History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States Part 17

The following voted against the bill, namely:

Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Guthrie, Hendricks, McDougall, Nesmith, Norton, Riddle, Saulsbury, Stockton, and Van Winkle--12.

Five Senators were absent, to wit:

Messrs. Creswell, Doolittle, Grimes, Johnson, and Wright--5.

CHAPTER X.

THE CIVIL RIGHTS BILL IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

The Bill referred to the Judiciary Committee and reported back -- Speech by the Chairman of the Committee -- Mr.

Rogers -- Mr. Cook -- Mr. Thayer -- Mr. Eldridge -- Mr.

Thornton -- Mr. Windom -- Mr. Sh.e.l.labarger -- Mr. Broomall -- Mr. Raymond -- Mr. Delano -- Mr. Kerr -- Amendment by Mr.

Bingham -- His Speech -- Reply by his Colleague -- Discussion closed by Mr. Wilson -- Yeas and Nays on the Pa.s.sage of the Bill -- Mr. Le Blond's proposed t.i.tle -- Amendments of the House accepted by the Senate.

On the 5th of February, four days after the pa.s.sage of the Civil Rights Bill in the Senate, it came before the House of Representatives, and having been read a first and second time, was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. On the 1st of March, the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Wilson, brought the bill again before the House, proposing some verbal amendments which were adopted. He then made a motion to recommit the bill, pending which, he made a speech on the merits of the measure. He referred to many definitions, judicial decisions, opinions, and precedents, under which negroes were ent.i.tled to the rights of American citizenship. In reference to the results of his researches, he said:

"Precedents, both judicial and legislative, are found in sharp conflict concerning them. The line which divides these precedents is generally found to be the same which separates the early from the later days of the republic. The further the Government drifted from the old moorings of equality and human rights, the more numerous became judicial and legislative utterances in conflict with some of the leading features of this bill."

He argued that the section of the bill providing for its enforcement by the military arm was necessary, in order "to fortify the declaratory portions of this bill with such sanctions as will render it effective." In conclusion he said:

"Can not protection be rendered to the citizen in the mode prescribed by the measure we now have under consideration? If not, a perpetual state of constructive war would be a great blessing to very many American citizens. If a suspension of martial law and a restoration of the ordinary forms of civil law are to result in a subjection of our people to the outrages under the operation of State laws and munic.i.p.al ordinances which these orders now prevent, then it were better to continue the present state of affairs forever. But such is not the case; we may provide by law for the same ample protection through the civil courts that now depends on the orders of our military commanders; and I will never consent to any other construction of our Const.i.tution, for that would be the elevation of the military above the civil power.

"Before our Const.i.tution was formed, the great fundamental rights which I have mentioned belonged to every person who became a member of our great national family. No one surrendered a jot or t.i.ttle of these rights by consenting to the formation of the Government. The entire machinery of Government, as organized by the Const.i.tution, was designed, among other things, to secure a more perfect enjoyment of these rights. A legislative department was created, that laws necessary and proper to this end might be enacted; a judicial department was erected to expound and administer the laws; an executive department was formed for the purpose of enforcing and seeing to the execution of these laws; and these several departments of Government possess the power to enact, administer, and enforce the laws 'necessary and proper' to secure those rights which existed anterior to the ordination of the Const.i.tution. Any other view of the powers of this Government dwarfs it, and renders it a failure in its most important office.

"Upon this broad principle I rest my justification of this bill. I a.s.sert that we possess the power to do those things which governments are organized to do; that we may protect a citizen of the United States against a violation of his rights by the law of a single State; that by our laws and our courts we may intervene to maintain the proud character of American citizenship; that this power permeates our whole system, is a part of it, without which the States can run riot over every fundamental right belonging to citizens of the United States; that the right to exercise this power depends upon no express delegation, but runs with the rights it is designed to protect; that we possess the same lat.i.tude in respect to the selection of means through which to exercise this power that belongs to us when a power rests upon express delegation; and that the decisions which support the latter maintain the former. And here, sir, I leave the bill to the consideration of the House."

