The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1868-02-21
Jlle s8elfura 6azette.
SPEECH OF SENATOR DOOLIFTLE. IN
THE u. y. SENATE, JANUARY 23d.

Mr.. DOOLITTLE-Mr President, the
! question presented in the amendment
offered by me is whether Congress is
still resolved to subject the white peo-
| ple of the Southern States to the dOml-
! nation of the negro race at the point OF
| the havOnet, or whether Congress, in
| Difference to the recently expressed
! will of the American people. will now
so far modify their policy as to leave
the governments in those States in the
hands of the white race and Ofthe more
civilized portion of the blacks? That
is the naked question.
| Sir, why press this negro supremacy
over the whites? What reason can
you give? | have heard three distinct
answers to this question worthy OF no
/ tice:
First. Because the States of the
South rejected the constitutional a.
! n4endment submitted by Congress;
Second. Because the negroes are
loyal, and the whites disloyal; and
Third. Because it will secure party
| ascendancy.
Let us consider the first answer, that
| the States of the South have rejected
| the constitutional amendment submit
| ted by tive last Congress as the basis OF
! reconstruction.
| admit the Legislatures of all the
Southern States rejected that amend
ment with great unanimity; but is that
any sufficient reason for the adoption
of this harsh policy? l think not. III
the first place, that amendment con-
tains one provision which made its a
doption impossible by the Southern
peopIe, at least until you change the
human heart and destroy all sense of
personal honor. 1t DISTINGUISHES from
| holding Office all the men of the South
i'm whom they had ever placed any
public confidence all who had ever
held any office, State or Federal. And
diSfranchises them for what? For sim
ply doing what they themselves had
done.
| can understand how one may say
in argument that the leaders should be
disfranchised. But how any man OF
common sense, or common manhood
could ever suppose it possible for the
people of the South to vote to distran-
chise men esteemed by them as equal
to. ii moi batter than themselves, for an
offense of which they themselves Were
equally guilty, is beyond my compre'
hensiOn. You ask the Southern peo'
pie to betray the men whom they trust
You ask them to dishDnOP those whom
they honor, to uprOOt the AFFECTION 0
wears from their hearts. You ask them
to strike with a serpent's tooth the
oosOm of a friend. But until human
nature shall cease to be what God has
made il, honorable men, to save them
selves, to save even their lives, would
not incur the guilt of aqch unnatural
treachery by voting for such a pFoVls'
ion. When it was pending before thu
Senate, June 6, 1868, urged and i'm.
, pIOred Senators to allow the several
provisions of that amendment to he
Separately submitted and voted upon
F. and | warned the friends Of the meas
ure that this provision would inevita
= bly defeat its adoption by every South
ern State, But sir, the majority were
; deaf to all appeals, The caucus haC
resolved the deed was to be done, Or
account, mainly, of that provision, the
amendment WAS rejected almost
unanimously by every Southern State
Again, when examined more closely
| we find that provision required then
to vote to disfranchise thousands WhC
. have received pardon and amnesty
and O. restoration 10 all their rights a.
citizens under the prOclamatiOns 6
President Lincoln and President John
. son. by virtue of lazy Of Congress
which you yourselves enacted, which
expressly authorized them to gran
such pardon and amnesty lion JUS
such terms as they thought proper
An amendment offered by ne in tht
l Senate the 3lst day of May, 1860, to ex
cept those men who had duly received
: pardon and amnesty under the ConStl
. tuition and laws, was voted down by
an unyielding majority, ! can neYe
view this provision in any other ligh
than most palpable violation Of thi
5 pIighted faith of this government Civ
: en- &c those persons in the most solemn
Q g y x
> Mr.. President, Congress has propose
from time to time many schemes, bu
= they may all be resolved into dlstinc
policies, radically opposed to each 9th
er.
First. Reconstruction by the Con
stitutiOnal amendment on the white
basis.
$ Second. Reconstruction by negr'
suffrage and military force.
The first. assumed that peace hat
o come that the States were in the Y
L Mon, with governments organized
: with Legislatures having pewer to rat
ify or to reject Constitutional amend
ments; and, furthermore, that thOs
governments were in the hands o
> white men, with power, as in all tn
other States, to admit or to exclude ne
groes from suffrage. And, in case tn