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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



enemy intrenched on impregnable heights would 

 act unwisely if he insisted on marching his troops 

 full in the face of a destructive fire merely to 

 show his courage. "Would it not be better to 

 flank the works and march reund and round 

 and besiege, and thus secure the surrender of 

 the enemy, though it might cost time ? The 

 former course would show valor and folly ; the 

 latter moral and physical courage, as well as 

 prudence and wisdom. 



" This proposition is not all that the commit- 

 tee desired. It falls far short of my wishes, 

 but it fulfils my hopes. I believe it is all that 

 can be obtained in the present state of public 

 opinion. Not only Congress but the several 

 States are to be consulted. Upon a careful 

 survey of the whole ground, we did not believe 

 that nineteen of the loyal States could be in- 

 duced to ratify any proposition more stringent 

 than this. I say nineteen, for I utterly repudi- 

 ate and scorn the idea that any State not acting 

 in the Union is to be counted on the question 

 of ratification. It is absurd to suppose that 

 any more than three-fourths of the States that 

 propose the amendment are required to make 

 it valid ; that States not here are to be counted 

 as present. Believing, then, that this is the 

 best proposition that can be made effectual, I 

 accept it. I shall not be driven by clamor or 

 denunciation to throw away a great good be- 

 cause it is not perfect. I will take all I can get 

 in the cause of humanity, and leave it to be per- 

 fected by better men in better times. It may 

 be that that time will not come while I am here 

 to enjoy the glorious triumph ; but that it will 

 come is as certain as that there is a just God. 



" The House should remember the great labor 

 which the committee had to perform. They 

 were charged to inquire into the condition of 

 eleven States of great extent of territory. They 

 sought, often in vain, to procure their organic 

 laws and statutes. They took the evidence of 

 every class and condition of witness, from the 

 rebel vice-president and the commander-in- 

 chief of their armies down to the humblest freed- 

 man. The sub-committees who were charged 

 with that duty of whom I was not one, and can 

 therefore speak freely exhibited a degree of 

 patience and diligence which was never ex- 

 celled. Considering their other duties, the mass 

 of evidence taken may be well considered ex- 

 traordinary. It must be remembered, also, that 

 three months since, and more, the committee 

 reported and the House adopted a proposed 

 amendment fixing the basis of representation 

 in such way as would surely have secured the 

 enfranchisement of every citizen at no distant 

 period. That, together with the amendment 

 repudiating the rebel debt, which we also 

 passed, would have gone far to curb the rebel- 

 lious spirit of secession, and to have given to 

 the oppressed race their rights. It went to 

 the other end of the Capitol, and was there 

 mortally wounded in the house of its friends. 



" After having received the careful examina- 

 tion and approbation of the committee, and 



having received the united Eepublican vote of 

 one hundred and twenty Representatives of the 

 people, it was denounced as 'utterly repre- 

 hensible ' and ' unpardonable ; ' ' to be en- 

 countered as a public enemy; ' 'positively en- 

 dangering the peace of the country, and cover- 

 ing its name with dishonor.' ' ' A wickedness 

 on a larger scale than the crime against Kansas 

 or the fugitive slave law; gross, foul, out- 

 rageous; an incredible injustice against the 

 whole African race ; ' with every other vulgar 

 epithet which polished cultivation could com- 

 mand. It was slaughtered by a puerile and 

 pedantic criticism, by a perversion of philo- 

 logical definition which, if when I taught school 

 a lad who had studied Lindley Murray had as- 

 sumed, I would have expelled him from the in- 

 stitution as unfit to waste education upon. But 

 it is dead, and unless this (less efficient, I admit) 

 shall pass, its death has postponed the protec- 

 tion of the colored race perhaps for ages. I 

 confess my mortification at its defeat. I grieved 

 especially because it almost closed the door of 

 hope for the amelioration of the condition of the 

 freedmen. But men in pursuit of justice must 

 never despair. Let us again try and see whether 

 we cannot devise some way to overcome the 

 united forces of self-righteous Republicans and 

 unrighteous copperheads. It will not do for 

 those who for thirty years have fought the 

 beasts at Ephesus to be frightened by the fangs 

 of modern catamounts. 



" Let us now refer to the provisions of the 

 proposed amendment. 



" The first section prohibits the States from 

 abridging the privileges and immunities of citi- 

 zens of the United States, or unlawfully de- 

 priving them of life, liberty, or property, or of 

 denying to any person within their jurisdiction 

 the 'equal' protection of the laws. 



; ' I can hardly believe that any person can be 

 found who will not admit that every one of 

 these provisions is just. They are all asserted, 

 in some form or other, in our DECLARATION or 

 organic law. But the Constitution limits only 

 the action of Congress, and is not a limitation 

 on the States. This amendment supplies that 

 defect, and allows Congress to correct the un- 

 just legislation of the States, so far that the law 

 which operates upon one man shall operate 

 equally upon all. Whatever law punishes a 

 white man for a crime shall punish the black 

 man precisely in the same way and to the same 

 degree. Whatever law protects the white man 

 shall afford 'equal' protection to the black 

 man. Whatever means of redress is afforded 

 to one shall be afforded to all. Whatever law 

 allows the white man to testify in court shall 

 allow the man of color to do the same. These 

 are great advantages over their present codes. 

 Now different degrees of punishment are in- 

 flicted, not on account of the magnitude of the 

 crime, but according to the color of the skin. 

 Now color disqualifies a man from testifying in 

 courts, or being tried in the same way as white 

 men. I need not enumerate these partial and 



