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CONGEESS, UNITED STATES. 



intimidated the trembling North, the South fre- 

 quently divided on questions of policy between 

 Whigs and Democrats, and gave victory alter- 

 nately to the sections. Now, you must divide 

 them between loyalists, without regard to color, 

 and disloyalists, or you will be the perpetual 

 vassals of the free-trade, irritated, revengeful 

 South. Tor these, among other reasons, I am 

 for negro suffrage in every rebel State. If it 

 be just, it should not be denied ; if it be neces- 

 sary, it should be adopted ; if it be a punish- 

 ment to traitors, they deserve it. 



" But it will be said, as it has been said, ' This 

 is negro equality ! ' What is negro equality, 

 about which so much is said by knaves, and. 

 some of which is believed! by men who are not 

 fools ? It means, as understood by honest Ee- 

 publicans, just this much, and no more : every 

 man, no matter what his race or color ; every 

 earthly being who has an immortal soul, has an 

 equal right to justice, honesty, and fair play with 

 every other man ; and the law should secure him 

 those rights. The same law which condemns or 

 acquits an African should condemn or acquit a 

 white man. The same law which gives a ver- 

 dict in a white man's favor should give a ver- 

 dict in a black man's favor on the same state of 

 facts. Such is the law of God, and such ought 

 to be the law of man. This doctrine does not 

 mean that a negro shall sit on the same seat or 

 eat at the same table with a white man. That 

 is a matter of taste which- every man must de- 

 cide for himself. The law has nothing to do 

 with it. If there be any who are afraid of the 

 rivalry of the black man in office or in business, 

 I have only to advise them to try and beat their 

 competitor in knowledge and business capacity, 

 and there is no danger that his white neighbors 

 will prefer his African rival to himself. I know 

 there is between those who are influenced by 

 this cry of ' negro equality ' and the opinion 

 that there is still danger that the negro will 

 be the smartest, for I never saw even a con- 

 traband slave that had not more sense than 

 such men. 



"There are those who admit the justice and 

 ultimate utility of granting impartial suffrage to 

 all men, but they think it is impolitic. An an- 

 cient philosopher, whose antagonist admitted 

 that what he required was just but deemed it 

 impolitic, asked him : ' Do you believe in Ha- 

 des? ' I would say to those above referred to, 

 who admit the justice of human equality be- 

 fore the law but doubt its policy : ; Do you 

 believe in hell ? ' 



" How do you answer the principle inscribed 

 in our political scripture, ' That to secure these 

 rights governments are instituted among men, 

 deriving their just powers from the consent of 

 the governed? ' Without such consent govern- 

 ment is a tyranny, and you exercising it are 

 tyrants. Of course, this does not admit male- 

 factors to power, or there would soon be no 

 penal laws, and society would become an an- 

 archy. But this step forward is an assault upon 

 ignorance and prejudice, and timid men shrink 



from it. Are such men fit to sit in the places 

 of statesmen ? 



"There are periods in the history of nations 

 when statesmen can make themselves names for 

 posterity ; but such occasions are never improved 

 oy cowards. In the acquisition of true fame, 

 courage is just as necessary in the civilian as in 

 the military hero. In the Reformation there 

 were men engaged as able and perhaps more 

 learned than Martin Luther. Melanctbon and 

 others were ripe scholars and sincere reformers, 

 but none of them had his courage. He alone 

 was willing to go where duty called, though 

 ' devils were as thick as the tiles on the houses.' 

 And Luther is the great luminary of the Refor- 

 mation, around whom the others revolve as 

 satellites and shine by his light. We may not 

 aspire to fame. But great events fix the eye of 

 history on small objects and magnify their 

 meanness. Let us at least escape that condi- 

 tion." 



Mr. Bingham, of Ohio, said : " Mr. Speaker, 

 the two bills now pending before the House, 

 and which I have moved to commit to the Com- 

 mittee on Reconstruction, are, first, the bill in- 

 troduced by the gentleman from Pennsylvania 

 (Mr. Stevens), without the sanction of any com- 

 mittee, and by way of substitute for the bill 

 originally reported by the Committee on Recon- 

 struction ; and the other is the bill reported 

 from the Committee on the Territories by my 

 colleague (Mr. Ashley). 



"I desire merely to call the attention of the 

 House to the attempts made by these two meas- 

 ures to induce the House to depart from what 

 has hitherto been agreed upon by the Com- 

 mittee on Reconstruction ; what has hitherto 

 been done and sanctioned by the Thirty-ninth 

 Congress; what has hitherto been done and 

 sanctioned by the people through the public 

 press, in their primary assemblies, at the ballot- 

 box ; and finally what is now being done, and 

 conclusively done, by the people of the organ- 

 ized States through their legislative assemblies. 

 Neither, sir, do I intend to be understood, in 

 any thing I may say here to-day, as attempting 

 to limit by any poor words of mine the sover- 

 eignty and power of the people of the United 

 States to take such security as, in their judg- 

 ment, they may deem effectual for the future 

 safety of the Republic and the protection of 

 the rights of all the people of the Republic. It 

 is because I insist upon that right of the peo- 

 ple a right that belongs alone to the people, 

 and which can be exercised effectively only by 

 the people that I oppose the legislation contem- 

 plated by the honorable gentleman from Penn- 

 sylvania (Mr. Stevens) and by my colleague 

 (Mr. Ashley). 



"While there are many, and in my judgment 

 weighty objections to these bills, that just stated 

 is not the least of them. I challenge these bills 

 to-day, in the presence of the House of Repre- 

 sentatives and in the presence of the nation, as 

 a substantial denial of the right of the great peo- 

 ple who have saved this Republic by arms to 



