Litchfield enquirer., 1865-11-02
Seward on Reconstruct ton.

The friends and neighbors of Secretary Sew | ard waited npon him at his lto','s in A abur~ N. Y. week before last, when he made short speech. His remarks upon the present scheme of reconstruction are worthy of careful perusal He said .- Eo., 9. rit .,
 "We are continually hearing debates con. corning the origin and authority of the plan of
 restoration. New converts, North and South
 call it the Presidents plan All speak of it as | if it were 8 new and recent development. On the contrary We now see that it is not special. ly Andrew Johnson's plan, nor even a new plan in any respect. It is the plan which ab- ruptly yet distinctly offered itself to the last administration. at the moment I have before recalled, when the work of restoration was about to begin at the moment when, although by the world unperceived, it did begin, and it | is the only plan which thus seasonably presented itself; and therefore is the only possible plan which then or ever afterward could be adopted. This plan, al. though occasionally requiring variation of de- tails, nevertheless admits of no substantial change or modification. It could neither be enlarged nor contracted. State conventions in loyal States. however favorable, in disloyal States, however hostile, could not lawfully or efectually disallow it. and everf the people themselves, when amending the Constitution of the United States, are only giving to tha, plan it's just and needtul sovereign sanction
 Iu the meantime, the executive and legislative authorities of Congress can do no more than discharge their proper functions of protecting the recently insurgent States from anarchy du- ring the intervening period while this plan is l Los, spko Sc Sol to this plan that the insurrectionary States shall, by themselves and for themselves, accept and adopt this plan, and thereby submit them. selves to and recognize the national authority
 Thisis IS what meant when said to MT. Adams in a passage which you may possibly recall
 that iu the sense in which the word su6juga
 ton was then used by the enemies of the Uni ted States, at home and abroad, it was not the expectation or purpose of this government that the Southern States should be subjugated but that thought that those States would be brought, by the judiciously mingled exercise of pressure and persuasion, to- a condition in which they would voluntarily return to their allegiance. This was the explanation which Mir. Adams gave to Lord Palmerston, the Prime Minister of England, when that great, and, as I trust, not unfrlendly statesman, said that he did not believe that the Federal Union could be restored, because he knew that while any man can lead horse to the water, no man could make him drink. The plan, therefore
 recognizes not the destruction, nor even the subversion of States, but their active existence and it reasons from facts as they are, not from assumed or possible changes to be effected by continual war, much less does it reason from mere chimeras. This absolute existence of the States which constitute the republic is the most palpable of all the facts with which the l American statesman has to deal If many have stumbled over it into treason and rebel lion, the fact, for all legitimate deductions and purposes, nevertheless remains. In practi- cal sense, at least, the States were before the American Union was. Even while they were colonies of the British crown, they still were embryo States-several, free, selfexisting and iniestructible. Our Federal Republic exists, and henceforth and forever must exist through not the creation but the combination ofthese several, free, selfexis.ing, stubborn States.
 |, You will ask whether reconciliation which followsso closelyupon military coersion can be relied upon. Can. it be sincere Can l it be permanent 2 l answer, Does anybody now believe that it ever will hereafter become possible Wil! you yourselves now or ever consent to it7ef You answer all these questions in the negative. Is not reconciliation, then, not only desirable, bnt imperative Is any other reconciliation, under the icircumstances, possible9 9sl Certainly Jou must accept this proposed reconciliation, or you must purpose to delay aoa wait until you can procure bet l tsf one. Good surgery requires 3hat eveh sim piedfaetures mach moro ic0mponhd ones, shall ne healed, T possible, at the s6at ,iptension. ] Would not delay necessarily prolong asnsairchy9