I desire that as early as possible, without curtailing debate, this House shall come to some conclusion as to what shall be done with the rebel States. My only objection to it is that it is too lenient. Thaddeus Stevens, Speech in favor of black suffrage, House of Representatives, January 3, 1867. The law has nothing to do with it. Remarkable Radical: Thaddeus Stevens | The National Endowment for the Mr. Speaker, I am very anxious that this bill should be proceeded with until finally acted upon. . As a politician in Pennsylvania, he supported free public education and suffrage for African Americans. . Now color disqualifies a man from testifying in courts, or being tried in the same way as white men. In failing health, Stevens requested that he be buried among Negroes resting in a cemetery in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. And yet I am amazed and alarmed at the impatience of certain well-meaning Republicans at the exclusion of the rebel States until the Constitution shall be so amended as to restrain their despotic desires. Johnson's policies allowed many former Confederates to regain political power. <>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S>> Whose especial duty is it to do it? If it be just, it should not be denied; if it be necessary, it should be adopted; if it be a punishment to traitors, they deserve it. The entire speech appears below. Finally, Stevens turned his attention to the plight of the former slaves who, though free, were without a hut to shelter them or a cent in their pockets. Rather than looking for Congress to help the Confederates, Stevens thought it more proper for Congress to shepherd the freedmen, providing them with the basic tools they needed in terms of education, legal protections, and security to establish themselves in their newfound freedom. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Thaddeus Stevens speech of December 18 1865; Address of a convention of Negroes held in Alexandria Virginia August 1865; Alexander Stephens on Reconstruction April 11 1866; Report of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction June 20 1866; Charles Sumner Opinion on the trial of Andrew Johnson 1868 The following speech lays out what he felt Congressional Reconstruction should encompass. In other words, that they are not out of the Union, but are only dead carcasses lying within the Union. inveterate rebels are invited to participate in our legislation. The parties acknowledged each other as such, and claimed to be governed by the law of nations and the laws of war in their treatment of each other. Now, sir, it is for these reasons that I insist on the passage of some such measure as this. . Our fathers had been compelled to postpone the principles of their great Declaration, and wait for the full establishment till a more propitious time. No one then pretended that the eleven States had any rights under the Constitution of the United States, or any right to interfere in the legislation of the country. . Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). In the Reformation there were men engaged as able and perhaps more learned than Martin Luther. governed by martial law. Any exception to this rule has been a work of grace in Congress by passing healing acts. As everyone within the government knew, Stevens was not amenable to allowing the Confederates to regain their role within the Union. Citizens replaced the foundations of slavery that formerly supported Southern states . PDF The Meaning of Emancipation in the Reconstruction Era The committee influenced the drafting and passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, which upheld the citizenship rights . They are all asserted, in some form or other, in our DECLARATION or organic law. If we do not furnish them with Now, you must divide them between loyalists, without regard to color, and disloyalists, or you will be the perpetual vassals of the free trade, irritated, revengeful South. The war was acknowledged by other nations as a public war between independent belligerents. They would merely misrepresent their constituents. In the second place, it is a necessity in order to protect the loyal white men in the seceded States. And I need hardly say that the first time that the South with their copperhead allies obtain the command of Congress it will be repealed. Stevens entered the political sphere in 1833, serving for four years in the state legislature as a member of the Anti-Masonic Party. We have allowed them the unwonted privilege of attending church, if they can do so without offending the sight of their former masters. As both a Southerner (who had remained loyal to the Union) and a Democrat, Johnson was hard-pressed to implement Lincoln's plan, especially in the face of a public discourse dominated by Thaddeus Stevens and the Radical Republicans. what its framers intended; and so as to secure perpetual Is their judgment misled by their kindness; or are they unconsciously drifting into the haven of power at the other end of the avenue? When Stevens rose to speak in the House of Representatives on December 18, 1865, his opposition to Johnson's Reconstruction plan was already well known. 20072023 Blackpast.org. Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment (1866) He focused much of his political attention on civil rights, eventually helping to draft the 14th Amendment. With them the blacks would act in a body; and it is believed that in each of said States, except one, the two united would form a majority, control the States, and protect themselves. Heaven forbid that the southern states, or any one of them, should be represented by this floor until such monuments of freedom are built high and firm. . . The future condition of the conquered power depends on the will of the conqueror. What power would the President have over anyone subject of government until Congress had legislated on that subject? No sane man believed that they had any organic or municipal laws which the United States were bound to respect. The employer offered to pay Watson every dollar that he might assess for the damage that had been done. We have imposed upon them the privilege of fighting our battles, of dying in defense of freedom, and of bearing their equal portion of taxes; but where have we given them the privilege of ever participating in the formation of the laws for the government of their native land? They were subject to the controlling power of the conquerors. But great events fix the eye of history on small objects and magnify their meanness. Excerpts from Henry Carey The Harmony of Interests Agricultural, Manufacturing & Commercial 1851, Excerpts from Henrey Carey The Slave Trade Domestic and Foreign 1853, Excerpt from Frederick Law Olmsted A journey in the Seaboard Slave States 1856, The Constitution of the Confederate States of America 1861, McClellan Letter to Lincoln on His Evacuation from the Penninsula Campaign 1862, Thaddeus Stevens speech of December 18 1865, Address of a convention of Negroes held in Alexandria Virginia August 1865, Alexander Stephens on Reconstruction April 11 1866, Report of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction June 20 1866, Charles Sumner Opinion on the trial of Andrew Johnson 1868, Exerpt from James W. Grimes Opinion on the Trial of Andrew Johnson 1868, Resolutions of a meeting of the Illinois State Farmers' Association April 1873. Later that year, on August 11, Stevens died in Washington and was buried near his home in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The leader of the Radical Republicans in the House, Stevens was a lawyer, politician, and staunch abolitionist. Petition to US Congress for Womens Suffrage, President Andrew Jacksons Message to Congress On Indian Removal, Canada Bans Commercial Fishing in Lakes St. Clair and Erie, Great Britain Withdraws from the Concert of Europe. A majority of Congress desires that treason shall be made odious, not by bloody executions, but by other adequate punishments. Whatever means of redress is afforded to one shall be afforded to all. Born to Joshua and Sarah (Morrill) Stevens, he was the second of four sons. Thaddeus Stevens, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives during Abraham Lincoln's presidency, fought to abolish slavery and helped draft the 14th Amendment during Reconstruction. Though the President is Commander-in-Chief, Congress is his commander; and, God willing, he shall obey. An ancient philosopher, whose antagonist admitted that what he required was just but deemed it impolitic, asked him: Do you believe in Hades? I would say to those above referred to, who admit the justice of human equality before the law but doubt its policy: Do you believe in heIl?. Thaddeus Stevens (April 4, 1792 - August 11, 1868) was a . If the doctrine enunciated in that decision be true, never were the people of any country anywhere, or at any time, in such terrible peril as are our loyal brethren at the South, whether they be black or white, whether they go there from the North or are natives of the rebel States. Thus much I have said at the outset of my remarks, which shall not be very long. Lincoln had already authorized reconstructed governments in Arkansas, Louisiana, Virginia, and Johnson's home state of Tennessee, and Johnson continued Lincoln's goal of quickly restoring local sovereignty to the states. Thaddeus Stevens, "Reconstruction" Speech, September 6, 1865. Though Commander- in-Chief by the Constitution, he would have nothing to command, either by land or water, until Congress raised both Army and Navy. In 1848, a third party called the Free Soil Party formed to highlight opposition to extending slavery into western territories that had not yet organized as states. Do you find this information helpful? That short delay would not be injurious. He focused much of his political attention on civil rights, eventually. Melancthon and others were ripe scholars and sincere reformers, but none of them had his courage. Thaddeus Stevens speech of December 18 1865 The President assumes, what no one doubts, that the late rebel States have lost their constitutional relations to the Union, and are incapable of representation in Congress, except by permission of the Government. Unless the law of nations is a dead letter, the late war between two acknowledged belligerents severed their original compacts and broke all the ties that bound them together. Popular interest in punishing or governing the South, as well as in ensuring justice for freedmen, waned, however, as Northerners prioritized a return to prosperity. We may not aspire to fame. Contributor: Stevens Thaddeus The day before the Pennsylvania Senate had voted to repeal this act, but Stevens' speech moved the state House to vote against repeal and the Senate to take another vote in support of free public schools. Holding them like clay in the hands of the potter, we must see that no vessel is made for destruction. Congress seemed fully in control. It were better for the black man if he were governed by one king than by twenty million. But the public mind has been educated in error for a century. 251-252. Thaddeus Stevens in Reconstruction Call you this a free Republic where four millions are subjects but not citizens? "Reconstruction," lithograph by J. L. Giles, ca. 1867 It is claimed for him by some as the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy. Let us now refer to the provisions of the proposed amendment. How, then, can such a State adopt the amendment? If we fail in this great duty now, when we have the Delivered only seven months after the war ended and on the same day that the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery, went into effect, Stevens's speech represented the view of a group in Congress known as the Radical Republicans. Whoever had then asserted that those States had remained unfractured, and entitled to all the rights and privileges which they enjoyed before the rebellion, and were on a level with their loyal conquerors, would have been deemed a fool, and would have been found insane by any inquisition de lunatico inquirendo.. Congress is to pass a law declaring the condition of these
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