeff. Thompson, and many others, coincided; and they, as well as some thousands of the former rebel soldiers, went to work manfully to aid in reconstruction on a fair and liberal basis.

The most noisy and violent of the supporters of the “Lost Cause,” as they styled themselves, were men and women who had taken no active part, except with their tongues, in the Rebellion, often of Northern birth, but thoroughly southernized in feeling; or, if the men had been connected with the Southern army or navy, they had been depredators on unarmed merchant ships, like Raphael Semmes, J. N. Maffit, or Lieutenant Braine; or bushwhackers, guerrillas, or deserters of the Mosby, Gilmor, and Clanton style; while the women were the imitators and admirers of Belle Boyd, Rosa Greenhow, and Sallie Rochester Ford.

Still this class, making up in noise and bluster for what they lacked in numbers and ability, and possessing a sort of recklessness, dash, and abandon, which has always been attractive to the excitable and half-educated people of the South, have succeeding in keeping up an excitement, and an explosive condition of society, very unfavorable to the restoration of quiet, industry, and good order. Whether intentionally or not, the course pursued by President Johnson was admirably calculated to foster just this state of feeling. He commenced his administration by a very great blunder,—the refusal to call an extra session of Congress in the summer of 1865. The emergency was one which demanded the assembling of the national legislature, and the harmonious and wise co-operation of the executive and legislative branches of the government in the restoration of law, order, and quiet, throughout the nation. Nothing save the overweening vanity and conceit of Andrew Johnson led him to neglect this obvious duty, and to assume to himself powers which the constitution had never granted to him.

Beginning with this mistake, let us briefly review his subsequent history so far as it relates to reconstruction, and see how it continued to be “a tragedy of errors.”

In June, 1865, delegates from the South were first admitted to private interviews with the President. On the 17th of June, he issued his proclamation, providing for the restoration of civil government in Georgia and Alabama, in which he excluded negroes from the category of loyal citizens entitled to vote. He soon after proceeded to appoint provisional governors for the Southern States,—an entirely unwarrantable proceeding. The character of these appointments may be seen in a sentiment uttered by Governor Perry, one of the number, soon after his installation. “There is not now in the Southern States,” said he, “any one who feels more bitterly the humiliation and degradation of going back into the Union than I do.” He ingratiated himself in the favor of the President, by assuring the people that the death of Mr. Lincoln was no loss to the South, while he had every hope that the accession of Mr. Johnson, an old slave-holding Democrat, would be an advantage.

In Alabama, under the provisional government established by Mr. Johnson, the Convention prohibited negroes from testifying in the courts. Throughout the South, the unrepentant rebels began at once to make their arrangements for taking part in the government. In November, Governor Perry, of South Carolina, made a public demand, that when Congress met, the clerk of the House should place on the roll the names of representatives from the States lately in rebellion.

When South Carolina hesitated to adopt the constitutional amendment abolishing slavery, President Johnson assured the Governor, that the clause giving Congress power to enforce it by appropriate legislation, really limited Congressional control over the negro question. After this preposterous assurance, South Carolina accepted the constitutional amendment.

In August and September, 1865, Democratic conventions indorsed the President’s policy, and Democratic papers (even those which six months before denounced him as a drunken boor, and demanded his resignation) began to praise him. The Republican party were yet unwilling to believe that the man whom they had elected to the Vice-Presidency would so grossly deceive and betray them, and hoped that after the assembling of Congress all differences would disappear.

They found very soon, however, that this hope was vain; for when the Thirty-ninth Congress was organized for business, and the message of the President was read, it was seen that he placed himself in direct opposition to the leaders of the Republican party, and utterly at variance with what he had at first avowed as his own policy. He professed his inability to concede the elective franchise to the freedmen in the South, because he must then of necessity have conceded it also to all colored men in the Northern States. A parity of reasoning would have required him to appoint provisional governors over all the Northern States, because he appointed them in the States lately in rebellion. While Congress was in session, and actually employed in legislating for the restoration of the rebel States, Mr. Johnson removed the Provisional Governor of Alabama, and handed the State government over to the officers elected by the people, thus ignoring the right of Congress to exercise any control over the subject.

In reply to the demand of the Senate for information respecting the condition of the rebel States, the President sent a message professing that they were all in a quiet and peaceful condition, and accompanied it by the reports of Generals Grant and Carl Schurz, which disproved his statements. Mr. Sumner denounced this as an attempt to “whitewash” their actual condition, and he was correct, though at the time severely denounced for the use of that term.

The Freedmen’s Bureau Bill was passed by a large majority of both houses of Congress, about the first of February; but was vetoed by the President on the 19th of February; and on the effort to pass it over the veto, six senators who had voted for it at first, receded and sustained the President’s veto. This was Mr. Johnson’s first and last triumph.

Two days later, on the 22d of February (1866), a day most unpropitious in his subsequent history, Mr. Johnson addressed to a noisy gathering which had assembled to serenade him, a most disgraceful speech, in which he denounced Senator Sumner and Representative Thaddeus Stevens by name, declaring that they were seeking to assassinate him, and indulged in the use of grossly insulting epithets toward other prominent men. This speech, for which his friends apologized, on the plea that he was intoxicated, seriously damaged the President’s cause, while it widened the breach between him and the party to whom he owed his advancement. Henceforward Congress moved cautiously but firmly. Every bill relating to reconstruction was carefully considered and thoroughly matured before its passage, and when the inevitable veto came, each bill was triumphantly passed over it.

The first measure to undergo this ordeal was the CIVIL RIGHTS BILL, passed March 13, 1866; vetoed by the President March 27, 1866; and passed over his veto, by 33 yeas to 15 nays in the Senate; and 122 yeas to 41 nays in the House, April 6–9, 1866.

This bill, the first of the permanent measures of reconstruction on the Congressional plan, provided that all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, should be declared and considered citizens of the United States, and that such citizens of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party had been duly convicted, should have the same right in every State and Territory of the United States to make and enforce contracts; to sue, be parties, and give evidence; to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property; and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens, and be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding.

It further provided for the punishment of all infractions of this act, and for its effectual enforcement, through the district courts of the United States and their officers; and authorized the President, or any persons whom he might empower, to prevent the violation of the act, and if necessary to call the land or naval forces of the United States, or the militia, to aid in preventing such violation.

The next measure of Congress looking toward reconstruction, was the passage and submission to the State legislatures of the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States. This amendment passed the Senate June 8, 1866, by a vote of 33 yeas to 11 nays; and the House, June 13, 1866, by 138 yeas to 36 nays. The following is the joint resolution and amendment:—

“Joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

“Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two thirds of both Houses concurring), That the following article be proposed to the legislatures of the several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by three fourths of said legislatures, shall be valid as part of the Constitution, namely:

ARTICLE 14.

“SECTION 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

“SECTION 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

“SECTION 3. No person shall be a senator or representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two thirds of each house, remove such disability.

“SECTION 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations, and claims shall be held illegal and void.

“SECTION 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”

On the 2d of July, 1866, the Senate, and on the 3d of July, the House, passed a second Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, continuing in force the original bill of March 3, 1865, for two years from the passage of this act, and providing more definitely for its administration, and the bestowment of its aid upon the freedmen and loyal refugees (the first bill having been somewhat loose in these particulars). It also prescribed in certain emergencies for the exercise of military protection, and jurisdiction to the freedmen, as the wards of the nation, by the commissioner and his assistants.

This bill Mr. Johnson, after repeated pledges that he would not do so, vetoed, on the 16th of July, 1866, and it was passed over the veto in both houses of Congress the same day: in the House by 103 yeas to 33 nays; and in the Senate by 33 yeas to 12 nays. On the 23d of July, Congress passed the following joint resolution to restore Tennessee to the Union:—

“Whereas, in the year eighteen hundred and sixty-one, the government of the State of Tennessee was seized upon and taken possession of by persons in hostility to the United States, and the inhabitants of said State, in pursuance of an act of Congress, were declared to be in a state of insurrection against the United States; and whereas said State government can only be restored to its former political relations in the Union by the consent of the lawmaking power of the United States; and whereas the people of said State did, on the twenty-second day of February, eighteen hundred and sixty-five, by a large popular vote, adopt and ratify a constitution of government whereby slavery was abolished, and all ordinances and laws of secession, and debts contracted under the same, were declared void; and whereas a State government has been organized under said constitution which has ratified the amendment to the Constitution of the United States abolishing slavery, also the amendment proposed by the Thirty-ninth Congress, and has done other acts proclaiming and denoting loyalty; Therefore,

“Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the State of Tennessee is hereby restored to her former proper, practical relations to the Union, and is again entitled to be represented by senators and representatives in Congress.”

This joint resolution passed the Senate, 28 yeas to 4 nays; and the House, 93 yeas to 26 nays. As a joint resolution it did not require the President’s signature to make it valid, but he addressed a message to Congress stating that he had signed it, but protesting against what he professed to regard as its anomalous features. With this act, the reconstruction measures of the first session of the Thirty-ninth Congress concluded. They were a good beginning in the work, but were not, and their authors did not regard them as, a complete system of reconstruction. The work was to be perfected in subsequent sessions.

Occurrences were transpiring, meanwhile, which were destined to have an influence on this subject. In May, 1866, a collision took place between some discharged negro soldiers, and the police of Memphis, Tennessee (which was composed to a large extent of rebel soldiers and officers, and of Irishmen, whose hatred of the negro was intense); and this culminated in a riot which lasted two or three days, and resulted in the murder of twenty-four negroes, the serious wounding of more than one hundred, many of whom subsequently died of their wounds, and the destruction of property to the amount of about $120,000, mostly negro dwellings, churches, and school-houses. On the side of the police one white man was wounded, it was alleged by the negroes, but, as was afterward ascertained, by another policeman. The real question at issue here was, the right of the freedman to the same privileges and immunities as the white. For this atrocious massacre of the nation’s wards, Mr. Johnson had no word of censure. On the 30th of July, at New Orleans, the Constitutional Convention of 1864, being revived and reconvened by Governor Wells, commenced its session at the Mechanics’ Institute, when they were set upon by the police (nine tenths of them unrepentant rebels), under the prompting of Mayor Monroe, the same man who was mayor in 1862, when New Orleans was captured, and Attorney-General Herron, another rebel officer. The police first assaulted a procession of colored men, who were marching to the Institute, and by firing upon them, compelled them to attempt their own defence (though not one in ten had any weapons). The police murdered a number, and drove the rest before them into the Institute, when they commenced an indiscriminate firing upon the members of the Convention, who were unarmed, though they raised at once a white flag. Several of these were killed, and others mortally wounded, among the number, Rev. J. W. Horton, who had acted as chaplain of the Convention, and Dr. A. P. Dostie, a prominent Union man. In all, 27 were killed outright, and over eighty wounded, many of them mortally. Of the policemen, and their abettors, forty-two were either killed or wounded. General Sheridan, the commander of the Fifth Military District, was at this time absent in Texas, having been assured beforehand by Monroe and Herron that there would be no disturbance and no violence. General Baird, who was in command at the time, seemed irresolute, and did not attempt any movement until too late to do any good. General Sheridan, on his return, examined into the affair, and on the 2d of August reported to General Grant, that “it was an absolute massacre by the police, which was not excelled in murderous cruelty by that of Fort Pillow. It was a murder which the mayor and police of the city perpetrated without the shadow of a necessity; furthermore, I believe it was premeditated, and every indication points to this. I recommend the removing of this bad man.”

