gather, in which he did not do full and substantial justice. * ***

The principal objection that has been made to his policy is that he did not extend his invitation to all the loyal men of the Southern States, including the colored as well as the white people. ** *Now, let us look at that question. In every one of the seceded States, before the rebellion, the negro was excluded from the right of voting by their laws. It is true the Senator from Massachusetts would say these are all swept away. Admit that; but in a majority of the Northern States to this hour there is a denial of the right of suffrage to the colored population. In Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York that right is limited, and these three States contain one third of the people of the United States. In a large majority of the States, including the most populous, negro suffrage is prohibited. And yet you ask President Johnson, by a simple mandatory proclamation or military order, to confer the franchise on a class of people who are not only prohibited from voting in the eleven Southern States, but in a majority of the Nortern States, and, indeed, I think, in all the States except six. * * * We complain here that the President has not

exercised his power to extend to freedmen the right of suffrage when Congress never has done it. We have absolute authority over this District; and, until this session, the proposition was not seriously mooted to extend the suffrage to the colored population. Here, better than anywhere else in the Union, they are fitted and entitled to suffrage; and yet we never, in our legislative power for this District, where we have absolute power, complied with that condition which has been asked of the President of the United States. *** So, I think, we have never conferred the right to vote upon negroes in the Territories. * * * And this is not all; in the only plan Congress has ever proposed for the reconstruction of the Southern States, the Wade and Davis bill, to whieh I have referred so often, Congress did not and would not make negro suffrage a part of their plan. The effort was made to do so, and was abandoned. By that bill the suffrage was conferred only upon white male loyal citizens. And in the plan adopted by the President, he adopted in this respect the very same conditions for suffrage prescribed by Congress. Now, have we, as candid and honorable men, the right to complain of the President because he declined

to extend suffrage to this most ignorant freed population, when we have refused or neglected to extend it to them, or to the negroes of this District, or to the colored men who may go to the Territories? No, sir; whatever may be our opinion of the theory or right of every man to vote-and I do not dispute or contest with honorable Senators upon that point-I say, with the President, that to ask him to extend to four millions of these people the right of suffrage, when we have not the courage to extend it to those within our control, when our States, represented by us here on this floor, have refused to do it, is to make of him an unreasonable demand, in which the people of the United States will not sustain Congress.

THADDEUS STEVENS,

OF PENNSYLVANIA.

(BORN 1792, DIED 1868.)

ON THE FIRST RECONSTRUCTION BILL; HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JANUARY 3, 1867.

MR. SPEAKER:

What are the great questions which now divide the nation? In the midst of the political Babel which has been produced by the intermingling of secessionists, rebels, pardoned traitors, hissing Copperheads, and apostate Republicans, such a confusion of tongues is heard that it is difficult to understand either the questions that are asked or the answers that are given. Ask what is the "President's policy," and it is difficult to define it. Ask what is the "policy of Congress," and the answer is not always at hand. A few moments may be profitably spent in seeking the meaning of each of these

terms.

In this country the whole sovereignty rests

with the people, and is exercised through their Representatives in Congress assembled. The legislative power is the sole guardian of that sovereignty. No other branch of the government, no other department, no other officer of the government, possesses one single particle of the sovereignty of the nation. No government official, from the President and Chief-Justice down, can do any one act which is not prescribed and directed by the legislative power. Suppose the government were now to be organized for the first time under the Constitution, and the President had been elected, and the judiciary appointed; what could either do until Congress passed laws to regulate their proceedings? What power would the President have over any one subject of government until Congress had legislated on that subject? * The President could not even create bureaus or departments to facilitate his executive operations. He must ask leave of Congress. Since, then, the President cannot enact, alter, or modify a single law; cannot even create a petty office within his own sphere of operations; if, in short, he is the mere servant of the people, who issue their commands to him through Congress, whence does he derive the constitutional

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