CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



221 



Nye, Osborn, Patterson, Pomeroy, Pool, Pratt, Kam- 

 sey, Rice, Sawyer, Scott, Sherman, Spencer, Stewart, 

 Simmer, West, Wilson, and Windom 43. 



ABSENT Messrs. Fenton, Ferry of Connecticut, 

 Flanagan, Kellogg, Logan, and Sprague 6. 



So the motion to strike out the fourth sec- 

 tion did not prevail. 



The bill was subsequently put upon its pas- 

 sage, and received the following vote : 



YEAS Messrs. Ames, Anthony, Boreman, Brown- 

 low, Buckingham, Caldwell, Cameron, Carpenter, 

 Chandler, Clayton, Cole, Conkling, Corbett, Cragin, 

 Edmunds, Ferry of Michigan, Frelinghuysen, Gil-' 

 bert, Hamilton of Texas, Hamlin, Harlan, Hitchcock, 

 Howe, Lewis, Logan, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, 

 Nye, Osborn, Patterson, Pomeroy, Pool, Pratt, Eam- 

 sey, Kice, Sawyer, Scott-Sherman, Spencer, Stewart, 

 Sumner, "West, Wilson, Windom, and "Wright 45. 



NAYS Messrs. Bayard, Blair, Casserly, Cooper, 

 Davis of Kentucky, Davis of West Virginia, Hamil- 

 ton of Maryland, Hill, Johnston, Kelly, Kobertson, 

 Saulsbury, Schurz, Stevenson, Stockton, Thurman, 

 Tipton, Trumbull, and Vickers 19. 



ABSENT Messrs. Fenton, Ferry of Connecticut, 

 Flanagan, Kellogg, Morrill of Maine, and Sprague 6. 



So the bill was passed. 



In the House, on April 15th, some of the 

 amendments of.the Senate were approved, and 

 others not concurred in. A committee of con- 

 ference was therefore appointed, consisting of 

 Mr. Shellabarger, of Ohio, Mr. Scofield, of 

 Pennsylvania, and Mr. Kerr, of Indiana. The 

 Senate at the same time appointed Mr. Ed- 

 munds, of Vermont, and Mr. Sherman, of 

 Ohio, as conferees on the part of the Senate. 



In the House, on April 18th, Mr. Shellabar- 

 ger, of Ohio, on presenting the report of the 

 committee of conference, said : 



" The first matter of difference between the 

 two Houses is found on page 2, in lines seven- 

 teen and eighteen of section two of the bill. 

 And I will state the effect of the report of the 

 committee of conference upon that point of 

 difference. The Senate had amended the 

 House bill by inserting in line seventeen of 

 section two of the printed bill the words ' or 

 while engaged in the.' The effect of that 

 amendment was, as will be noticed, to provide 

 that ' if two or more persons within any State 

 or Territory of the United States shall conspire 

 together ' 'to induce any officer of the United 

 States to leave any State, district, or place 

 where his duties as such officer might lawfully 

 be performed, or to injure him in his person 

 or property on account of, or while engaged 

 in, the lawful discharge of the duties of his 

 office,' that should be an offence against the 

 laws of the United States. 



"To that the objection made was, that an 

 attack upon the property of an officer of the 

 United States, however remote that property 

 might be from the sphere of the duties of the 

 officer, was to be an offence against the laws 

 of the United States. It was objected that 

 that should not be so provided ; that there was 

 no divinity that hedged around an officer or 

 his property in such a way as that it could not 

 be injured, unless the injury in some way pre- 



judiced him in the exercise of official duties. 

 That was the point of difference between the 

 two Houses. 



" That is avoided by what has been agreed 

 to by the committee of conference wholly 

 avoided as I understand. The report leaves 

 out the words inserted by the Senate, and in- 

 serts after the word ' office,' in the eighteenth 

 line of the printed bill, the words which I will 

 read: 'or to injure his person while engaged 

 in the lawful discharge of the duties of his 

 office, or to injure his property so as to molest, 

 interrupt, hinder, or impede him in the dis- 

 charge of his official duty.' If the section 

 shall be so amended it will then provide, 'that 

 if two or more persons' 'shall conspire to- 

 gether ' ' to injure him ' (an officer of the United 

 States) ' in his person or property on account 

 of his lawful discharge of the duties of his 

 office, or to injure his person while engaged in 

 the lawful discharge of the duties of his office, 

 or to injure his property so as to molest, inter- 

 rupt, hinder, or impede him in the discharge 

 of his official duty,' it shall be an offence 

 against the laws of the United States. I ap- 

 prehend that no objection will be made in this 

 House, as none was made in the Senate, to 

 that portion of the report of the committee 

 of conference. 



" The next point of difference between the 

 two Houses was the amendment of the Senate 

 at the end of section four of the bill. In the 

 provision relative to the time when this act 

 should cease to be in operation, the Senate 

 amended by striking out the words ' the 1st 

 day of June, A. D. 1872,' and inserting in lieu 

 thereof the words ' the end of the next regular 

 session of Congress.' The committee of con- 

 ference assented to this amendment in the 

 form in which the Senate had made it, there 

 being, as was believed, not much difference 

 between the two provisions. The 1st of June, 

 1872, will no doubt be substantially the time 

 of the close of the next session of Congress. 



" The next amendment is in section six, line 

 thirteen, of the printed bill. As agreed to by. 

 the committee of conference, the Senate amend- 

 ment is changed by inserting after the word 

 ' the,' where it occurs in brackets in line thir- 

 teen, these words, ' the first section of; ' so 

 that the repeal of the act in regard to the 

 jurors' test-oath will be confined to the first 

 section of that act, instead of repealing the 

 entire act, as the House bill provided. 



" The effect of this amendment will be seen 

 by turning to the jury-oath law, which the 

 House bill proposed to repeal and which the 

 Senate amendment would wholly preserve. 

 In that law there are but three sections. The 

 first section (I will state its purport without 

 reading it) gives to parties in any case in the 

 courts of the United States the right of a per- 

 emptory challenge for the grounds set forth 

 in that section, those grounds being, in short, 

 that the person challenged has been engaged 

 in some one of the disloyal practices named 