Monroe and Herron, and their party, insisted that they had the sanction of the President in all their conduct; and the telegraphic despatches of the President to Herron, and to General Baird; his permitting, if he did not direct, the garbling of Sheridan’s despatches; his attempted justification of Monroe and Herron, and his effort to throw the blame on Congress, at St. Louis, and subsequently on Secretary Stanton, gave good reason to believe their statement true.

The attempt to revive this defunct convention may have been injudicious; some of the men who took part in it, especially Governor Wells and R. Cutler King, may have been bad men—demagogues; but it was an honest effort on the part of the great majority of the delegates (whether wise or not) to reorganize the State on a loyal basis, and in accordance with the Congressional plan of reconstruction; and this was sufficient to arouse Mr. Johnson’s hostility to it.

The next act in the drama was the Philadelphia Convention, called, by those who summoned it, the National Union Convention, which met in that city, August 14, 1866, responsive to a call signed by Messrs. A. W. Randall, J. R. Doolittle, O. H. Browning, Edgar Cowan, Charles Knapp, and Samuel Fowler; as Executive Committee of the National Union Club, and indorsed by Senators Norton, Nesmith, Dixon, and Hendricks. The object of this convention was to rally to the support of the President a considerable portion (a majority it was hoped) of both parties upon a so-called conservative platform, which should be sufficiently comprehensive to accommodate the Semi-Republicans, the War-Democrats, Peace-Democrats, and the half-repentant Rebels. General J. A. Dix was chosen temporary, and Senator Doolittle, permanent President of the Convention, and Mr. Henry J. Raymond, of the “New York Times,” was made Chairman of the Committee on Resolutions.

At the opening of the Convention, General Couch, of Massachusetts, a former corps commander in the Army of the Potomac, and Ex-Governor Orr, of South Carolina, came in arm-in-arm, “at which scene,” said the reporters, “every eye was suffused with tears.” The Convention, however, proved a failure. The elements were too discordant to mingle readily; and though Mr. Raymond proposed a very plausible and neatly worded address and series of resolutions, and Messrs. Doolittle, Cowan, and others, spoke very eloquently in favor of harmony and union on the President’s policy, the influence of the affair on the nation was positively nothing, and the prime movers in it, who had been Republicans, found themselves read out of their own party, and not received cordially by the other.

Mr. Johnson had for some months been receiving delegations of all sorts of men, and expressing his opinions on political questions with great freedom, though not always with consistency or coherence. On receiving a committee from the Philadelphia Convention, who, through their chairman, Hon. Reverdy Johnson, presented their proceedings, he made one of his characteristic speeches, full of references to himself, his feelings and emotions, his weeping at the touching scene in the Convention, and allusions to “the humble individual who was then addressing them,” and spoke of Congress in these words: “We have seen hanging upon the verge of the government, as it were, a body called, or which assumes to be, the Congress of the United States, while in fact it is a Congress of only a part of the States. We have seen this Congress pretend to be for the Union, when its every step and act tended to perpetuate disunion, and make a disruption of the States inevitable. Instead of promoting reconciliation and harmony, its legislation has partaken of the character of penalties, retaliation, and revenge. This has been the course and the policy of one portion of your government.”

Such unwarrantable charges against a coördinate department of the government, were not only in bad taste, but tended to bring the two into speedy collision; and it was due rather to the great patience and forbearance of Congress, than to any circumspection on the part of Mr. Johnson, that a revolution was not precipitated.

Then came that journey to Chicago, professedly to lay the corner-stone of the monument to the late Hon. Stephen A. Douglas, but really intended as a political canvass in behalf of what Mr. Johnson called his “policy.” This disgraceful expedition, aptly termed, from one of his own pet expressions, “swinging round the circle,” was to every loyal American the most humiliating exhibition ever made by any public man in this country.

Leaving Washington on the 28th of August, he proceeded northward, accompanied by Secretaries Seward and Welles, Postmaster-General Randall, General Grant, Admiral Farragut, and others, a part of whom, however, left the party some time before it reached its destination. At every point of his progress, which was by way of Philadelphia, New York, Albany, the New York Central and Lake Shore roads to Chicago, and thence to St. Louis, Louisville, Indianapolis, and Cincinnati, he seized upon the opportunity to make a speech, and in many places was speedily involved in a wordy wrangle with the crowd, in which he invariably became angry, and exhibited a proficiency in the use of Billingsgate that might have done credit to a fishwoman, but was simply shameful in the chief magistrate of the United States. We cannot consent to defile our pages with specimens of the venom and abuse, which sometimes was almost blasphemous in its character, with which his twenty or thirty speeches during this tour were so freely interlarded. They are too fresh in the minds of the people, and have formed recently one of the counts in the indictment with which a long-suffering people have visited this public offender.

Yet the abusive portions of these speeches were the only parts of them which were readable. The dreary platitudes about “the humble individual who now addresses you,” the ineffable conceit which on every occasion rehearsed the fact that “he had filled every station from alderman of a small country village to his present exalted station,” the gravity with which he stated at every railway station that he “left the Constitution of the United States, and the flag with thirty-six stars in their hands,” became at last so intolerably wearisome, that nobody could wade through the mass of dullness.

The elections of the autumn of 1866, which immediately succeeded this tour, proved most conclusively the growing disgust of the people for-the man who occupied the presidential chair. The Thirty-ninth Congress had been strongly Republican; the Fortieth was overwhelmingly so; and wherever Johnson had addressed the public, there the Republican majorities were unprecedented. The reconstruction measures which Congress had adopted, were sanctioned by the people, and others of a more decided character completing the work, were urged upon them.

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Footnote 24:

This and the following chapters are furnished by the author of Woman’s Work in the Civil War, History of the Civil War, Men of Our Day, etc.

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LXXXIII. RECONSTRUCTION

Condition of the Republican and Democratic Parties in Congress in December, 1866.—The District of Columbia Elective Franchise Bill passed: Its Provisions.—Mr. Johnson vetoes it, but it is passed over the Veto.—Territorial Franchise Bill passed.—Admission of Nebraska as a State, with the Elective Franchise Proviso.—Difficulties in Maturing satisfactorily the Reconstruction Act.—The Provisions of the House Bill.—It is materially changed in the Senate.—Further Modification in the House Provisions of the Bill as finally passed.—Necessity for the Tenure of Office Act: Its Provisions.—Effect of the Passage of the District of Columbia Franchise Bill on Tennessee.—Decision of the Supreme Court of Tennessee.—The First Supplementary Reconstruction Act of the Fortieth Congress.—It is vetoed, and re-passed: Its Provisions.—Arrangement for the Call of a Summer Session.—Mr. Stanbery’s Exposition of the Reconstruction Acts.—The Summer Session of 1867.—The Second Supplementary Reconstruction Act: Its Provisions.—Appropriations for Carrying out the Reconstruction Acts.—The President’s Communication.—The Resolution of the House in Reply.—Sharp Talk.—The Completion of Congressional Legislation on the Subject in 1867.—Condition of the Desolated States in 1867.

The elections of the Autumn of 1866 had greatly strengthened and encouraged the Republican majority in Congress, and when the members of the Thirty-ninth Congress met in their second session in December, 1866, they were resolved to complete their work of reconstruction, so far as it was possible to do so, and to pass the necessary bills over the President’s veto. The minority (Democrats) were weak in numbers in both houses, but they numbered several men of very considerable ability, and they had been reënforced by the defection from the Republicans of Messrs. Cowan, Doolittle, Dixon, and Norton in the Senate, and Mr. Raymond, and two or three others, on some questions, in the House. Their losses by death and by the unseating of several members whose seats were contested, however, gave them really very little more available strength than in the previous session, while the Republicans were united and thoroughly in earnest.

The first measure adopted during the session, having a bearing on the question of reconstruction, was the bill regulating the elective franchise in the District of Columbia. This was a measure of great importance, as, the District of Columbia being under the exclusive government of Congress, the action of that body in regard to conferring the suffrage and other privileges of citizenship upon the negro there, would indicate distinctly what Congress would require from the Rebel States as conditions precedent to their admission into the Union. Its provisions were as follows: Sec. 1 confers the elective franchise on male citizens of the United States, twenty-one years old and upward without distinction on account of race or color, who shall have resided in the District one year next preceding any election therein, excepting paupers, persons under guardianship, those convicted of any infamous crime or offense, and those who may have voluntarily given aid and comfort to the Rebels in the late Rebellion. Sec. 2 provides that any person whose duty it shall be to receive votes at any election within the District of Columbia, who shall reject the vote of any person entitled to vote under this act, shall be liable to an action of tort by the person injured, and on indictment and conviction, to a fine not exceeding $5,000, or to imprisonment not exceeding one year in the jail of the District, or both. Sec. 3 provides that any one willfully disturbing an elector in the exercise of such franchise shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction, shall be liable to a fine not exceeding $1,000, or an imprisonment not exceeding thirty days in the jail of the District, or both. Sec. 4 makes it the duty of criminal courts in the District to give this act in special charge to the grand jury at the common circuit of each term of the court. Secs. 5 and 6. The voting lists are to be prepared by the mayors and aldermen of the cities of Washington and Georgetown on and before the first day of March in each year, and are to be posted in public places ten days before the annual election. The remaining four sections give other prescriptions as to the manner in which the election shall be held.

This bill passed the Senate December 14, 1866, by a vote of 32 yeas to 13 nays; and the House by 128 yeas to 46 nays. Mr. Johnson vetoed it in a very elaborate message, on the 7th of January, 1867; and the same day the Senate passed it again over the veto, by yeas 29, nays 10; and the next day, the House followed their example by yeas 113, nays 38.

On the 14th of January, 1867, a bill was sent to the President, which had previously passed both houses of Congress by a large majority, which provided that from and after its passage there should be no denial of the elective franchise in any of the territories of the United States, now, or hereafter to be organized, to any citizen thereof, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude; and all acts or parts of acts, either of Congress or the legislative assemblies of said territories, inconsistent with the provisions of this act, are declared null and void.

This bill, not being returned by the President within ten days, became a law on the 24th of January, 1867.

The next measure was the admission of Nebraska as a State, with the condition that the new State should by a solemn act assent to the provision that there should be no denial within the State of the elective franchise, or of any other right to any person, by reason of race or color, excepting Indians not taxed. This was vetoed by the President, but passed over his veto, February 9.

The question of reconstruction proper, as applied to the States lately in insurrection, was one of greater difficulty. Several bills were presented in both houses, and very considerable differences of opinion evidently existed among the Republican members. So serious were these at one time as to make it doubtful whether any measure which would be generally satisfactory could be passed during the session. A bill at length passed the House, for abrogating the existing provisional governments in the Rebel States, and establishing military rule there, dividing the whole Southern territory into five military districts, and conferring upon the General-in-chief the power of appointing the commanders of these districts. This bill was materially modified, or rather, another bill, combining with it reconstruction measures, and placing the appointing power in the hands of the President, was presented in the Senate, by Senator Sherman of Ohio, which passed that body. To this the House disagreed, and voted to adhere to its original bill. After some time, however, the House receded, and added some important amendments to Sherman’s bill, which was then passed by both houses; the vote in the House being 128 yeas to 46 nays, and that in the Senate, 35 yeas to 7 nays.

This measure was one of such importance that we deem it necessary to give the text of it in full. It is as follows:—

“AN ACT to provide efficient Government for the Insurrectionary States.

“Whereas, No legal State governments or adequate protection for life or property now exist in the Rebel States of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Texas, and Arkansas; and whereas, it is necessary that peace and good order should be enforced in said States until loyal and republican State governments can be legally established; therefore,

“Be it enacted, etc., That said Rebel States shall be divided into military districts, and made subject to the military authority of the United States, as hereinafter mentioned; and for that purpose Virginia shall constitute the First District; North Carolina and South Carolina the Second District; Georgia, Alabama, and Florida the Third District; Mississippi and Arkansas the Fourth District; and Louisiana and Texas the Fifth District.

