308 
Indiana University 
address followed the appointment of the joint-committee on 
reconstruction to inquire into the condition of the southern 
states for the purpose of determining whether they, or any 
of them, were entitled to representation^^ Vorhees supported 
Johnson’s plan of pacification and restoration. He denounced 
the action of the radicals under the leadership of Thaddeus 
Stevens. “We are asked”, he asserted, “to ravel to pieces all 
that the President has done and to commence the knitting 
process of reunion for ourselves.” Much of the address was 
devoted to the constitutional aspects of the question. The 
“dead state” theory was condemned as a theory “proclaimed 
because its adoption would give better scope to ulterior de- 
signs of vengeance and revolutionary destruction”. “I plant 
myself”, declared the speaker “on the Constitution which rec- 
ognizes an unbroken Union.”^“ In this speech Vorhees spoke 
the sentiments of his Democratic colleagues. 
The Republican press of Indiana found no difficulty in sup- 
porting the action of Congress in refusing to receive the rep- 
resentatives from the southern states and in providing for 
the joint-committee on reconstruction. The Indianapolis 
Journal conceded that President Johnson had labored assidu- 
ously to restore the southern states to a full participation 
and equality in the national government. Congress, on the 
other hand, was not responsible for the delay. The states 
themselves were to blame. The delay was the direct result 
of their efforts to retain the substance of slavery after abol- 
ishing it in form, and of their acts in seeking to confer honor 
upon “their most obnoxious traitors” by electing them to Con- 
gress."^^ 
Indiana was represented in the Senate of the Thirty-ninth 
Congress by Henry S. Lane, a Republican, and Thomas A. 
Hendricks, a Democrat. The former, tho not a radical, sup- 
ported the measures of the Republican majority, while Hen- 
dricks was always numbered with the opposition. He 
opposed the appointment of a joint-committee to inquire into 
the conditions of the Confederate states. He opposed the bill 
enlarging the powers of the Freedman’s Bureau. He opposed 
the Civil Rights Bill. He denounced in strong terms the Hour- 
ly James A. Woodburn, The Life of Thaddeus Stevens (Indianapolis, 1913), 340. 
^2 Charles W. Voorhees (ed.). Speeches of Daniel W. Vorhees (Cincinnati, 1885), 
229-259. 
Indianapolis Daily Journal, December 27, 1865. 