Mr. Rogers, of New Jersey, followed with an argument against the bill, because it interfered with "States' Rights." Under its provisions, Congress would "enter the domain of a State and interfere with its internal police, statutes, and domestic regulations." He said:

"This act of legislation would destroy the foundations of the Government as they were laid and established by our fathers, who reserved to the States certain privileges and immunities which ought sacredly to be preserved to them.

"If you had attempted to do it in the days of those who were living at the time the Const.i.tution was made, after the birth of that n.o.ble instrument, the spirit of the heroes of the Revolution and the ghosts of the departed who laid down their lives in defense of the liberty of this country and of the rights of the States, would have come forth as witnesses against the deadly infliction, and the destruction of the fundamental principle of the sovereignty of the States in violation of the Const.i.tution, and the breaking down of the ties that bind the States, and the violation of the rights and liberties of the white men and white women of America.

"If you pa.s.s this bill, you will allow the negroes of this country to compete for the high office of President of the United States. Because if they are citizens at all, they come within the meaning and letter of the Const.i.tution of the United States, which allows all natural-born citizens to become candidates for the Presidency, and to exercise the duties of that office if elected.

"I am afraid of degrading this Government; I am afraid of danger to const.i.tutional liberty; I am alarmed at the stupendous strides which this Congress is trying to initiate; and I appeal in behalf of my country, in behalf of those that are to come after us, of generations yet unborn, as well as those now living, that conservative men on the other side should rally to the standard of sovereign and independent States, and blot out this idea which is inculcating itself here, that all the powers of the States must be taken away, and the power of the Czar of Russia or the Emperor of France must be lodged in the Federal Government.

"I ask you to stand by the law of the country, and to regulate these Federal and State systems upon the grand principles upon which they were intended to be regulated, that we may hand down to those who are to come after us this bright jewel of civil liberty unimpaired; and I say that the Congress or the men who will strip the people of these rights will be handed down to perdition for allowing this bright and beautiful heritage of civil liberty embodied in the powers and sovereign jurisdiction of the States to pa.s.s away from us.

"I am willing to trust brave men--men who have shown as much bravery as those who were engaged on battle-fields against the armed legions of the North; because I believe that even when they were fighting against the flag, of their country, the great ma.s.s of those people were moved by high and conscientious convictions of duty. And in the spirit of Christianity, in the spirit which Jesus Christ exercised when he gave up his own life as a propitiation for a fallen world, I would say to those Southern men, Come here in the Halls of Congress, and partic.i.p.ate with us in pa.s.sing laws which, if const.i.tutionally carried into effect, will control the interests and destinies of four millions people, mostly living within the limits of your States."

Mr. Cook, of Illinois, replied: "Mr. Speaker, in listening to the very eloquent remarks of the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Rogers], I have been astonished to find that in his apprehension this bill is designed to deprive somebody, in some State of this Union, of some right which he has heretofore enjoyed. I am only sorry that he was not specific enough; that he did not inform us what rights are to be taken away. He has denounced this bill as dangerous to liberty, as calculated in its tendency at least to destroy the liberties of this country. I have examined this bill with some care, and, so far as I have been able to understand it, I have found nothing in any provision of it which tends in any way to take from any man, white or black, a single right he enjoys under the Const.i.tution and laws of the United States.

"I would have been glad if he would have told us in what manner the white men of this country would have been placed in a worse condition than they are now, if this becomes the law. This general denunciation and general a.s.sault of the bill, without pointing out one single thing which is to deprive one single man of any right he enjoys under the Government, seems to me not ent.i.tled to much weight.

"When those rights which are enumerated in this bill are denied to any cla.s.s of men, on account of race or color, when they are subject to a system of vagrant laws which sells them into slavery or involuntary servitude, which operates upon them as upon no other part of the community, they are not secured in the rights of freedom. If a man can be sold, the man is a slave. If he is nominally freed by the amendment to the Const.i.tution, he has nothing in the world he can call his own; he has simply the labor of his hands on which he can depend. Any combination of men in his neighborhood can prevent him from having any chance to support himself by his labor. They can pa.s.s a law that a man not supporting himself by labor shall be deemed a vagrant, and that a vagrant shall be sold. If this is the freedom we gave the men who have been fighting for us and in defense of the Government, if this is all we have secured them, the President had far better never have issued the Proclamation of Emanc.i.p.ation, and the country had far better never have adopted the great ordinance of freedom.

