Year: 1866

dent, called at the Presidential Mansion
on Saturday afternoon. They were re-
ceived by the President, Secretaries
MCUILocH, WELLS and BROWNING
Postmaster General RANDALL, General
GRANT and other distinguished person
ages The proceedings of the Conven
ton were presented by Hon. REvERDY
JOHNSON, on behalf of the committee:


SPEECH OF SENATOR JOHNSON.


MIR. PRESIDENT We are before yon
as a committee of the National Union
Convention which met in Philadelphia,
ON Tuesday, the l4th instant, charged
with the duty of presenting you with
an authenticated copy of its proceed
ings.
Before placing it in your hand, permit
ns to congratulate you that in the object
for which the Convention was called, in
tbe enthusiasm with which in every
State and Territory the call was respond
ed TO, in the unbroken harmony Of its
deliberations, in the unanimity with
which the principles it has declared were
adopted, and more especially in the pat
riotic and constitutional character OF the
principles themselves, we are confident
that you and the country will find graf
ifying and cheering evidence that there
exists among the people a public senti-
ment which renders an early and com.
plete restoration of the Union, as estab-
iished by the Constitution, certain and
inevitable.


Party faction, seeking the continuance
of its misrule, may momentarily delay
it, but the principles of political liberty
for which our forefathers successfully
cOntended, and to secure which they
adopted the Constitution, are so glaring-
w inconsistent with the condition in
which the country has been placed by
such misrule that it will not be permit
ted much lon ger duration.


We wish, Mr.. President, you could
have personally witnessed the spirit of
concord and brotherly affection which
animated every member of the Conven-
ton. Great rs your confidence ever has
been in the intelligence and patriotism
of Your fellow citizens in their deep de-
voLion to tho Union, and in their pres
ent determination to reinstate and main
tain it, that confidence would have be-
come q positive conviction if you could
have seen and heard all that was done
and said upon the occasion. Every
heart was evidently full of joy; every
eye beamed with patriotic animation.
Dependency gave place to assurance
that our late civil strife ended, the bliss
ful reign of peace under the protection,
not of arms, but of the Constitution and
laws, would have sway, and be, IN ev-
ery part of our land cheerfully ac
knowledged, and imperfect good faith
obeyed-you would not have doubted
that the recurrence Of dangerous domes-
tic insurrectlon in the future, are not to
he apprehended. If you could have
seen, sir the men of Massachusetts ana
South Carolina, coming into the Con
vsntion. on the first day of its meeting,
hand in hand, amidst the rapturous ap'
plause of the whole body, awakened by
heartfelt qualification at the event,
filling the eyes OF thousands with tears
Of Joy which they neither could nor
desired to suppress, you would have ieit'
as every person present ielt' that the
time had arrived when all sectional, or
other perilous dissentions had ceased,
and that nothing would be heard in the
future but the voice OF harmony pro.
claiming devotion to a common country,





common union, existing and protected
by forms Of government proved by eX-
perierce to be eminently fitted Tor the
exigencies of either peace or war.


In the principles announced by tho
convention, and in the feeling there
manifested, we have every assurance
that harmony throughout our entire land
will soon prevail We know that IN
former days, as was eloquently declared
by Webster, tue nations most gifted
statesman, Massachusetts and South
Carolina marched shoulder to shout.
der through the revolution" and stood
hand in hand "round the administration
of Washington, and felt his own great
arm lean on theirs for support" so will
they again, with like uuanimity, devo,
tion and power, stand round your
administration, and cause you to feel
that you may also lean on them for
support,


In the proceedings, Mr. President,
which we are to place IN your hands,
YOU will find that the convention per-
formed the grateful duty imposed upon
them by their knowledge of your "devo
lion to the Constitution, the laws, and
interest of your country, as illustrated
by your entire Presidential career OF
declaring that in you they recognize q
Chief Magistrate worthy of the nation
and equal to the great crisis upon which
your lot is cast" and in this declaration
It gives MS unmixed pleasure to add we
are confident that the convention have
but spoken the intelligent and patriotic
sentiment of the country. Ever inac
cessible to the low influences which
often control the mere partizan, governed
alone by all honest opinion of constitu
uonal obligations and rights of the duty
oI !ooklng solely to the true interest
salet!: and honor Of the nation, such
class IS incapable of restoring to any
stale palt tor popularity at the expense
of the public good. "


AIN the measure which you have adont-
ed for the restoration of the Union the
Convention saw only continuance OF
the policy, which, for the same pnr
pose, was inauguraled by your imme
diate predecessor. In his re election by
the people after that policy had beer
fully indicated and had been made on,
of issues of the contest, those of hi
political friends who are assailiug Vol
or strictly pursuing it are forgetful o
regardless Of the opinions which thei
support of re- election necessarily involy
ed. Being upon the same ticket wit