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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



bers from the halls of Congress, and when they 

 were converting a constitutional Union into 

 a military despotism. The gentleman from 

 Pennsylvania has made the charge. Let Rev- 

 erdy Johnson answer for himself, and, as his 

 words come back to us from the silent echoes 

 of the tomb, let his memory be for ever vindi- 

 cated. Speaking of these laws, he said : ' The 

 amendments made and which now form a part 

 of this bill go further than I think we have a 

 right to go, but in the name of freedom I im- 

 plore the Senate not to go a step further. . . . 

 Oh save us ! save us in the name of freedom ; 

 save us in regard to the sacred memory of our 

 ancestors; save us from the rule of military des- 

 potism.' Sir, I can now only add to that, may 

 God in his mercy save us from any more polit- 

 ical exigencies in which it may seem proper to 

 gentlemen on this floor to misrepresent the 

 dead and blacken the names of such men as 

 Lazarus Powell and Reverdy Johnson by charg- 

 ing that they were ever the advocates of using 

 the United States army to keep the peace at 

 the polls ! 



" The gentleman from Ohio, and many others 

 on his side of the House, in the last session, 

 admitted that it was repugnant to the every 

 idea of Anglo-Saxon liberty that troops should 

 be used at the polls. He indicated then a will- 

 ingness that these laws, as he expressed it, 

 might be ' mustered out of service.' Now he 

 has changed his front. His excuse for this 

 change is twofold. First, he says that the De- 

 mocracy of the Forty-fifth Congress showed 

 no disposition to compromise. Upon this point 

 he is flatly met by the gentleman from Tennes- 

 see [Mr. Atkins], chairman of the House con- 

 ference committee, who states that he was not 

 only willing but offered to compromise, but 

 that no compromise could be made unless he 

 yielded everything which the Republican Sen- 

 ate seriously contended for. 



" But the second and the great excuse of the 

 gentleman was that the Democratic party is 

 inaugurating a revolutionary method of legis- 

 lation by attempting to coerce a coordinate 

 branch of the Government by placing legisla- 

 tion upon an appropriation bill, and this he de- 

 nounces as revolutionary. If the mere fact 

 that legislation is found upon an appropriation 

 bill be revolutionary, then the history of Re- 

 publican legislation shows revolution after rev- 

 olution that has been accomplished by the Re- 

 publicans during its period of power, and one 

 of these bloodless revolutions has been accom- 

 plished by the gentleman from Ohio himself, 

 who, when he was chairman of the Committee 

 on Appropriations, tacked on an appropriation 

 bill one of these objectionable election laws. 

 If it be revolutionary to put upon an appropri- 

 ation bill a measure which perchance the Pres- 

 ident may not approve, then the freedom of 

 this House might as well be surrendered, we 

 might as well permit the President to dictate 

 to us what kind of legislation is pleasing to his 

 most excellent highness. If, again, it is rev- 



olution to put upon an appropriation bill a 

 measure which we have reason to believe or 

 know will not meet the approval of the Presi- 

 dent, then a Republican Congress has set that 

 example in its most offensive form. If it be 

 coercion to do what we now propose, then a 

 Republican House in 1856 undertook to coerce 

 both a Democratic Senate and a Democratic 

 President ; and in 1867 they absolutely did co- 

 erce Andrew Johnson into a surrender of a 

 portion of his constitutional prerogatives. And 

 all this was done upon an army appropriation 

 bill. Yet the gentleman from Ohio, in a style 

 that the elder Booth might have envied, has 

 attempted to startle the country with the dec- 

 laration that the Democratic party is entering 

 upon a new and revolutionary method of legis- 

 lation. The coercion of Andrew Johnson was 

 one of the most iniquitous acts of usurpation 

 ever perpetrated by the Republican party in 

 the long list of its violations of constitutional 

 rights. Andrew Johnson was a President elect- 

 ed by themselves, and yet, because he refused 

 at their dictation to continue the violations of 

 the Constitution which during a state of war 

 were deemed necessary to save the Union, they 

 pursued him with the remorseless fury of hy- 

 enas. In the act passed in March, 1867, they 

 not only took from him his constitutional pow- 

 er to command the army, but, as has been well 

 said by my colleague from Mississippi [Mr. 

 Muldrow], they at the same time undertook to 

 deprive ten sovereign States of their constitu- 

 tional power to protect themselves ; they dis- 

 banded their militia, and forbade its reorganiza- 

 tion without the consent of Congress. Every 

 man who voted for that iniquitous measure 

 was a Republican. But, as I have just said to 

 gentlemen on the other side, there were some 

 Republicans so shocked at this outrageous vio- 

 lation of constitutional right that they refused 

 to vote with the majority. Andrew Johnson 

 on that trying occasion set an example to his 

 Republican friends which they would do well 

 to remember now. Rather than see the wheels 

 of this Government stopped, he signed that bill ; 

 but he signed it under protest, and thus made 

 his appeal to the country. 



" If it is deemed necessary to make another 

 appeal to the people on the question now at 

 issue, the Republican President can make his 

 choice. He can either follow the example of 

 Andrew Johnson, or he can, as the gentle- 

 man from Ohio said, destroy this Government 

 without firing a single hostile gun. It is for 

 him, not for us, to say which course he will 

 choose. 



" Now, Mr. Chairman, legislation upon ap- 

 propriation bills has been denounced by the 

 Democratic party in the past, and even now 

 we admit that it should never be resorted to 

 except in the most extreme cases like this, 

 where the will of the people has time after 

 time been defeated by factious opposition, and 

 where the resolutions of a Republican caucus 

 that no legislation except appropriation bills 