“SECTION 2. That it shall be the duty of the President to assign to the command of each of said districts an officer of the army not below the rank of Brigadier-General, and to detail a sufficient military force to enable such officer to perform his duties and enforce his authority within the district to which he is assigned.

“SECTION 3. That it shall be the duty of each officer assigned as aforesaid to protect all persons in their rights of person and property; to suppress insurrection, disorder, and violence; and to punish or cause to be punished all disturbers of the public peace and criminals; and to this end he may allow local civil tribunals to take jurisdiction of and try offenders, or, when in his judgment it may be necessary for the trial of offenders, he shall have power to organize military committees or tribunals for that purpose; and all interference under color of State authority with the exercise of military authority under this act shall be null and void.

“SECTION 4. That all persons put under military arrest by virtue of this act shall be tried without unnecessary delay, and no cruel or unusual punishment shall be inflicted; and no sentence of any military commission or tribunal hereby authorized affecting the life or liberty of any person shall be executed until it is approved by the officer in command of the district; and the laws and regulations for the government of the army shall not be affected by this act, except in so far as they may conflict with its provisions. Provided, That no sentence of death under this act shall be carried into execution without the approval of the President.

“SECTION 5. When the people of any one of said Rebel States shall have formed a constitution and government in conformity with the Constitution of the United States in all respects, framed by a convention of delegates elected by the male citizens of said State, 21 years old and upward, of whatever race, color, or previous condition, who have been resident in said State for one year previous to the day of such election, except such as may be disfranchised for participation in the Rebellion, or for felony at common law, and when such constitution shall provide that the elective franchise shall be enjoyed by all such persons as have the qualifications herein stated for electors of delegates, and when such constitution shall be ratified by a majority of the persons voting on the question of ratification who are qualified as electors for delegates, and when such constitution shall have been submitted to Congress for examination and approval, and Congress shall have approved the same, and when said State by a vote of its legislature elected under said constitution shall have adopted the amendment to the Constitution of the United States proposed by the Thirty-ninth Congress, and known as Article 14, and when said article shall have become part of the Constitution of the United States, said State shall be declared entitled to representation in Congress, and Senators and Representatives shall be admitted therefrom, on their taking the oath prescribed by law, and then and thereafter the preceding sections of this act shall be inoperative in said State. Provided, That no person excluded from the privilege of holding office by said proposed amendment to the Constitution of the United States shall be eligible to election as a member of the convention to frame a constitution for any of said Rebel States, nor shall any such person vote for members of such convention.

“SECTION 6. Until the people of the said Rebel States shall by law be admitted to representation to the Congress of the United States, all civil governments that may exist therein shall be deemed provisional only, and shall be in all respects subject to the paramount authority of the United States, at any time to abolish, modify, control, and supersede the same, and in all elections to any office under such provisional governments all persons shall be entitled to vote under the provisions of the fifth section of this act. And no person shall be eligible to any office under such provisional governments who would be disqualified from holding office under the provisions of the third article of said Constitutional Amendment.”

This act completes the reconstruction measures properly so called, of the Thirty-ninth Congress. One other bill, passed by that Congress, at its second session, demands notice in this connection, from its purpose, and its subsequent bearing on the question of impeachment. The due and active enforcement of the reconstruction measures passed by Congress over the President’s veto, depended in a great degree upon the Secretary of War. It was known that Mr. Johnson would not be remarkably zealous in compelling obedience to them, though it was not known, till some months later, that he would counsel their violation, on the ground of his belief or impression that they were unconstitutional. But of the fidelity and loyalty of Hon. E. M. Stanton, Secretary of War, the Republicans in Congress had no question, and their only apprehension was that Mr. Johnson would discharge him from his cabinet, and place in the department some supple tool of his own, whose whole effort would be to nullify these measures which they regarded as so important. There were others, too, in administrative positions, especially in connection with the Freedmen’s Bureau, who were liable to removal for no other offense than that of an honest effort to administer the laws in letter and spirit.

To prevent the exercise of this arbitrary power by the President, the Tenure of Office Act was matured, and passed the Senate February 18, 1867, by yeas 22, nays 10; and the House, February 19, by yeas 112, nays 41. It was as follows:—

“AN ACT regulating the Tenure of certain Civil Offices.

“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That every person holding any civil office to which he has been appointed by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and every person who shall hereafter be appointed to any such office, and shall become duly qualified to act therein, is, and shall be, entitled to hold such office until a successor shall have been in like manner appointed and duly qualified, except as herein otherwise provided: Provided, That the Secretaries of State, of the Treasury, of War, of the Navy, and of the Interior, the Postmaster-General, and the Attorney-General shall hold their offices respectively for and during the term of the President by whom they may have been appointed, and for one month thereafter, subject to removal by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.

“SECTION 2. That when any officer appointed as aforesaid, excepting judges of the United States courts, shall, during the recess of the Senate, be shown, by evidence satisfactory to the President, to be guilty of misconduct in office, or crime, or for any reason shall become incapable or legally disqualified to perform its duties, in such case, and in no other, the President may suspend such officer, and designate some suitable person to perform temporarily the duties of such office until the next meeting of the Senate, and until the case shall be acted upon by the Senate; and such person, so designated, shall take the oaths and give the bonds required by law to be taken and given by the person duly appointed to fill such office; and in such case it shall be the duty of the President, within twenty days after the first day of such next meeting of the Senate, to report to the Senate such suspension, with the evidence and reasons for his action in the case, and the name of the person so designated to perform the duties of such office. And if the Senate shall concur in such suspension, and advise and consent to the removal of such officer, they shall so certify to the President, who may thereupon remove such officer, and, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, appoint another person to such office. But if the Senate shall refuse to concur in such suspension, such officer so suspended shall forthwith resume the functions of his office, and the powers of the person so performing its duties in his stead shall cease, and the official salary and emoluments of such officer shall, during such suspension, belong to the person so performing the duties thereof, and not to the officer so suspended: Provided, however, That the President, in case he shall become satisfied that such suspension was made on insufficient grounds, shall be authorized, at any time before reporting such suspension to the Senate as above provided, to revoke such suspension, and reinstate such officer in the performance of the duties of his office.

“SECTION 3. That the President shall have power to fill all vacancies which may happen during the recess of the Senate, by reason of death or resignation, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session thereafter. And if no appointment, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall be made to such office so vacant or temporarily filled as aforesaid during such next session of the Senate, such office shall remain in abeyance without any salary, fees, or emoluments attached thereto, until the same shall be filled by appointment thereto, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate; and during such time all the powers and duties belonging to such office shall be exercised by such other officer, as may by law exercise such powers and duties in case of a vacancy in such office.

“SECTION 4. That nothing in this act contained shall be construed to extend the term of any office the duration of which is limited by law.

“SECTION 5. That if any person shall, contrary to the provisions of this act, accept any appointment to or employment in any office, or shall hold or exercise, or attempt to hold or exercise, any such office or employment, he shall be deemed, and is hereby declared to be, guilty of a high misdemeanor, and, upon trial and conviction thereof, he shall be punished therefor by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding five years, or both said punishments, in the discretion of the court.

“SECTION 6. That every removal, appointment, or employment made, had, or exercised, contrary to the provisions of this act, and the making, signing, sealing, countersigning, or issuing of any commission or letter of authority for or in respect to any such appointment or employment, shall be deemed, and are hereby declared to be, high misdemeanors, and, upon trial and conviction thereof, every person guilty thereof shall be punished by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding five years, or both said punishments, in the discretion of the court: Provided, That the President shall have power to make out and deliver, after the adjournment of the Senate, commissions for all officers whose appointment shall have been advised and consented to by the Senate.

“SECTION 7. That it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Senate, at the close of each session thereof, to deliver to the Secretary of the Treasury, and to each of his assistants, and to each of the Auditors, and to each of the Comptrollers in the Treasury, and to the Treasurer, and to the Register of the Treasury, a full and complete list, duly certified, of all persons who shall have been nominated to and rejected by the Senate during such session, and a like list of all the offices to which nominations shall have been made and not confirmed and filled at such session.

“SECTION 8. That whenever the President shall, without the advice and consent of the Senate, designate, authorize, or employ any person to perform the duties of any office, he shall forthwith notify the Secretary of the Treasury thereof, and it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury thereupon to communicate such notice to all the proper accounting and disbursing officers of his Department.

“SECTION 9. That no money shall be paid or received from the Treasury, or paid or received from or retained out of any public moneys or funds of the United States, whether in the Treasury or not, to or by or for the benefit of any person appointed to or authorized to act in or holding or exercising the duties or functions of any office contrary to the provisions of this act; nor shall any claim, account, voucher, order, certificate, warrant, or other instrument providing for or relating to such payment, receipt, or retention, be presented, passed, allowed, approved, certified, or paid by any officer of the United States, or by any person exercising the functions or performing the duties of any office or place of trust under the United States, for or in respect to such office, or the exercising or performing the functions or duties thereof; and every person who shall violate any of the provisions of this section shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and upon trial and conviction thereof, shall be punished therefor by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding ten years, or both said punishments, in the discretion of the court.”

The action of Congress in bestowing the franchise, without distinction of race or color, on the inhabitants of the District of Columbia, speedily exerted an influence in other sections. On the 6th of February, 1867, the lower branch of the Tennessee Legislature passed a bill striking the word “white” from the franchise law of the State, by yeas 38, nays 25. On the 18th of February the State Senate concurred, by yeas 14, nays 7. On the 21st of March, the Supreme Court of the State unanimously sustained the constitutionality of the franchise law as thus amended, and in August following, the negroes, for the first time, exercised the franchise, at the election for governor.

In the passage of the Reconstruction Act of March 2, 1867, the Republicans of the Thirty-ninth Congress had not fully come up to the positions which it was their duty to occupy.

The bill too was somewhat loosely drawn, and some supplementary legislation was necessary to give it force and efficacy. It was, perhaps, the best that could be done under the circumstances, for they were embarrassed by the diversity of opinions on many of the details of reconstruction, among the Republicans themselves, and by the fact, that any very stringent measure could not be passed over the veto which was sure to come. The Fortieth Congress, which was called together by the officers of its predecessor on the 4th of March, 1867, was fresh from the people, and stronger and more positive in its convictions. One of the measures taken up at its short session of March, 1867, was a supplementary Reconstruction Act, which passed both houses on the 19th of March. This was vetoed March 23, and the same day passed over the veto; in the House by 114 yeas to 25 nays, and in the Senate by 40 yeas to 7 nays.

