CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



185 



proposition here to punish 

 Not 





"There is no 



Jefferson Davis. Nobody is seeking to do it. 

 That time has gone by. The statute of litni- 

 t iii.'ii-. common feelings of humanity, will su- 

 |) T\ cue for his benefit. But what you ask us 

 to do is, to declare, by a vote of two-thirds of 

 both branches of Congress, that we consider 

 Mr. Davis worthy to till the highest offices in 

 the United States if he can get a constituency 

 to indorse him. He is a voter ; he can buy, 

 and he can sell ; he can go, and he can come. 

 II.- is as free as any man in the United States. 

 There is a large list of subordinate offices to 

 which he is eligible. This bill proposes, in 

 view of that record, that Mr. Davis, by a two- 

 thirds vote of the Senate and a two-thirds vote 

 of the Uouse, be declared eligible and worthy 

 to fill any office up to the presidency of the 

 United States. For one, upon full delibera- 

 tion, I will not do it. 



" One word more, Mr. Speaker, in the way 

 of detail, which I omitted. It has often been 

 said, in mitigation of Jefferson Davis in the 

 Andersonville matter, that the men who died 

 there in such large numbers (I think the vic- 

 tims were about 15,000) fell pr,ey to an 

 epidemic, and died of a disease which could 

 not be averted. The record shows that out of 

 35,000 men about 33 per cent, died, that is, one 

 in three, while of the soldiers encamped near 

 by to take care and guard them only one man 

 in 400 died ; that is, within half a mile only, 

 one in 400 died. 



" As to the general question of amnesty, Mr. 

 Speaker, as I have already said, it is too late 

 to debate it. It has gone by. Whether it has 

 in all respects been wise, or whether it has 

 been unwise, I would not detain the House 

 here to discuss. Even if I had a strong con- 

 viction upon that question, I do not know that 

 it would be productive of any great good to 

 enunciate it ; but, at the same time, it is a very 

 singular spectacle that the Republican party, 

 in possession of the entire Government, have 

 deliberately called back into public power the 

 leading men of the South, every one of whom 

 turns up its bitter and relentless and malignant 

 foe ; and to-day, from the Potomac to the Rio 

 Grande, the very men who have received this 

 amnesty are as busy as they can be in consoli- 

 dating into one compact political organization 

 the old slave States, just as they were before 

 the war. We see the banner held out blazoned 

 again with the inscription that, with the united 

 South, and a very few votes from the North, 

 this country can be governed. I want the 

 people to understand that is precisely the move- 

 ment ; that that is the animus and the intent. I 

 do not think offering amnesty to the seven 

 hundred and fifty men who are now without 

 it will hasten or retard that movement. I do 

 not think the granting of amnesty to Mr. Davis 

 will hasten or retard it, or that refusing it will 

 do either. 



" I hoar it said, ' We will lift Mr. Davis again 

 into great consequence by refusing amnesty.' 



That is not for me to consider ; I only see 

 before me, when his name is presented, a man 

 who by a wink of his eye, by a wave of hi* 

 hand, by a nod of his head, could have stopped 

 the atrocity of Anderaonville. Some of us had 

 kinsmen there, most of us had friends there, 

 all of us had countrymen there, and in the name 

 of those kinsmen, friends, and countrymen, I 

 here protest, and shall with my vote protest, 

 against their calling back and crowning with 

 the honors of full American citizenship tho 

 man who organized that murder." 



Mr. Kelley, of Pennsylvania, said : " Mr. 

 Speaker, I voted for the bill of my colleague 

 (Mr. Randall), and not to have done so would 

 have shown me false to cherished and often- 

 expressed convictions. I appreciate my temer- 

 ity in dissenting from my distinguished friend, 

 the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Blaine), and in 

 attempting to temper the influence of his fervid, 

 eloquent, and magnetic speech, and the terrible 

 array of facts with which it was charged. Yet, 

 sir, I feel it due to myself and to the Republi- 

 can party to appeal to my friends on this side 

 of the House to vote for amnesty, general and 

 unqualified. My life as a member of this House 

 is a little longer than that of my distinguished 

 friend. I was here throughout the war. Abra- 

 ham Lincoln's summons brought me here to 

 the extra session of July 4, 1861, which was 

 convened for the purpose of providing means 

 for the preservation of the Union ; and while 

 the war lasted I voted for the most urgent and 

 the harshest measures as in my judgment those 

 characterized by the highest degree of benevo- 

 lence. Nothing is so cruel as protracted and 

 slow-wasting war. 



" The report from which the eloquent gentle- 

 man from Maine read the terrible story of the 

 horrors of Andersonville was made in 1867. 

 The Government knew then all that he has 

 recited to-day in order to harrow our feelings 

 and sway our judgment. Jefferson Davis was 

 its prisoner. I do not remember just how long 

 he was held in confinement. Then he was 

 bailed, Horace Greeley and other men like him 

 in the North being his bondsmen, and amply 

 responsible for his production for trial at any 

 time. If he were guilty of crime beyond all 

 others, why was he not tried ? When Wirz 

 was tried and executed, the Government that 

 sentenced and executed him knew this whole 

 story of Jefferson Davis's relation to his crimes. 

 Why did they not try him then? Shall we 

 Republicans to-day reflect, by an implied vote 

 of censure, upon those who have administered 

 the Government through all the intervening 

 years, from the close of the rebellion until now, 

 Dy attempting to punish him for that which 

 they, day by day, week by week, month by 

 month, and year by year, have condoned ? Do 

 not let this country convey to foreigners the 

 idea that any one man within the broad limit 

 of our country, any one man among the forty / 

 millions of our people, is so powerful for evil 

 that we dare not grant him amnesty. The gen- 



