actually sent this large number of men into the great struggle, lacking only 102,496 of the whole number called for; and these were rapidly coming in when the close of the war arrested the people in their march to the field. Besides the above, 120,000 "emergency men" and 178,975 colored troops sprang to arms, at the call of the government, to save their country and their liberties. On the 1st of March, 1865, our military force of all arms, officers, and men, amounted to 965,591. On the 1st of May, 1865,-just two months later, -the number had swelled, by enlistments alone, to 1,000,516. According to the public judgment of the most enlightened of other nations, these facts are without a parallel in history. Of our brave citizen-soldiers, there were, during the war, killed, wounded, and missing, 441,316; while the killed, wounded, and missing of our rebel foes reached 765,765: making the frightful aggregate of victims to this Rebellion. 1,207,081. When the war closed, we held of our Confederate foes 98,802 as prisoners of war; while the whole number of men surrendered to our arms amounted to 174,223. Now, when we place by the side of these exertions of power, and exhaustions of numbers, the fact, that our popu lation steadily increased during the whole period of the war, we shall have some idea of the moral force of people, with which we enter upon our future mission. Look at the cost of the war. As a single fact toward an approximate estimate, consider, that, for the five years ending June 30, 1866, the expenditures for the war and navy departments increased more than $300,000,000. Add the amount paid for pensions (already between $15,000,000 and $16,000,000 annually), add also the interest of the public war debt, the expenditures of the loyal States for bounty, relief of soldiers through the great commissions and otherwise, the maintenance of military force in the rebel States during their unsettled condition, the enormous destruction of property in the war districts, and the value of the labor of our millions taken away from the pursuits of industry to exhaust their time and strength in military campaigns, and the amount swells beyond our power of estimation or proper conception. Notwithstanding all this, we begin our new career with largely increased wealth and business energy. Look at the national debt. On the 31st of August, 1865, it rose to $2,735,689,571,- its highest point. To this must be added the debts of the several States and local corporations, amounting to about $650,000,000. The aggregate of these public debts seems so enormous, that great financiers in England and on the Continent have regarded repudiation and the utter bankruptcy of the nation as inevitable. We moved from the war into the future with this debt. Look at our resources. The Great Republic does not stagger under these enormous burdens. Our people paid income-tax, in one day, viz., the 31st of August, 1865,$2,315,000; on the 4th of September, 1865 (a Sunday preceding), $4,066,731.42; and on the 2d of January, 1866 (New-Year's holiday preceding), $4,068,000. These figures show the highest amounts reached in a single day. The growth of wealth may be seen by the following figures. Income-tax yielded in The whole amount realized from this source from 1862 to 1866 is $164,865,018. Our aggregate revenue from customs, internal revenue, and direct tax (including also loans and treasury-notes), reached in 1864 1865 1866 $1,358,758,614.58 Can a people commanding such resources, with reasonable financial economy, be wrecked for the want of funds? Let it be observed, that, notwithstanding the predictions of our foreign friends, we have paid all our interest, amounting, as it did for 1866 (including treasury-notes), to $133,067,741.69; and from the 31st of August, 1865, to the 1st of October, 1867, we had reduced the principal of our national debt $262,412,124.24. Thus we begin our great future.* ORGANIC UNITY AND REGENERATED PATRIOTISM. During the reign of slavery, sectional tendencies greatly impaired and threatened our united strength. Though the ultra doctrine of State against National rights was thoroughly exploded by our clearest-minded statesmen, it nevertheless exerted an injurious influence over the national feeling of multitudes. The first great fact of the new nation is the acknowledged indissoluble unity of all the States and Territories. We are not merely so many millions of people, living in good or bad neighborhood; we are not so many great sovereign States of rival and antagonist power. We now know for ourselves, and the world understands, that, like "liberty and union," our great States are "one and inseparable now and forever." This aggregates our strength, bringing all our millions of people and wealth into one grand whole; and this can no longer be regarded as a unity of accidents, a unity by external pressure or arbitrary power. It is a unity of principles, of national life and development; by the clearly expressed will of God, an organic, indissoluble unity. Strong and enthusiastic has been the feeling of American patriotism from the first. It has, however, been vitiated by sectional institutions and vices, especially those of slavery. But the patriotism of the new nation has passed through the fire. Its dross has been given to the flames. It has been tried, and comes forth as gold." Now we love, not one town or one State merely, not the North or the South 66 * Official statistics, from Hon. C. COLE, senator from California. alone; but we love our whole country. Southern patriots have suffered by the assault made upon its integrity, and Northern people in its defence, as hardly any people ever suffered before; and now the whole land, baptized in tears and blood, is unspeakably dear to us all. Woe to the nation which shall attempt to place hostile foot upon it! Every inch of this vast country is now sacred soil,- sacred to liberty and to God. True, the time has not yet come for the largest, fullest realization of this regeneration of national patriotism. The bitter prejudices of a generation at least must pass away before its obstacles will be removed, and the love of country throughout our growing millions shall reach the national breadth and power which now rises up before us as our certain destiny. True, also, the task of experimental Christianity, in grappling with our personal and national vices, is hard, and practically endless. Just so far, however, as it advances, it will extend our patriotic devotion to our whole great country into the sphere of a true philanthropy, and proportionally increase its power. THE TRANSITION. The history of reconstruction cannot now be written. It is not yet accomplished. The chaos immediately following a bloody war and a great revolution must have time to resolve itself into order. Popular legislation and a passing administration cannot lead as promptly to executive strength as could a pure-minded, absolute despotism. There will, of necessity, be a great variety of opinions as to the methods. of rehabilitating States resolved by rebellion into their inorganic elements. Party spirit will struggle hard for the mastery, and only by degrees will the true methods of wisdom evolve from the strife. We shall not, therefore, chronicle the contests or the decisions that are seeking to identify the facts and principles which must assume the mastery in our final adjustments and future developments. A few things incident to our critical, transition period, we have distinctly seen. The feeling of revenge, gradually narrowing the scope of its hostility, and triumph moderating into magnanimity and fraternity, point the way to a hopeful future. In the mean time, it has been evident that our released millions could not, without help, wisely and safely assume their new relations of independence and equality before the law; and hence the Freedmen's Bureau has been an absolute necessity. It has been shown by indisputable facts that former rebel masters would seek to invent methods of virtually remanding them back to slavery; that they would not, without the presence and authority of the General Government, deal with their former slaves as freemen, nor would they all render obedience to civil national law without the pres ence of a power competent to enforce it. Hence acts of Congress for the reconstruction of State governments have included adequate military force; and obstinate local injustice has been, in some instances, compelled to yield to the power of a strong national government, now, more than in any former period of our history, beginning to be known and realized as everywhere present. In the mean time, it can be affirmed with gratitude that regenerating influences from the various churches have found their way through our distracted South; and, subduing rebellion against God, they have inspired consideration and love for man, until it may be claimed that the most hostile parties are gradually losing their asperities. Around and within the newly-organized churches of the South a true and noble citizenship is rising up in loyal obedience to the government and to God. Thus another indication of the true power of reconstruction reveals itself. It is not yet, however, time to write the history of this great regenerating force in its work of re-organizing civil society. The loyal people, white and colored, by thousands and tens of thousands, are getting their places in the Church of Christ; and, just so far as this work extends, the strength and harmony of the new nation appears. |