"Does any man in this House believe that these people can be safely left in these States without the aid of Federal legislation or military power? Does any one believe that their freedom can be preserved without this aid? If any man does so believe, he is strangely blind to the history of the past year; strangely blind to the enactments pa.s.sed by Legislatures touching these freedmen. And I shuddered as I heard the honorable gentleman from New Jersey [Mr.

Rogers] claiming that he was speaking and thinking in the spirit which animated the Savior of mankind when he made atonement for our race; that it was in that spirit he was acting when he was striving to have these people left utterly defenseless in the hands of men who were proving, day by day, month by month, that they desire to oppress them, for they had been made free against their consent. Every act of legislation, every expression of opinion on their part, proves that these people would be again enslaved if they were not protected by the military arm of the Federal Government; without that they would be slaves to-day. And I submit, with all deference, that it is any thing but the spirit which the gentleman claims to have exercised, which prompted the argument he has made.

"For myself, I trust that this bill will be pa.s.sed, because I consider it the most appropriate means to secure the end desired, and that these people will be protected. I trust that we will say to them, Because upon our call you aided us to suppress this rebellion, because the honor and faith of the nation were pledged for your protection, we will maintain your freedom, and redeem that pledge."

On the following day, the House of Representatives resumed the consideration of this bill. A speech was made by Mr. Thayer, of Pennsylvania. He said:

"This bill is the just sequel to, and the proper completion of, that great measure of national redress which opened the dungeon-doors of four million human beings. Without this, in my judgment, that great act of justice will be paralyzed and made useless. With this, it will have practical effect, life, vigor, and enforcement. It has been the fashion of gentlemen, holding a certain set of opinions, in this House to characterize that great measure to which I have referred as a revolutionary measure.

"Sir, it was a revolutionary measure. It was one of the greatest, one of the most humane, one of the most beneficial revolutions which ever characterized the history of a free State; but it was a revolution which, though initiated by the conflict of arms and rendered necessary as a measure of war against the public enemy, was accomplished within and under the provisions of the Const.i.tution of the United States. It was a revolution for the relief of human nature, a revolution which gave life, liberty, and hope to millions whose condition, until then, appeared to be one of hopeless despair. It was a revolution of which no freeman need be ashamed, of which every man who a.s.sisted in it will, I am sure, in the future be proud, and which will illumine with a great glory the history of this country.

"There is nothing in this bill in respect to the employment of military force that is not already in the Const.i.tution of the United States. The power here conferred is expressly given by that instrument, and has been exercised upon the most stupendous scale in the suppression of the rebellion. What is this bill? I hope gentlemen, even on the opposite side of the House, will not suffer their minds to be influenced by any such vague, loose, and groundless denunciations as these which have proceeded from the gentleman from New Jersey. The bill, after extending these fundamental immunities of citizenship to all cla.s.ses of people in the United States, simply provides means for the enforcement of these rights and immunities. How? Not by military force, not through the instrumentality of military commanders, not through any military machinery whatever, but through the quiet, dignified, firm, and const.i.tutional forms of judicial procedure. The bill seeks to enforce these rights in the same manner and with the same sanctions under and by which other laws of the United States are enforced. It imposes duties upon the judicial tribunals of the country which require the enforcement of these rights. It provides for the administration of laws to protect these rights. It provides for the execution of laws to enforce them. Is there any thing appalling in that? Is that a military despotism? Sir, it is a strange abuse of language to say that a military despotism is established by wholesome and equal laws. Yet the gentleman declaimed by the hour, in vague and idle terms, against this bill, which has not a single offensive, oppressive, unjust, unusual, or tyrannical feature in it. These civil rights and immunities which are to be secured, and which no man can conscientiously say ought to be denied, are to be enforced through the ordinary instrumentalities of courts of justice.