The following are the main provisions of this act:—

“Before September 1, 1867, the commanding general in each district, defined by an act entitled ‘An Act to provide for the more Efficient Government of the Rebel States,’ passed March 2, 1867, shall cause a registration to be made of the male citizens of the United States, twenty-one years of age and upwards, resident in each county or parish in the State or States included in his district, which registration shall include only those persons who are qualified to vote for delegates by the act aforesaid, and who shall have taken and subscribed the following oath or affirmation: ‘I, ——, do solemnly swear (or affirm), in the presence of Almighty God, that I am a citizen of the State of ——; that I have resided in said State for —— months next preceding this day, and now reside in the county of ——, or the parish of ——, in said State (as the case may be); that I am twenty-one years old; that I have not been disfranchised for participation in any rebellion or civil war against the United States, nor for felony committed against the laws of any State or of the United States; that I have never been a member of any State legislature, nor held any executive or judicial office in any State and afterwards engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; that I have never taken an oath as a member of Congress of the United States, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, and afterwards engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; that I will faithfully support the Constitution and obey the laws of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, encourage others so to do, so help me God;’ which oath or affirmation may be administered by any registering officer. SEC. 2. After the completion of the registration hereby provided for in any State, at such time and places therein as the commanding general shall appoint and direct, of which at least thirty days’ public notice shall be given, an election shall be held of delegates to a convention for the purpose of establishing a constitution and civil government for such State loyal to the Union, said convention in each State, except Virginia, to consist of the same number of members as the most numerous branch of the State legislature of such State in the year 1860, to be apportioned among the several districts, counties, or parishes of such State by the commanding general, giving to each representation in the ratio of voters registered as aforesaid, as nearly as may be. The convention in Virginia shall consist of the same number of members as represented the territory now constituting Virginia in the most numerous branch of the legislature of said State in the year 1860, to be apportioned as aforesaid. SEC. 3. At said election the registered voters of each State shall vote for or against a convention to form a constitution therefor under this act. The person appointed to superintend said election, and to make return of the votes given thereat, as herein provided, shall count and make return of the votes given for and against a convention; and the commanding general to whom the same shall have been returned shall ascertain and declare the total vote in each State for and against a convention. If a majority of the votes given on that question shall be for a convention, then such convention shall be held as hereinafter provided; but if a majority of said votes shall be against a convention, then no such convention shall be held under this act: Provided, that such convention shall not be held unless a majority of all such registered voters shall have voted on the question of holding such convention. SEC. 4. The commanding general of each district shall appoint as many boards of registration as may be necessary, consisting of three loyal officers or persons, to make and complete the registration, superintend the election, and make return to him of the votes, lists of voters, and of the persons elected as delegates by a plurality of the votes cast at said election; and upon receiving said returns he shall open the same, ascertain the persons elected as delegates according to the returns of the officers who conducted said election, and make proclamation thereof; and if a majority of the votes given on that question shall be for a convention, the commanding general, within sixty days from the date of election, shall notify the delegates to assemble in convention, at a time and place to be mentioned in the notification, and said convention, when organized, shall proceed to frame a constitution and civil government according to the provisions of this act and the act to which it is supplementary; and when the same shall have been so framed, said constitution shall be submitted by the convention for ratification to the persons registered under the provisions of this act, at an election to be conducted by the officers or persons appointed or to be appointed by the commanding general, as hereinbefore provided, and to be held after the expiration of thirty days from the date of notice thereof, to be given by said convention; and the returns thereof shall be made to the commanding general of the district. SEC. 5. That if, according to said returns, the constitution shall be ratified by a majority of the votes of the registered electors qualified as herein specified, cast at said election (at least one half of all the registered voters voting upon the question of such ratification), the president of the convention shall transmit a copy of the same, duly certified, to the President of the United States, who shall forthwith transmit the same to Congress, if then in session, and if not in session, then immediately upon its next assembling; and if it shall, moreover, appear to Congress, that the election was one at which all the registered and qualified electors in the State had an opportunity to vote freely and without restraint, fear, or the influence of fraud, and if the Congress shall be satisfied that such constitution meets the approval of a majority of all the qualified electors in the State, and if the said constitution shall be declared by Congress to be in conformity with the provisions of the act to which this is supplementary, and the other provisions of said act shall have been complied with, and the said constitution shall be approved by Congress, the State shall be declared entitled to representation, and Senators and Representatives shall be admitted therefrom as therein provided. SEC. 6. All elections in the States mentioned in the said ‘Act to provide for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States,’ shall, during the operation of said act, be by ballot; and all officers making the said registration of voters and conducting said elections shall, before entering upon the discharge of their duties, take and subscribe the oath prescribed by the Act approved July 2, 1862, entitled ‘An Act to prescribe an Oath of Office:’ Provided, That if any person shall knowingly and falsely take and subscribe any oath in this act prescribed, such person so offending and being thereof duly convicted, shall be subject to the pains, penalties, and disabilities which by law are provided for the punishment of the crime of wilful and corrupt perjury.”

Mr. Johnson promised to carry out this act faithfully, but the Republican leaders had seen so often how little dependence was to be placed upon his pledges, that they did not think it prudent to adjourn without making provision for the calling of a Summer Session, should it prove to be necessary.

The event proved that this was a wise and needful precaution. In direct contradiction to his promises, Congress had hardly adjourned before Mr. Johnson procured from his Attorney-General, Mr. Stanbery, a series of opinions in regard to the Reconstruction Acts, in which, with a lawyer’s ingenuity, they were wrested from their plain and obvious meaning, and explained to be merely measures of military police, of no particular importance. The first of these opinions, bearing date May 24, the President had forwarded to the various military commanders, accompanied with a note calling their attention to it. It was his obvious intention, though he was too disingenuous to say so distinctly, that it should be regarded as mandatory; and by this device he hoped to annul the Reconstruction Acts.

This artful trick rendered it necessary to summon Congress to meet on the 4th of July, 1867, and they promptly passed another supplementary Reconstruction Act, in terms so plain and unmistakable that even the Attorney-General could not subvert its meaning, and the execution of the act was conferred on the General-in-chief and the commanders of the military districts, instead of the President. This act was passed July 13, in the Senate by a vote of 31 to 6; in the House by 111 to 23. Mr. Johnson vetoed it (of course) on the 19th of July, and it was at once passed over the veto; in the Senate by a vote of 30 to 6, in the House by 100 to 22. The bill was as follows:—

“SEC. 1. That it is hereby declared to have been the true intent and meaning of the Act of the 2d day of March, 1867, entitled ‘An Act to provide for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States,’ and the act supplementary thereto, passed the 23d of March, 1867, that the governments then existing in the Rebel States of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Texas, and Arkansas, were not legal State governments; and that thereafter said governments, if continued, were to be continued subject in all respects to the military commanders of the respective districts, and to the paramount authority of Congress.

“SEC. 2. That the commander of any district named in said act shall have power, subject to the disapproval of the General of the army of the United States, and to have effect until disapproved, whenever, in the opinion of such commander, the proper administration of said act shall require it, to suspend or remove from office, or from the performance of official duties, and the exercise of official powers, any officer or person holding or exercising, or professing to hold or exercise, any civil or military office or duty in such district, under any power, election, appointment, or authority derived from, or granted by, or claimed under, any so-called State, or the government thereof, or any municipal or other division thereof; and upon such suspension or removal such commander, subject to the approval of the General as aforesaid, shall have power to provide from time to time for the performance of the said duties of such officer or person so suspended or removed, by the detail of some competent officer or soldier of the army, or by the appointment of some other person to perform the same, and to fill vacancies occasioned by death, resignation, or otherwise.

“SEC. 3. That the General of the army of the United States shall be invested with all the powers of suspension, removal, appointment, and detaching, granted in the preceding section to district commanders.

“SEC. 4. That the acts of the officers of the army, already done in removing in said districts persons exercising the functions of civil officers, and appointing others in their stead, are hereby confirmed; provided that any persons heretofore or hereafter appointed by any district commander to exercise the functions of any civil office may be removed either by the military officer in command of the district, or by the general of the army, and it shall be the duty of such commander to remove from office, as aforesaid, all persons who are disloyal to the government of the United States, or who use their official influence in any manner to hinder, delay, prevent or obstruct the due and proper administration of this act and the acts to which it is supplementary.

“SEC. 5. That the boards of registration provided for in the act entitled ‘An Act supplementary to an Act entitled “An Act to provide for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States,” passed March 2, 1867, and to facilitate Restoration,” passed March 23, 1867, shall have power, and it shall be their duty, before allowing the registration of any person, to ascertain, upon such facts or information as they can obtain, whether such person is entitled to be registered under said act, and the oath required by said act shall not be conclusive on such question; and no person shall be registered unless such board shall decide that he is entitled thereto; and such board shall also have power to examine under oath, to be administered by any member of such board, any one touching the qualification of any person claiming registration; but in every case of refusal by the board to register an applicant, and in every case of striking his name from the list, as hereinafter provided, the board shall make a note or memorandum, which shall be returned with the registration list to the commanding general of the district, setting forth the ground of such refusal or such striking from the list: Provided, that no person shall be disqualified as a member of any board of registration by reason of race or color.

“SEC. 6. That the true intent and meaning of the oath presented in said supplementary act is (among other things), that no person who has been a member of the legislature of any State, or who has held any executive or judicial office in any State, whether he has taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States or not, and whether he was holding such office at the commencement of the rebellion or had held it before, and who has afterwards engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof, is entitled to be registered or vote; and the words ‘executive or judicial’ office in any State, in said oath mentioned, shall be construed to include all civil offices created by law for the administration of any general law of a State, or for the administration of justice.

“SEC. 7. That the time for completing the original registration provided for in any act may, in the discretion of the commander of any district, be extended to the 1st day of October, 1867; and the board of registration shall have power, and it shall be their duty, commencing fourteen days prior to any election under said act, and upon reasonable public notice of the time and place thereof, to revise for a period of five days the registration lists, and upon being satisfied that any person not entitled thereto has been registered, to strike the name of such person from the list, and such person shall not be allowed to vote. And such board shall also, during the same period, add to each registry the names of all persons who at that time possess the qualifications required by said act, who have not been already registered, and no person shall at any time be entitled to be registered or to vote by reason of any executive pardon or amnesty, for any act or thing which, without such pardon or amnesty, would disqualify him from registration or voting.

“SEC. 8. That all members of said boards of registration, and all persons hereafter elected or appointed to office in said military districts under any so-called State or municipal authority, or by detail or appointment of the district commander, shall be required to take and subscribe to the oath of office prescribed by law for the officers of the United States.

“SEC. 9. That no district commander or member of the board of registration, or any officer or appointee acting under them, shall be bound in his action by any opinion of any civil officer of the United States.

“SEC. 10. That section four of said last-named act shall be construed to authorize the commanding general named therein, whenever he shall deem it needful, to remove any member of a board of registration, and to appoint another in his stead, and to fill any vacancy in such board.

“SEC. 11. That all the provisions of this act, and of the acts to which this is supplementary, shall be construed liberally, to the end that all the intents thereof may be fully and perfectly carried out.”

A bill was also passed appropriating $1,675,000 to carry out the Reconstruction Acts, which was vetoed, and passed over the veto; in the Senate by 32 to 4, and in the House by 100 to 24. The Senate passed a bill, 25 to 5, providing that in the District of Columbia no person should be disqualified for holding office on account of race or color. The President sent in a communication, stating that the annual cost of maintaining State Governments in the ten States was $14,000,000, and if the General Government undertook to manage them it would be greater; also that if it abolished the present State Governments, it would be liable for their debts, amounting to at least $100,000,000. The House passed a resolution, 100 to 18, declaring this communication “at war with the principles of international law, a deliberate stab at the national credit, abhorrent to every sentiment of loyalty, and well pleasing only to the vanquished traitors by whose agency alone the governments of said States were overthrown and destroyed.”

Such was the legislation on the subject of reconstruction during the year 1867. We shall see in our next chapter what was done by the military authorities and the people of the desolated States, during the year, to carry out these measures.

