236 



CONGRESS, U. S. 



men that are in arms against you are in arms 

 against your very existence. The idea of your 

 national life a day after you yield to their posi- 

 tion, is absurd and inconsistent. Sir, this Gov- 

 ernment had borne and forborne until your for- 

 bearance was construed into pusillanimity ; and 

 during the last session of Congress the most in- 

 sulting language that ever fell from human lips 

 was uttered in reference to this very General 

 Government." 



Mr. Powell, of Kentucky, spoke in answer, 

 expressing his views thus : " My friend from 

 New Hampshire tells us that this is a contest 

 between despotism and constitutional liberty. 

 Sir, so far as I have witnessed the action of the 

 Executive, and, I regret to say, some of the acts 

 of this body, it does not seem to me that the 

 Constitution is much regarded. This proceed- 

 ing is, in my judgment, an overthrow of the 

 Constitution and the forms of our Government. 

 As I said the other day, we have but little left 

 save the Constitution, and I invoke Senators to 

 preserve that." 



The debate was continued for some time, 

 when a division was taken on the motion to 

 refer, and it was lost. Ayes, 5 ; noes, 35. 



In the Senate the Army bill being under con- 

 sideration on the 18th of July, Mr. Powell, of 

 Kentucky, moved to amend it by adding the fol- 

 lowing section : 



And be it further enacted, That no part of the army 

 or navy of the United States shall be employed or used 

 in subjecting or holding as a conquered province any 

 sovereign State now or lately one of the United States, 

 or in abolishing or interfering with African slavery in 

 any of the States. 



Mr. Sherman, of Ohio, immediately took the 

 floor saying : u I shall vote against the amend- 

 ment, as a matter of course, because it is out of 

 place, and ought not to be offered here, in my 

 judgment; but I wish it distinctly understood 

 that in voting against it, I do not assent to the 

 proposition, or the imputation, that this is a 

 war for the purpose of subjugating any State or 

 freeing any slave. If I understand the purpose 

 of this war, it is to maintain the national honor, 

 to defend the national property, to uphold the 

 national flag everywhere wherever by right it 

 floats, whether it be in South Carolina, or Flor- 

 ida, or Louisiana; but I say here, as I have said 

 elsewhere, that there is no purpose in conduct- 

 ing this war to subjugate a State, to free a slave, 

 or to interfere with the social or domestic insti- 

 tutions of any State or of any people. The pur- 

 pose of the war, as I understand it, is to pre- 

 serve this Union ; to maintain the Constitution 

 as it is in all its clauses, in all its guarantees, 

 without change or limitation." 



Mr. Powell, of Kentucky, replied: "I am 

 pleased to hear the conservative sentiments 

 uttered by the Senator from Ohio; but the 

 Senator, I think, was unnecessarily surprised in 

 his astonishment at the idea of any Senator sup- 

 posing the result of this war would be probably 

 the emancipation of the slaves, or the overthrow 

 of State sovereignty. Does not the Senator from 



Ohio know that more than one of those who 

 have been heretofore considered the most con- 

 servative Senators on the other side of this 

 Chamber have declared that if the necessity 

 existed, they were for emancipating the slaves 

 in the southern States ? It was so announced 

 by the Senator from Connecticut, (Mr. Dixon.) 

 It was affirmed by the Senator from Michigan, 

 (Mr. Bingham.) The Senator from Kansas (Mr. 

 Pomeroy) introduced a bill into the Senate, 

 which is now before the Judiciary Committee, 

 and has been printed, for the purpose of abolish- 

 ing slavery in all the seceded States. When we 

 witness all this, should the Senator from Ohio 

 be surprised that the representatives of the 

 slaveholding States fear that it may be and is 

 the purpose of those in power to use the Army 

 for the purpose of abolishing the institution of 

 slavery and ovei-throwing the States? Did not 

 the Senator from Oregon (Mr. Baker) the other 

 day declare that if it were necessary, he would 

 vote to reduce the seceded States to provinces, 

 and send Governors there from other States to 

 govern them as Territories? "When we hear all 

 these declarations, I think the Senator should 

 not be surprised at the fear which I have ex- 

 pressed." 



Mr. Dixon, of Connecticut, next rose, saying : 

 " What I said was this : that if the war should 

 be persisted in, and be long protracted on the 

 part of the South, and in the course of its prog- 

 ress it should turn out that either this Gov- 

 ernment or slavery must be destroyed, then the 

 people of the North the conservative people 

 of the North would say, rather than let the 

 Government perish, let slavery perish. That is 

 what I said, and say it now, and shall continue 

 at all times to say the same ; not by any means 

 as a threat, but as a warning and an admoni- 

 tion." 



Mr. Lane, of Kansas, followed, saying : " We 

 would have stood by the compromises of the 

 Constitution, and permitted slavery to exist in 

 the States where it was planted ; would not, 

 by word or act, have disturbed it ; but they 

 have forced upon us this struggle, and I, for 

 one, am willing that it shall be followed to its 

 logical conclusion. 



" I do believe, Mr. President, that the insti- 

 tution of slavery will not survive, in any State 

 of this Union, the march of the Union armies, 

 and I thank God that it is so. It is an institu- 

 tion that has been the curse of the country ever 

 since my recollection ; these Halls have been 

 accursed with it ; the people of the States 

 where it exists have been accursed with it, and 

 the people of the free Sates have been accursed 

 with it." 



Mr. Carlile, from Western Virginia, did not 

 intend to vote for the resolution. But this was 

 no war of subjugation. There was no power in 

 this Government to carry on such a war ; no 

 constitutional, no physical power, to carry it 

 on. This was a war for the maintenance of the 

 existence of the Constitution, and the Union 

 under it ; and it was a war in which the hearts 



