Year: 1866




gates from each State, appointed by the
National Union Convention to waitupon
the President with an official copy of
the proceedings of the Convention, met
this morning and postponed until one
o'clock the time for the interview. 1t
was originally intended that ten AM.
should be the hour at which the recep-
ton would be had.


About one o'clock the committee,
headed by band of music, reached the
White House. They were conducted
into the East Room by Marshal Gooding,
and were so arranged as to form circle.
The delegates to the Convention who
were in the city were then invited in,
and took position in the rear of the
committee. The President soon appear
ed, and was accompanied by Secretaries
M'Culloch, Welles, and Browning, and
Postmaster General Randall. The Hon.
Reverdy johnson, of Maryland, then
advanced and said:


Mr.. PRESIDENT: We are before you
as a committee of the National Union
Convention, which met in Philadelphia
on Tuesday, the fourteenth instant,
charged with the duty of presenting you
with an authentic copy of its proceed
ings.


Before placing it in your hands, you
will permit us to congratulate you on
the object for which the Convention was
called in the enthusiasm with which, in
every State and Territory, the call was re-
sponded 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
patriotic and constitutional character of
the principles themselves, we are conf
dent that you and the country will find
gratifying and cheering evidence that
there exists among the people a public
sentiment which renders an early and
complete restoration of the Union as
established by the Constitution certain
and inevitable. Party faction, seeking
the continuance of its miSrule, may
momcntarily delay it, but the principles
of political liberty for which our fathers
successfully contended, and to secure
which they adopted the Constitution
are so glaringly inconsistent with the
condition in which the country has beer
placed by such misrule, that it will not
be permitted much longer duration
We wish, Mr.. President, you could have
witnessed the spirit of concord ant
brotherly affection which animated ever!
member of the Convention. Great IL
YOUR confidence has ever been in the in
telligence and patriotism Of your fellow
citizens, in their deep devotion to the
Union, and their present determination
to reinstate and maintain it, that con
fidence would have become Il positive
conviction could you have seen ant
heard all that was done and said upor
the occasion. Every heart was evidently
full of joy, every eye beamed with pa
triotic animation; dependency gave
place to the assurance that, our late
dreadful civil strife ended, the blisSfu
reign of peace, under the protection, no
of arms, but of the Constitution ant
laws, would have sway, and be in every
part of our land cheerfully acknowl
edged and in perfect good faith obcyed
You would not have doubted that th'
recurrence of dangerous domestic insur
rectiOns in the future are not to be ap
pretended. If you could have seen th'
men of Massachusetts and South Caroline
coming into the Convention on the frs
day of its meeting, hand to hand, annie
the rapturous applause of the who'll
body, awakened by heartfelt qualification
at the event, filling the eyes of thousand
with tears of joy which they neithe
could nor desired to repress, you Woult
have felt, as every person present felt
that he time had arrived when all sec
tional or other perilous diSsensions hat
ceased, and that nothing should be heart
in the future but the voice of harmony
proclaiming devotion to common
country, of pride in being bound together
by common Union, existing and pro
tected by forms of government PROVED
by experience to be eminently fitted TO
the eXigencies of either war or peace.


In the principles announced by theC Con
vention, and in the feeling there mani
tested, we have every assurance tina


harmony throughout our entire lan'
will soon prevail. We know that IL
in former days, as was eloquently de
clared by Webster, the nations mos
gifted statesman, Massachusetts anC
South Carolina went shoulder t
shoulder through the Revolution" ant
stood hand in hand around the Admin
, istration of Washington, and felt hi
own great arm lean on them for support
so will they again with like magnani
nifty, devotion, and power stand roun'
your Administration and cause you +
feel that you may also lean on them TO
) support. In the proceedings, Mr.. Presi
dent, which we are to place in you


hands, you will find that the Conventio
performed the grateful duty impose
upon them by their knowledge of you
"deVotion to the Constitution and law
) and interests of your country" as Illus
, trated by your entire Presidential careel
of declaring that in you they "recogni2
Chief Magistrate worthy of the natior


and loyal to the great crisis upon whic
: your lot is cast" and in this declaratio
= it gives us marked pleasure to add, W
t are confident that the Convention hi


hut Snolynn tho intnIliunnt and nntripti