With a glance at the condition of these States early in the year, we close our present chapter. The winter of 1866–67 was one of great and widely extended suffering. The crops had been short, and of inferior quality, and for want of help many of them had not been fully gathered. In some sections there was actual starvation. Over $500,000 had been raised in the Northern States and distributed mostly in breadstuffs to those who were most in need. Congress, in March, authorized the distribution of aid to a limited extent through the Freedmen’s Bureau. In April, 65,000 persons received rations daily through the Freedmen’s Bureau, in Alabama alone, and 20,000 more were on the verge of distress. There was also prevalent a deplorable state of lawlessness. Bands of armed men, ruffians, mostly bushwhackers, formerly connected with the Rebel army, roamed through many districts, plundering and burning property, and destroying the lives of loyal men, white and black, often under circumstances of peculiar atrocity. Some parts of the South, and especially Kentucky, Middle and Western Tennessee, Louisiana, and Texas, seemed given over to anarchy.

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LXXXIV. THE WORK OF RESTORATION

Votes on the Fourteenth Constitutional Amendment.—The New States and Reconstructed States likely to vote for it.—Action of the Commanders of the Military Districts.—The Fifth District.—Measures adopted by General Sheridan.—His Reasons for them.—Further Action of General Sheridan.—Governor Wells removed, and Governor Flanders appointed.—Incidents in Charleston: The Railroad Cars; The Flag at the Charleston Fire Parade.—General Sickles’ Order No. 10: Its Provisions.—Attorney-General Stanbery’s Objections to it.—Other Orders of General Sickles.—He asks to be relieved of his Command.—Troubles in General Pope’s District.—Insubordination of Governor Jenkins: General Pope asks that he be removed; General Grant’s Indorsement.—Riot in Mobile.—In Richmond.—Registration, and Powers of Military Commanders.—The Interference of the Attorney-General.—His Written Opinions.—General Grant decides that they are not Mandatory.—General Sheridan’s Opinion of them.—Removal of Throckmorton.—Sheridan’s Complaint of Rousseau.—The Removal of Secretary Stanton determined upon, and of General Sheridan also.—The President’s Letter to Stanton.—Stanton’s Reply.—General Grant’s Private Letter to the President.—Stanton suspended, and Grant appointed Secretary of War ad interim.—The Order for Sheridan’s Removal.—General Grant’s Protest.—The President’s Reply.—Thomas appointed to the Fifth District, but declines on account of his Health.—Hancock appointed.—General Griffin’s Death.—General Sickles’ Removal.—Generals Canby and Mower’s Orders.—The President’s two Proclamations.—Who are to be amnestied.—The President’s Pardons.—General Hancock’s Special Order.—The President’s delight with it.—He proposes that Congress shall make a Public Recognition of the General’s Patriotism.—Congress “don’t see it.”—Measures of General Hancock.—General Grant revokes his Orders.—Hancock asks to be relieved, and is appointed by the President to the Command of the New Department of Washington.—The New Constitutions.—Alabama: The Measures of the Rebels to prevent the adoption of the Constitution.—The Constitutions of the other States adopted.—Vote on Convention and Constitution.

Before proceeding to give an account of the progress of reconstruction under the Congressional acts, in the Desolated States, we subjoin the following table of the votes of the Legislatures of the several States on the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which was submitted to them for ratification on the 13th June, 1866:—

VOTES OF STATE LEGISLATURES ON THE FOURTEENTH CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT.

LOYAL STATES.

RATIFIED—TWENTY-ONE STATES.

Maine.—Senate, January 16, 1867, yeas 31, nays 0. House, January 11, 1867, yeas 126, nays 12.

New Hampshire.—Senate. July 6, 1866, yeas 9, nays 3. House, June 28, 1866, yeas 207, nays 112.

Vermont.—Senate, October 23, 1866, yeas 28, nays 0. House, October 30, 1866, yeas 199, nays 11.

Massachusetts.—Senate, March 20, 1867, yeas 27, nays 6. House, March 14, 1867, yeas 120, nays 20.

Rhode Island.—Senate, February 5, 1867, yeas 26, nays 2. House, February 7, 1867, yeas 60, nays 9.

Connecticut.—Senate, June 25, 1866, yeas 11, nays 6. House, June 29, 1866, yeas 131, nays 92.

New York.—Senate, January 3, 1867, yeas 23, nays 3. House, January 10, 1867, yeas 76, nays 40.

New Jersey.—Senate, September 11, 1866, yeas 11, nays 10. House, September 11, 1866, yeas 34, nays 24.

Pennsylvania.—Senate, January 17, 1867, yeas 20, nays 9. House, February 6, 1867, yeas 58, nays 29.

West Virginia.—Senate, January 15, 1867, yeas 15, nays 3. House, January 16, 1867, yeas 43, nays 11.

Ohio.—Senate, January 3, 1867, yeas 21, nays 12. House, January 4, 1867, yeas 54, nays 25.

Tennessee.—Senate, July 11, 1866, yeas 15, nays 6. House, July 12, 1866, yeas 43, nays 11.

Indiana.—Senate, January 16, 1867, yeas 29, nays 18. House, January 23, 1867, yeas—, nays—.

Illinois.—Senate, January 10, 1867, yeas 17, nays 7. House, January 15, 1867, yeas 59, nays 25.

Michigan.—Senate, January, 1867, yeas 25, nays 1. House, January, 1867, yeas 77, nays 15.

Missouri.—Senate, January 5, 1867, yeas 26, nays 6. House, January 8, 1867, yeas 85, nays 34.

Minnesota.—Senate, January 16, 1867, yeas 16, nays 5. House, January 15, 1867, yeas 40, nays 6.

Kansas.—Senate, January 11, 1867, unanimously. House, January 10, 1867, yeas 75, nays 7.

Wisconsin.—Senate, January 23, 1867, yeas 22, nays 10. House, February 7, 1867, yeas 72, nays 12.

Oregon.—[25]Senate, September, 1866, yeas 13, nays 7. House, September 19, 1866, yeas 25, nays 22.

Nevada.—[25]Senate, January 22, 1867, yeas 14, nays 2. House, January 11, 1867, yeas 34, nays 4.

REJECTED—THREE STATES.

Delaware.—Senate, February. House, February 6, 1867, yeas 6, nays 15.

Maryland.—Senate, March 23, 1867, yeas 4, nays 13. House, March 23, 1867, yeas 12, nays 45.

Kentucky.—Senate, January 8, 1867, yeas 7, nays 24. House, January 8, 1867, yeas 26, nays 62.

NOT ACTED—THREE STATES.

Iowa, California, Nebraska.

INSURRECTIONARY STATES.

REJECTED—TEN STATES.

Virginia.—Senate, January 9, 1867, unanimously. House, January 9, 1867, 1 for amendment.

North Carolina.—Senate, December 13, 1866, yeas 1, nays 44. House, December 13, 1866, yeas 10, nays 93.

South Carolina.—Senate, —— ——. House, December 20, 1866, yeas 1, nays 95.

Georgia.—Senate, November 9, 1866, yeas 0, nays 36. House, November 9, 1866, yeas 2, nays 131.

Florida.—Senate, December 3, 1866, yeas 0, nays 20. House, December 1, 1866, yeas 0, nays 49.

Alabama.—Senate, December 7, 1866, yeas 2, nays 27. House, December 7, 1866, yeas 8, nays 69.

Mississippi.—Senate, January 30, 1867, yeas 0, nays 27. House, January 25, 1867, yeas 0, nays 88.

Louisiana.—Senate, February 5, 1867, unanimously. House, February 6, 1867, unanimously.

Texas.—Senate, —— ——. House, October 13, 1866, yeas 5, nays 67.

Arkansas.—Senate, December 15, 1866, yeas 1, nays 24. House, December 17, 1866, yeas 2, nays 68.

Of these States North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, and Arkansas, and possibly some of the other desolated States, will reverse their decision the present summer, and Nebraska, Iowa, and Colorado will also vote for it. On the other hand, New Jersey and Ohio, which have now Democratic Legislatures, have attempted, but in vain, to reverse their decisions and reject the Amendment. The votes of the reconstructed States will undoubtedly be sufficient to secure its adoption by the affirmative vote of the constitutional number (three fourths) of the States.

The commanders of the five military districts, Generals Meade, Sickles, Pope, Thomas, and Sheridan, after the passage of the Reconstruction Act, and its first supplement, issued their orders, insisting on obedience to its provisions, as according to the law they were required to do, but manifesting at the same time a disposition to interfere as little as possible with the existing civil government until the question of a constitutional convention could be voted on, and if called, a new constitution prepared and adopted, and the machinery of government set in motion under the new regime. Many leading citizens of the South, who had been prominent in the Rebellion, advised acquiescence in the Congressional plan, and while strong opposition was manifested in many quarters, it was hoped that there would be a general participation in the work of reorganization. The opposition was violent, and most strongly marked in the cities, where many of the leading papers, of Rebel antecedents, took an active part in abusing and berating Congress. The action of the military commander of the Fifth District, General Sheridan, in suppressing the violence of the Rebel opposition, was early and decided, as, indeed, was necessary. On the 27th of March, 1867, he removed from office Andrew S. Herron, Attorney-General of Louisiana, John T. Monroe, Mayor of New Orleans, and Edmund Abell, Judge of the first District Court of the city, and appointed in their places B. L. Lynch, Edward Heath, and W. W. Howe. In a note to General Grant, soon after, he assigned the following reasons for this action:—

“I did not deem it necessary to give any reason for the removal of these men, especially after the investigation made by the Military Board on the massacre of July 30, 1866, and the report of the Congressional Committee on the same massacre; but as some inquiry has been made for the cause of removal, I would respectfully state as follows: The court over which Judge Abell presided is the only Criminal Court in the city of New Orleans, and for a period of at least nine months previous to July 30, he had been educating a large portion of the community to the perpetration of this outrage, by almost promising no prosecution in his court against the offenders, in case such an event occurred. The records of this court will show that he fulfilled his promise, as not one of the guilty ones has been prosecuted. In reference to Andrew S. Herron, Attorney-General of the State of Louisiana, I considered it his duty to indict these men before this criminal court. This he failed to do, but went so far as to attempt to impose on the good sense of the whole nation by indicting the victims of the riot instead of the rioters—in other words, making the innocent guilty and the guilty innocent. He was, therefore, an abettor of and coadjutor with Judge Abell in bringing on the massacre of July 30. Mayor Monroe controlled the element engaged in this riot, and when backed by an attorney-general who would not prosecute the guilty, and a judge who advised the grand jury to find the innocent guilty and let the murderers go free, felt secure in engaging his police force in the riot and massacre. With these three men exercising a large influence on the worst elements of this city, giving to these elements an immunity for riot and bloodshed, the General-in-chief will see how insecure I felt in letting them occupy their present positions in the troubles which might occur in registration and voting in the reorganization.”

Monroe was mayor when New Orleans was captured by Farragut and Butler. He had been pardoned by the President and reëlected mayor.