"While engaged in this great work of restoration, it concerns our honor that we forget not those who are unable to help themselves; who, whatever may have been the misery and wretchedness of their former condition, were on our side in the great struggle which has closed, and whose rights we can not disregard or neglect without violating the most sacred obligations of duty and of honor. To us they look for protection against the wrongs with which they are threatened. To us alone can they appeal in their helplessness for succor and defense. To us they hold out to-day their supplicating hands, asking for protection for themselves and their posterity. We can not disregard this appeal, and stand acquitted before the country and the world of basely abandoning to a miserable fate those who have a right to demand the protection of your flag and the immunities guaranteed to every freeman by your Const.i.tution."

Mr. Eldridge, of Wisconsin, opposed the bill, in a speech of which the following are the concluding remarks:

"I had hoped that this subject would be allowed to rest. Gentlemen refer us to individual cases of wrong perpetrated upon the freedmen of the South as an argument why we should extend the Federal authority into the different States to control the action of the citizens thereof. But, I ask, has not the South submitted to the altered state of things there, to the late amendment of the Const.i.tution, to the loss of their slave property, with a cheerfulness and grace that we did not expect? Have they not acquiesced more willingly than we dared to hope? Then why not trust them? Why not meet them with frankness and kindness? Why not encourage them with trust and confidence?

"I deprecate all these measures because of the implication they carry upon their face, that the people who have heretofore owned slaves intend to do them wrong. I do not believe it. So far as my knowledge goes, and so far as my information extends, I believe that the people who have held the freedmen slaves will treat them with more kindness, with more leniency, than those of the North who make such loud professions of love and affection for them, and are so anxious to pa.s.s these bills. They know their nature; they know their wants; they know their habits; they have been brought up together, and have none of the prejudices and unkind feelings which many in the North would have, toward them.

"I do not credit all these stories about the general feeling of hostility in the South toward the negro. So far as I have heard opinions expressed upon that subject, and I have conversed with many persons from that section of the country, they do not blame the negro for any thing that has happened. As a general thing, he was faithful to them and their interests until the army reached the place and took him from them. He has supported their wives and children in the absence of the husbands and fathers in the armies of the South. He has done for them what no one else could have done. They recognize his general good feeling toward them, and are inclined to reciprocate that feeling toward him.

"I believe that is the general feeling of the Southern people to-day.

The cases of ill-treatment are exceptional cases. They are like the cases which have occurred in the Northern States where the unfortunate have been thrown upon our charity. Take for instance the stories of the cruel treatment of the insane in the State of Ma.s.sachusetts. They may have been barbarously confined in the loathsome dens, as stated in particular instances, but is that any evidence of the general ill-will of the people of the State of Ma.s.sachusetts toward the insane? Is that any reason why the Federal arm should be extended to Ma.s.sachusetts to control and protect the insane there?

"It has also been said that certain paupers in certain States have been badly used--paupers, too, who were whites. Is that any reason why we should extend the arm of the Federal Government to those States to protect the poor who are thrown upon the charities of the people there?

"Sir, we must yield to the altered state of things in this country. We must trust the people; it is our duty to do so; we can not do otherwise. And the sooner we place ourselves in a position where we can win the confidence of our late enemies, where our counsels will be heeded, where our advice may be regarded, the sooner will the people of the whole country be fully reconciled to each other and their changed relationship; the sooner will all the inhabitants of our country be in the possession of all the rights and immunities essential to their prosperity and happiness."

Mr. Thornton, of Illinois, feared there was "something hidden, something more than appears in the language" of the bill. He feared "a design to confer the right of suffrage upon the negro," and urged that a proviso should be accepted "restricting the meaning of the words 'civil rights and immunities.'" He remarked further: "The most serious objection that I have to this bill is, that it is an interference with the rights of the South. It was remarked by my friend from Wisconsin that it has often been intimated on this floor, and throughout the country, that whenever a man talks about either the Const.i.tution or the rights of the States, he is either a traitor or a sympathizer with treason. I do not a.s.sume that the States are sovereign. They are subordinate to the Federal Government. Sovereignty in this country is in the people, but the States have certain rights, and those rights are absolutely necessary to the maintenance of our system of government. What are those rights? The right to determine and fix the legal _status_ of the inhabitants of the respective States; the local powers of self-government; the power to regulate all the relations that exist between husband and wife, parent and child, guardian and ward; all the fireside and home rights, which are nearer and dearer to us than all others.