Early in April, General Griffin, who was in command in Texas, wrote to General Sheridan, stating that, under the Military Bill, both the Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of that State were disqualified to act, and that he desired the immediate removal of Governor Throckmorton. General Sheridan forwarded the letter to General Grant, with his favorable recommendation indorsed thereon, and added that he feared he would be compelled to remove Governor Wells, of Louisiana, who was impeding him all he could. To this General Grant responded, April 3, advising him not to remove the governors at present, the question of the powers of military commanders being under consideration in the Cabinet. This ended the matter for the time being. On the 6th of April, General Sheridan telegraphed General Grant that he was nearly ready to proceed with the work of registration, and that “an authoritative decision, as to what classes are disfranchised, is very important.” General Grant replied, that the questions had been submitted to the Attorney-General, and that no answer had been received, adding, “Go on giving your interpretation of the law until answer is given.” Breaches in the Mississippi levees were very disastrous in March and April, and there had been a serious conflict in regard to Levee Commissioners. General Sheridan removed those officers May 2, and appointed others in their places. June 3, General Sheridan removed Governor Wells, and appointed Thomas J. Durant in his stead. June 4, he informed General Grant of his action, saying, “He has embarrassed me very much since I came in command, by his subterfuge and political chicanery. This necessary act will be approved here by every class and shade of political opinion. He has not a friend who is an honest man. Nothing will answer here but a bold and strong course, and in taking it, I am supported by every class and all parties.” Mr. Durant declining the office, General Sheridan, on the 6th, appointed Benjamin F. Flanders in his stead. Governor Wells declining to vacate the office, General Sheridan, on the 7th, addressed a note to him, stating that he had been informed that he disputed his right to remove him from office, which right he had previously acknowledged and urged. He concluded his note as follows: “I therefore send Brevet Brigadier-General James W. Forsyth, of my staff, to notify you that he is sent by me to eject you from the Governor’s room forcibly, unless you consider this notification as equivalent to ejection.” General Forsyth presented the communication on the 8th, when Governor Wells vacated, responding, “I surrender the office I hold only to the sword.” Governor Flanders went to New Orleans in 1842, was driven out of the city in 1861, by a body of Rebels, styling themselves a Vigilance Committee, for his devotion to the Union. He made his way to Cairo and Columbus, barely saving his life, and returned with Butler in 1862. In the fall of the same year he was elected a member of Congress. Upon his return, he was appointed City Treasurer, and shortly afterward was selected, by Secretary Chase, as supervising special agent for the Treasury Department for the District. He was connected with the Treasury Department from that time until his appointment as Governor. It having been reported that General Grant favored reprimanding Sheridan for the removal, the former telegraphed the latter, June 7, denying the report, saying, “There is not one word of truth in the story.” The bold action of General Sheridan caused great excitement, and rumors of his having been removed by the President were constantly set afloat.

In the Second District, Charleston was the scene of one or two interesting incidents in the earlier days of the enforcement of the Reconstruction Act. During the last ten days in March, the freedmen, who had been denied equal privileges in the cars, undertook to secure them by force, and several of them were arrested. Commissioner R. K. Scott, of the Freedmen’s Bureau, issued a circular, warning them that such attempts would only retard the acknowledgment of their rights, and that their only remedy was through legal process. The question was finally settled May 3, by the directors resolving to admit all classes alike. The arrested persons were released.

An annual parade of the Charleston fire department was to have taken place at ten o’clock on the morning of the 27th of April. As it was about starting, it was observed that it did not bear the American flag. General Sickles thereupon addressed the chief engineer a note, stating that, at the previous parade, regrets had been expressed at the absence of the national emblem, and ordering that the Stars and Stripes be borne at the head of the column; that an escort of honor be detailed to escort it, and that each person in the procession salute it. The order was obeyed, the procession being delayed until the ensign was procured.

General Sickles issued an order, April 10, known as General Order No. 10, designed to relieve the destitute, which attracted considerable attention. It prohibited imprisonment for debt, except for fraud; directed that judgments on actions arising during the Rebellion should not be enforced; sheriffs’ sales on process prior to December 19, 1860, were suspended for a year; allowed process to continue judgments entered since May 15, 1865; suspended all proceedings for the recovery of money in the purchase of negroes; protected advances of moneys and materials for agricultural purposes, and made wages a lien; provided a homestead exemption of $500; declared United States currency legal tenders; property of an absent debtor should not be taken under foreign attachment, but aliens should not be disturbed; other provisions relative to criminal proceedings were set aside; the carrying of deadly weapons was prohibited; corporeal punishment was abrogated; the punishment of death in cases of burglary and larceny was abolished, and terms of imprisonment substituted; the governors of North and South Carolina were authorized to reprieve or pardon criminals sentenced by civil courts. The order closed with these words: “Any law or ordinance heretofore in force in North Carolina or South Carolina, inconsistent with the provisions of this general order, are hereby suspended and declared inoperative.” It gave great satisfaction in South Carolina, on account of the features staying executions in civil cases.

In an opinion addressed to the President, June 12, Attorney-General Stanbery strongly objected to the issuing of this and other orders, which he said began to assume the dimensions of a Code. He said that under it the commanding general assumed, “not only a power to suspend the laws, but to declare them generally inoperative, and assuming full powers of legislation by the military authority.” The Attorney-General proceeded: “The ground upon which these extraordinary powers are based is thus set forth in military order No. 1, issued in this district: ‘The civil government now existing in North Carolina and South Carolina is provisional only, and in all respects subject to the paramount authority of the United States at any time to abolish, modify, control, or supersede the same.’ Thus far the provisions of the Act of Congress are well recited. What follows is in these words: ‘Local laws and municipal regulations not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States, or the proclamations of the President, or with such regulations as are or may be prescribed in the orders of the commanding general, are hereby declared to be in force, and, in conformity therewith, civil officers are hereby authorized to continue the exercise of their proper functions, and will be respected and obeyed by the inhabitants.’ This construction of his powers under the act of Congress places military commanders on the same footing as the Congress of the United States. It assumes that ‘the paramount authority of the United States at any time to abolish, modify, control, or supersede,’ is invested in him as fully as it is reserved to Congress.”

The Attorney-General conceded that the orders were issued under an honest belief they were necessary or expedient, and warranted by the act of Congress, but he protested against the assumption of such powers, as full of evil and mischief.

General Sickles issued an order, April 18, establishing a Provost Court in the military post of Aiken, S. C., in consequence of “it having become apparent that justice to freedmen cannot be obtained in the civil courts within that post.” The court was given jurisdiction of any case to which a person of color was a party, except murder, arson, and rape. On the 23d of April, he issued an order prohibiting the sale or gift of liquors to United States soldiers, sailors, or marines, and giving post commanders supervision over all sheriffs and police within their commands, and directing them, “whenever necessary for the preservation of order, and the efficient discharge of their duties, to assume command of the police force.” It having been alleged that the supply of food had been greatly diminished by distillation; that distillers defrauded the revenue, and maltreated the collectors when endeavoring to collect the tax; and that the practice of distillation tended to increase poverty, disorder, and crime, he issued an order May 30, prohibiting the distillation of grain.

The strictures of the Attorney-General were received in Charleston June 19, and the same day General Sickles forwarded a request to Washington to be relieved from duty, and demanded a court of inquiry on his official actions. He was subsequently relieved, but the court of inquiry was not granted.

Third District.—Early in April, movements were instituted in Washington to enjoin the enforcement of the Reconstruction Act, in the name of the State of Georgia. (A similar movement was made on the part of Mississippi). On the 10th of April, Governor Jenkins, of Georgia, issued an address to the people of the State, dated at Washington, advising them to take no action under the Reconstruction law until its constitutionality could be tested. On the 24th, General Pope addressed him a note, reminding him that it was his duty, under the law, to place no impediment in the way of reconstruction, and that if he did, he was liable to removal. General Pope likewise addressed General Grant on the subject. His letter contained the following paragraph:—

“The ill effects of permitting the whole power of the provisional State government, through all its civil departments and in all its ramifications, to be used to frustrate the acts of Congress, and to keep up the disturbed condition of the public mind, cannot be overstated. No reconstruction is possible, and it will be next to impossible to secure faithful administration of the laws, while such influences are allowed to go on unchecked, unless the entire civil government is overthrown and the military substituted. I deem it of the last importance to arrest it now, in the person of Provisional Governor Jenkins. If he is permitted to set authority at defiance, it will be useless to notice such offenses committed by the minor officers.”

General Grant forwarded the letter to the War Department, indorsed as follows:—

“Respectfully forwarded to the Secretary of War for his information. The telegraphic despatch herein inclosed shows that Governor Jenkins, of Georgia, has given such pledges to the commander of the Third District as to induce him to withhold, for the present, his order suspending the Governor.

“The conduct of Governor Jenkins demonstrates, however, how possible it is for discontented civil officers of the reconstructed States to defeat the laws of Congress, if the power does not exist with the district commanders to suspend their functions for cause in some way. It seems clear to me that the power is given in the bill ‘for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States,’ to use or not, at the pleasure of district commanders, the provisional machinery set up without the authority of Congress, in the States to which the Reconstruction Act applies. There being doubt, however, on this point, I would respectfully ask an early opinion on the subject.

“If the power of removal does not exist with district commanders, then it will become necessary for them to take refuge under that section of the Bill which authorizes military commissions.

“U. S. GRANT, General.

“HEAD-QUARTERS, ARMIES UNITED STATES, April 22, 1867.”

A riot occurred in Mobile, May 14, on the occasion of a speech made by Judge Kelley, of Pennsylvania, who had been speaking in the South in favor of reorganizing under Congressional law. Four persons were killed and twenty wounded. A citizens’ meeting was held, composed of all parties, which denounced the outrage. The Mayor and Chief of Police were censured, on an investigation into the affair, and, on the 22d of May, were removed, and others appointed in their stead.

A negro riot took place in Richmond, May 9, on the occasion of an engine trial, when a thousand negroes were dispersed at the point of the bayonet.

No events worthy of special notice occurred in the First and Fourth Districts, except the registration proceedings.

Registration, and the Powers of Military Commanders.—The military commanders had scarcely begun the work of registration before questions involving the construction of the law were originated. Different commanders construed the act differently, and of course conflicting instructions were given. Some were very stringent, and others more moderate. The one most widely variant from those generally issued, was issued by General Ord, June 10. The views of Secretary Stanbery and General Grant, respectively, are set forth in the following note, signed by General Grant, June 23:—

“I entirely dissent from the views contained in Paragraph IV. Your view as to the duty of registrars to register every man who will take the required oath, though they know the applicant perjures himself, is sustained by the views of the Attorney-General. My opinion is, that it is the duty of the Board of Registration to see, so far as it lies in their power, that no unauthorized person is allowed to register. To secure this end, registrars should be allowed to administer oaths and examine witnesses. The law, however, makes district commanders their own interpreters of their power and duty under it: and, in my opinion, the Attorney-General or myself can no more than give our opinion as to the meaning of the law; neither can enforce their views against the judgment of those made responsible for the faithful execution of the law,—the district commanders.”

The Attorney-General had addressed an opinion to the President, May 24, giving his interpretation of the law, so far as relates to registration, at length. Under it there were comparatively few who were not entitled to register. This opinion was forwarded to the various commanders by the President, with a note, directing attention to it. General Pope, June 27, telegraphed General Grant to learn whether the note of the President was mandatory or not, and received the following response:—

“Enforce your own construction of the Military Bill until ordered to do otherwise. The opinion of the Attorney-General has not been distributed to district commanders in language or manner entitling it to the force of an order, nor can I suppose that the President intended it to have such force.

“U. S. GRANT, General.”

A similar despatch was sent to General Sheridan the same day, in answer to a telegram. The latter officer, June 22, wrote to General Grant, that the opinion of the Attorney-General opened a “broad, macadamized road to perjury,” and that its effects were beginning to show themselves in organized opposition to all the acts of the military commanders. “Every civil officer in the State will administer justice according to his own views: many of them, denouncing the Military Bill as unconstitutional, will throw every impediment in the way of its execution.”

The Attorney-General gave a lengthy opinion, June 12, to the effect that military commanders did not possess the power to remove State officers; that they could not take cognizance of past offenses; and generally confining their powers within limits more contracted than it had been supposed was the scope of the law.

Under the supplementary Reconstruction Act of July 23, the military commanders proceeded in the discharge of their duties. General Sheridan, on the 30th of July, issued an order in these words: “A careful consideration of the reports of Brevet Major-General Charles Griffin, U. S. A., shows that J. W. Throckmorton, Governor of Texas, is an impediment to the reconstruction of that State under the law. He is, therefore, removed from that office. E. M. Pease is hereby appointed Governor of Texas, in place of J. W. Throckmorton, removed. He will be obeyed and respected accordingly.” Governor Pease took the oath of office, August 7, and Governor Throckmorton vacated the following day. On the 3d of August, General Sheridan informed General Grant that the work of registration in Louisiana was complete, and that “the State will, in all probability, come in as a Union State. In accomplishing this registration, I have had no opposition from the masses of the people; on the contrary, much assistance and encouragement; but from the public press, especially that of the city of New Orleans, and from office-holders and office-seekers disfranchised, I have met with bitterness and opposition. I have, as I have heretofore stated to you, permitted no political influence nor political machinery to help or influence me in this work. Receiving the law as an order, it was so executed. I regret that I have to make the charge against Brigadier-General L. H. Rousseau, U. S. A., of visiting my command recently, and without exhibiting any authority, interfering with my duties and suggesting my removal.”

President Johnson had long been dissatisfied with Secretary Stanton, who was friendly to the Congressional plan of reconstruction, and had aided so far as was in his power, in the faithful execution of the laws pertaining to that subject. The President was desirous of having his Cabinet composed wholly of men who would reflect his views and support him in the violation or careless and incomplete execution of the measures which he hated, and Stanton, whom he could not use or control, was to him a Mordecai sitting in the king’s gate, who would do him no reverence. He determined, therefore, to rid himself of him. Accordingly, on the 5th of August, he addressed a note to the Secretary, saying that public considerations of high character constrained him to say that his resignation as Secretary of War would be accepted. Secretary Stanton replied the same day in the following terms: “In reply, I have the honor to say, that public considerations of a high character, which alone have induced me to continue at the head of this department, constrain me not to resign the office of Secretary of War before the next meeting of Congress.” To this, the President made no direct reply. But his determination to drive Stanton from the War Department had been too long cherished to be relinquished, especially by a man of such a tenacious and wilful disposition as the President. He had intimated in the latter part of July, to General Grant, his intention of removing both Secretary Stanton and General Sheridan, the commander of the Fifth District, from their positions, and the General-in-chief, who well knew the value of the two men, in executing promptly and fairly the laws, had remonstrated in the following manly letter, which was only made public on the subsequent demand of Congress:—

“HEAD-QUARTERS ARMIES OF THE U. S., } WASHINGTON, D. C., August 1, 1867. }

“[Private.] “His Excellency, A. Johnson, President of the United States:

“SIR: I take the liberty of addressing you privately on the subject of the conversation we had this morning, feeling as I do the great danger to the welfare of our country, should you carry out the designs then expressed.

“1. On the subject of the displacement of the Secretary of War. His removal cannot be effected against his will without the consent of the Senate. It is but a short time since the United States Senate was in session, and why not then have asked for his removal, if it was desired? It certainly was the intention of the legislative branch of the Government to place the Cabinet Ministers beyond the power of Executive removal, and it is pretty well understood that, so far as Cabinet Ministers are affected by the Tenure of Office Bill, it was intended especially to protect the Secretary of War, whom the country felt great confidence in. The meaning of the law may be explained away by an astute lawyer, but common sense and the views of loyal people will give to it the effect intended by its framers.

“2. On the subject of the removal of the very able commander of the Fifth Military District, let me ask you to consider the effect it would have upon the public. He is unusually and deservedly beloved by the people who sustained this Government through its trials, and feared by those who would still be enemies of the Government.

“It fell to the lot of but few men to do as much against our armed enemy as General Sheridan did during the Rebellion; and it is within the scope of the ability of few, in this or other countries, to do what he has. His civil administration has given equal satisfaction. He has had difficulties to contend with which no other district commander has encountered. Almost, if not quite, from the day he was appointed district commander to the present time, the press has given out that he was to be removed; that the administration was dissatisfied with him, etc.

“This has emboldened the opponents to the laws of Congress within his command to oppose him in every way in their power, and has rendered necessary, measures which otherwise might never have been necessary.

“In conclusion, allow me to say, as a friend desiring peace and quiet, the welfare of the whole country, North and South, that it is, in my opinion, more than the loyal people of this country (I mean those who supported the Government during the great Rebellion) will quietly submit to, to see the very men of all others whom they have expressed confidence in, removed.

“I would not have taken the liberty of addressing the Executive of the United States thus, but for the conversation on the subject alluded to in this letter, and from a sense of duty, feeling that I know I am right in this matter.

“With great respect, your obedient servant, “U. S. GRANT, General.”

The President was not, as we have said, to be turned from his purpose. On the 12th of August, he notified Secretary Stanton that he was suspended from office from that date, and on the same day addressed a note to General Grant authorizing and requiring him to act as Secretary of War ad interim. General Grant informed Secretary Stanton of his assignment and acceptance, assuring him at the same time of his appreciation of the zeal, patriotism, firmness, and ability with which he had ever discharged his duties as Secretary of War. Mr. Stanton replied to both the President and the General; denying the power of the former to suspend him from office, without the consent of the Senate, and saying that he yielded under protest to superior force; and repeating the protest to the latter, while at the same time he assured him of his personal appreciation of his sentiments and patriotism.

Having thus, for the time (though not permanently, as he hoped), disposed of Secretary Stanton, Mr. Johnson next proceeded to issue an order, assigning General George H. Thomas to the command of the Fifth District, General Hancock to the Department of the Cumberland, and General Sheridan to the Department of Missouri, and directing the Secretary of War ad interim to issue the necessary instructions to carry the order into effect. A note from the President accompanied the order, that, before he issued the instructions, he would be pleased to receive any suggestions respecting the assignments. General Grant replied the same day in a note, from which the following is an extract:—

“I am pleased to avail myself of this invitation to urge, earnestly urge—urge in the name of a patriotic people, who have sacrificed hundreds of thousands of loyal lives, and thousands of millions of treasure, to preserve the integrity and union of this country—that this order be not insisted on. It is unmistakably the expressed wish of the country that General Sheridan should not be removed from his present command. This is a Republic, where the will of the people is the law of the land. I beg that their voice may be heard.

“General Sheridan has performed his civil duties faithfully and intelligently. His removal will only be regarded as an effort to defeat the laws of Congress. It will be interpreted by the unreconstructed element in the South—those who did all they could to break up this Government by arms, and now wish to be the only element consulted as to the method of restoring order—as a triumph. It will embolden them to renewed opposition to the will of the loyal masses, believing that they have the Executive with them.

“There are military reasons, pecuniary reasons, and, above all, patriotic reasons, why this order should not be insisted on.

“I beg to refer to a letter, marked private,[26] which I wrote to the President when first consulted on the subject of the change in the War Department. It bears upon the subject of this removal, and I had hoped would have prevented it.”

The President responded in a lengthy letter, dated the 19th. He had not intended to invite a formal report, but only a verbal statement of General Grant’s views. He was not aware that this question of removal of General Sheridan had been submitted to the people for their determination. He commended General Thomas’s abilities, and complained of the results of General Sheridan’s administration as producing a bitter spirit of antagonism. He had rendered himself exceedingly obnoxious, and his rule had been one of absolute tyranny. In his opinion, he should be removed.

General Grant issued the instructions required, August 19, attaching a clause, directing General Thomas to “continue to execute all orders he may find in force in the Fifth Military District at the time of his assuming command of it, unless authorized by the General of the Army to annul, alter, or modify them.” In consequence of the unfavorable condition of General Thomas’s health, the President issued an order, August 26, assigning General Hancock to the Fifth District, directing him to “proceed directly to New Orleans, Louisiana, and, assuming the command to which he is hereby assigned, he will, when necessary to a faithful execution of the laws, exercise any and all powers conferred by acts of Congress upon district commanders, and all authority pertaining to officers in command of military departments.” General Grant issued the necessary instructions. General Sheridan was directed to turn over his command to Major-General Charles Griffin, which he at once proceeded to do. He then came North, visited many of the principal cities, in all of which he was enthusiastically received. General Griffin assumed command, September 7, and issued an order, in which he directed that “all existing orders should remain in full.” General Griffin soon died, of yellow fever, and Brevet Major-General Joseph A. Mower assuming command, reiterated the same order.

The President issued an order, August 26, relieving Major-General Daniel E. Sickles, and assigning Brevet Major-General Edward R. S. Canby to the command, of the Second District. General Canby assumed command, September 5, and in his order adopted and confirmed all existing orders and regulations.

General Canby issued an order, September 14, declaring tax-payers registered as voters, qualified to serve as jurors. General Mower issued an order, September 28, declaring all persons registered in Texas qualified to act as jurymen.

General Grant issued an order, August 29, as General of the Army, directing that commanders of the military districts created under the Act of March 2, 1867, should make no appointments to civil office of persons who have been removed, by themselves or their predecessors in command.

On the 3d of September, apparently in vindication of his previous acts, President Johnson issued a proclamation declaring the supremacy of the Constitution, the Laws, and the decisions of the Civil Courts, warning all persons against obstructing them, and enjoining all civil and military officers to enforce them.

On the 8th of September, 1867, the President issued another amnesty proclamation, in which he declared the people of the unreconstructed States loyally disposed, deprecated a vindictive policy, and extended the benefits of the Amnesty Proclamation of May 29, 1865, to all persons except the following:—

First. The chief, or pretended chief executive officers, including the President, Vice-President, and all heads of departments of the pretended Confederate or Rebel Government, and all who were agents thereof in foreign states and countries, and all who held, or pretended to hold, in the service of the said pretended Confederate Government, a military rank or title above the grade of Brigadier-General, or naval rank or title above that of Captain, and all who were, or pretended to be, governors of States while maintaining, abetting, submitting to, or acquiescing in, the Rebellion.

Second. All persons who, in any way, treated otherwise than as lawful prisoners of war, persons who, in any capacity, were employed or engaged in the military or naval service of the United States.

Third. All persons who, at the time they may seek to obtain the benefits of this proclamation, are actually in civil, military, or naval confinement or custody, or legally held to bail either before or after conviction; and all persons who were engaged directly or indirectly in the assassination of the late President of the United States, or in any plot or conspiracy in any manner therewith connected.

This proclamation further declared the amnestied persons restored to all privileges, immunities, and rights of property, except as to property with regard to slaves, and except in cases of legal proceedings under the laws of the United States.

This proclamation amnestied a very large number of Rebels, and left very few to be excepted from pardon, and the greater part of these received special pardons from the President upon application, without any professions of repentance being required. Other cases also received the Executive clemency, greatly to the prejudice of all efforts to bring offenders to justice. Every counterfeiter or forger of the national currency or bonds, every man who had defrauded the Government during the war, by means of spurious claims, and every one who was detected in the attempt to cheat the Government of its dues in the way of internal revenue, was promptly pardoned by the Executive, generally on the first application.

General Hancock assumed command of the Fifth Military District on the 29th of November, 1867, and issued a special order on taking command, of which the second item was the most important, as containing an exposition of his intentions in regard to the military and civil government of the district. It was as follows:—

“Second. The General commanding is gratified to learn that peace and quiet reign in this department. It will be his purpose to preserve this condition of things. As a means to this great end, he regards the maintenance of the civil authorities in the faithful execution of the laws, as the most efficient under existing circumstances. In war it is indispensable to repel force by force, and overthrow and destroy opposition to authority; but when insurrectionary force has been overthrown and peace established, and the civil authorities are ready and willing to perform their duties, the military power should cease to lead, and the civil administration resume its natural and rightful dominion. Solemnly impressed with these views, the General announces that the great principles of American liberty still are the lawful inheritance of this people, and ever should be. The right of trial by jury, the habeas corpus, the liberty of the press, the freedom of speech, and the natural rights of persons and the rights of property must be preserved. Free institutions, while they are essential to the prosperity and happiness of the people, always furnish the strongest inducements to peace and order. Crimes and offenses committed in the district must be referred to the consideration and judgment of the regular civil authorities, and these tribunals will be supported in their lawful jurisdiction. Should there be violations of existing laws, which are not inquired into by the civil magistrates, or should failures in the administration of justice by the courts be complained of, the cases will be reported to these Head-quarters, when such orders will be made as may be deemed necessary. While the General thus indicates his purpose to respect the liberties of the people, he wishes all to understand that armed insurrections or forcible resistance to law, will be instantly suppressed by arms.”