"Sir, this is but a stepping-stone to a centralization of the Government and the overthrow of the local powers of the States.

Whenever that is consummated, then farewell to the beauty, strength, and power of this Government. There is nothing left but absolute, despotic, central power. It lives no longer but as a naked despotism.

There is nothing left to admire and to cherish."

Mr. Windom, of Minnesota, next obtained the floor. Referring to the speech of Mr. Rogers, he said: "I wish to make another extract from the speech of the gentleman from New Jersey. He said, 'If you pa.s.s this bill, you will allow negroes to compete for the high office of the President of the United States.' You will actually allow them to compete for the Presidency of the United States! As for this fear which haunts the gentleman from New Jersey, if there is a negro in the country who is so far above all the white men of the country that only four millions of his own race can elect him President of the United States over twenty-six millions of white people, I think we ought to encourage such talent in the country.

"Sir, the gentleman has far less confidence in the white race than I have, if he is so timid in regard to negro compet.i.tion. Does he really suppose that black men are so far superior to white men that four millions of them can elect a President of their own race against the wishes of thirty millions of ours? Ever since I knew any thing of the party to which the gentleman belongs, it has entertained this same morbid fear of negro compet.i.tion; and sometimes I have thought that if we were to contemplate the subject from their stand-point we would have more charity than we do for this timidity and nervous dread which haunts them. I beg leave, however, to a.s.sure the gentleman that there is not the slightest danger of electing a black President, and that he need never vote for one, unless he thinks him better fitted for the office than a white man."

With more direct reference to the merits of the question, Mr. Windom said: "Our warrant for the pa.s.sage of this bill is found in the genius and spirit of our inst.i.tutions; but not in these alone. Fortunately, the great amendment which broke the shackles from every slave in the land contains an express provision that 'Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.'

"When this amendment was acted upon, it was well understood, as it is now, that although the body of slavery might be destroyed, its spirit would still live in the hearts of those who have sacrificed so much for its preservation, and that if the freedmen were left to the tender mercy of their former masters, to whose heartless selfishness has been superadded a malignant desire for vengeance upon the negro for having aided us in crushing the rebellion, his condition would be more intolerable than it was before the war. And hence the broad grant of power was made to enable Congress to enforce the spirit as well as the letter of the amendment. Now, sir, in what way is it proposed to enforce it? By denying to any one man a single right or privilege which he could otherwise const.i.tutionally or properly enjoy? No. By conferring on any one person or cla.s.s of persons a single right or immunity which every other person may not possess? By no means. Does it give to the loyal negro any preference over the recent would-be a.s.sa.s.sins of the nation? Not at all. It merely declares that hereafter there shall be no discrimination in civil rights or immunities among the citizens of any State or territory of the United States on account of race, color, or previous condition of slavery, and that every person, except such as are excluded by reason of crime, shall have the same right to enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other.

"We know, and the whole world knows, that when in the hour of our extremity we called upon the black race to did us, we promised them not liberty only, but all that that word liberty implies. All remember how unwilling we were to do any thing which would inure to the benefit of the negro. I recall with shame the fact that when, five years ago, the so-called Democracy--now Egyptians--were here in this capital, in the White House, in the Senate, and on this floor, plotting the destruction of the Government, and we were asked to appease them by sacrificing the negro, two-thirds of both houses voted to rivet his chains upon him so long as the republic should endure. A widening chasm yawned between the free and slave States, and we looked wildly around for that wherewith it might be closed. In our extremity we seized upon the negro, bound and helpless, and tried to cast him in.

But an overruling Providence heard the cries of the oppressed, and hurled his oppressors into that chasm by hundreds of thousands, until the whole land was filled with mourning, yet still the chasm yawned.

In our anguish and terror, we felt that the whole nation would be speedily ingulfed in one common ruin. It was then that the great emanc.i.p.ator and savior of his country, Abraham Lincoln, saw the danger and the remedy, and seizing four million b.l.o.o.d.y shackles, he wrenched them from their victims, and standing with these broken manacles in his hands upraised toward heaven, he invoked the blessing of the G.o.d of the oppressed, and cast them into the fiery chasm. That offering was accepted, and the chasm closed.