President Johnson had at last, after much tribulation, found a district commander after his own heart; and though it was soon found that General Hancock removed loyal men from office, and, so far as he could, put disloyal ones in their place, and that he was winning the praise of every rebel in his district and the hearty dislike of every loyal citizen, yet the President was so delighted with his course and his proclamations, that on the 18th of December, 1867, he sent a message to Congress, in which, after the most fulsome commendation of the General, comparing him to Washington, and saying that to him belonged the distinguished honor of being the first officer in high command south of the Potomac, since the close of the civil war, who had given utterance to these noble sentiments in the form of a military order, he suggested to Congress, that some public recognition of General Hancock’s patriotic conduct was due, if not to him, to the friends of law and justice throughout the country. “Of such an act as his at such a time,” he continued, “it is best fitting that the dignity should be vindicated and the virtue proclaimed, so that its value as an example may not be lost to the nation.” Congress could not view General Hancock’s conduct in so praiseworthy a light, and they accordingly declined to make any public recognition of it.

On assuming command, General Hancock found in force an order issued by General Mower, who had been in temporary command, dated November 21, removing several State and other officers. These orders were revoked in different orders, and on the 3d of December, General Mower was relieved from duty as Commander of the District of Louisiana and Commissioner of Freedmen, and returned to his regiment. General Hancock also issued an order, December 5, revoking an order issued August 24, requiring persons to be sworn for registered voters, and restoring the State laws.

An order was issued from the Freedmen’s Bureau for the District of Louisiana, December 19, which provided that all differences between whites and freedmen, or between freedmen themselves, should first be referred to the civil courts for adjudication. The Bureau agents were to seek, in the first place, an amicable adjustment of difficulties, but if they failed in that, then resort was to be had to the courts, to which, also, all legal questions must be referred. They were likewise to act on behalf of the freedmen as attorneys, and in case planters refuse or neglect to pay their wages, if the courts fail to award justice, then the agents are to enforce it.

In January, General Hancock proceeded to remove the colored members of the Council of Education in New Orleans, on the alleged ground that they had transcended their powers and duties, and to put Rebels in their places. General Grant, on investigation, ordered him to reinstate the members he had removed. He complied with the order, but requested to be relieved from his command, and after some delay his request was granted, and the President created a new Military Department of Washington, including Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and the District of Columbia, and after trying several other officers, placed Major-General Hancock in command of it. Meantime, the voting for the constitutional conventions, under the Reconstruction Act, had resulted in the decision to hold conventions in all the desolated States, and the conventions had begun to assemble. The first to convene was that of Alabama, November 5. It consisted of one hundred delegates, sixty-one of whom signed the new Constitution, and sixteen protested against it. Its provisions were substantially the same with those of the other States, which followed in its train, and we therefore quote them as examples of the general character of these constitutions.

It declared all men created equal; persons born in the United States or naturalized, to be citizens of the State of Alabama, possessing equal civil and political rights and public privileges, and prohibiting slavery. The following is the article in regard to suffrage:—

“In all elections by the people, the electors shall vote by ballot. Every male person born in the United States, and every person who has been naturalized, or who has legally declared his intentions to become a citizen of the United States, twenty-one years old or upwards, who shall have resided in this State six months next preceding the election, and three months in the county in which he offers to vote, except as hereinafter provided, shall be deemed an elector.

“Soldiers, sailors, and marines in the United States service are not permitted to vote by reason of being stationed in the State on duty. Registration must be provided for by the General Assembly, and the following persons are not permitted to register.

“First. Those who during the late Rebellion inflicted or caused to be inflicted any cruel or unusual punishment upon any soldier, sailor, or marine, employee, or citizen of the United States, or who in any other way violated the rules of civilized warfare.

“Second. Those who may be disqualified from holding office by the proposed amendment to the Constitution of the United States, known as Article XIV., and those who have been disqualified from registering to vote for delegates to the Convention to frame a Constitution for the State of Alabama, under the act of Congress ‘to provide for the more efficient Government of the Rebel States,’ passed by Congress March 2, 1867, and the acts supplementary thereto, except such persons as aided in the reconstruction proposed by Congress, and accept the political equality of all men before the law: Provided, That the General Assembly shall have power to remove the disabilities incurred under this clause.

“Third. Those who shall have been convicted of treason, embezzlement of public funds, malfeasance in office, crime punishable by law with imprisonment in the penitentiary, or bribery.

“Fourth. Those who are idiots or insane.

“All persons, before registering, must take and subscribe the following oath: ‘I, ——, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and maintain the Constitution and laws of the United States, and the Constitution and laws of the State of Alabama; that I am not excluded from registering by any of the clauses in section 8, article 7, of the Constitution of the State of Alabama; that I will never countenance or aid in the secession of this State from the United States; that I accept the civil and political equality of all men, and agree not to attempt to deprive any person or persons, on account of race, color, or previous condition, of any political or civil right, privilege, or immunity, enjoyed by any other class of men; and furthermore, that I will not in any way injure, or countenance in others any attempt to injure, any person or persons, on account of past or present support of the Government of the United States, the laws of the United States, or the principle of the political and civil equality of all men, or for affiliation with any political party.’”

The Convention adjourned December 6, and the Constitution was submitted to the people on the 4th and 5th of February, 1868. The Rebels and those opposed to the Constitution, and to the Congressional policy of reconstruction, used every device to defeat it. The provisions of the Reconstruction Act required that for the adoption of the Constitution, there must be a majority of the whole number of registered voters, and taking advantage of this, the Rebels registered as many names as possible (many, it was believed, fraudulently), and then, when the time came for voting, they not only kept away from the polls themselves, but by threats, by discharging from their employ every colored man who would vote, and by a general system of terrorism, sought to prevent as many as possible from voting. The registration was 170,631 voters, but the registry of four counties was illegal and fraudulent. This reduced the whole number of registered voters to 156,945; and the lowest number required for ratification of the Constitution was 78,473. The actual legal vote, under these adverse influences, was 70,359, or 8,114 short of the vote required. Of these 70,359 votes, 62,089 were for the Constitution. Under the existing law, therefore, the Constitution failed of ratification.

The Louisiana Convention met November 23. It adopted for its first article, that all men were born free and equal, and on the 28th of December, enacted the following as its second article: “All persons, without regard to race, color, or previous condition, born and naturalized in the United States, and residents of this State for one year, are citizens of this State. They shall enjoy the same civil, political, and public rights and privileges, and be subject to the same pains and penalties.”

This Constitution was voted upon in April, and was ratified by a majority of over 17,000 votes.

The Georgia Convention met on the 12th of December, and sat through nearly the whole of January. The Constitution formed by it was adopted in April, by about 18,000 majority.

The Florida Convention met January 20, 1868. At first there was considerable difficulty—two factions existing in the Convention, which seemed determined to divide and ruin its councils; but through the friendly interference of General Meade, who had succeeded to General Pope in command of the district on the 28th of December, 1867, the two parties were reconciled, and the Convention perfected its Constitution, which was ratified by the people early in May, by about 3,000 majority.

In South Carolina the Convention was called by a large majority, and met on —— ——. Its Constitution was ratified in April, by a majority of over 36,000, in a registry of 127,550, and a vote of 85,843.

North Carolina adopted her new Constitution also in April, by nearly 30,000 majority.

Arkansas voted on her new Constitution in May, and ratified it by about 2,000 majority.

Virginia, Mississippi, and Texas have each held their conventions and framed constitutions, but they have not yet been submitted to the people.[27]

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Footnote 25:

Unofficial.

Footnote 26:

See this letter on a preceding page.

Footnote 27:

According to the most complete returns now available, the vote of the registration and for a convention to form a constitution in all the desolated States, except Texas, was substantially as follows:—

──────────────┬─────────────────────────────┬────────────────────────── STATES. │ REGISTRATION.[28] │ CONVENTION. ──────────────┼─────────┬─────────┬─────────┼────────┬────────┬──────── │ White. │Colored. │ Total. │ For. │Against.│ Not │ │ │ │ │ │Voting. ──────────────┼─────────┼─────────┼─────────┼────────┼────────┼──────── Alabama │ 74,450│ 90,350│ 166,289│ 87,672│ 5,683│ 72,934 Arkansas │ 33,047│ 21,207│ 66,805│ 27,576│ 13,558│ 25,671 Florida │ 10,804│ 15,234│ 27,521│ 13,882│ 111│ 13,528 Georgia │ 95,214│ 93,458│ 188,672│ 102,282│ 4,127│ 82,263 Louisiana │ 45,199│ 84,431│ 129,630│ 75,083│ 4,006│ 50,541 Mississippi │ 46,636│ 60,167│ 139,327│ 69,739│ 6,277│ 63,311 North Carolina│ 103,060│ 71,657│ 174,717│ 57,359│ 18,635│ [29] South Carolina│ 45,751│ 79,535│ 125,286│ 60,278│ 1,480│ 63,528 Texas │ 59,666│ 47,430│ 107,096│ │ │ Virginia │ 116,982│ 104,772│ 221,754│ 107,342│ 61,887│ 52,525 ──────────────┼─────────┼─────────┼─────────┼────────┼────────┼──────── Total │ 630,809│ 668,241│1,347,097│ 601,213│ 115,764│ 424,301 ──────────────┴─────────┴─────────┴─────────┴────────┴────────┴────────

The latest available reports in regard to the adoption of the constitutions and the election of legislatures in these States are as follows:—

Total For Against. White Against. Colored Against. vote. Constitution. for. for.

Alabama 71,817 70,812 1,005 5,802 900 62,089 105

South 98,046 70,758 27,288 Carolina[28]

Arkansas[29] 19,978 10,985 8,993

North Majority for Constitution over 25,000 Carolina—

Georgia Majority for Constitution over 17,923

Louisiana Majority for Constitution over 17,000

Florida Majority for Constitution over 3,000

The Governors elected in these States were, South Carolina, —— ——; Arkansas, —— ——; North Carolina, W. W. Holden; Georgia, —— Bullock; Louisiana, H. C. Warmoth; Florida, —— Reed. The Governors were all Republicans. The Legislatures had also in every case a Republican majority, in some cases a very large one. In Georgia, the Senate stood 27 Republicans to 16 Democrats, and 1 doubtful; the House, 96 Republicans to 24 Democrats, and 6 doubtful. In North Carolina, the Republicans had 32 out of the 50 Senators, and 68 of the 122 Representatives. In Louisiana, the Republicans had 21 out of 36 Senators, and 56 out of 101 Representatives. The other States had generally large majorities on the Republican side.

The Senators from all these States were Republicans, and the Representatives in Congress were of the same party, except three from Georgia, and one from Louisiana, whose seat was to be contested.

Footnote 28:

In a number of the States, a discrepancy will be observed between the white and colored registries and the total. It arises from the fact that we have used official totals where we could obtain them, giving incomplete divisions of the races when we could obtain nothing better.

Footnote 29:

The returns of the vote in this State are so incomplete that the number not voting cannot be given.

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