The martyr presented the truth bodily, when he said, in suggestive metaphor, that we must “build up from the sound materials”; but his successor insists upon building from materials rotten with treason and gaping with rebellion.

He is constructing State governments, not merely in preponderating part, but in whole, from the hostile element.

The martyr says to his successor that the policy adopted is “simply absurd.” He is right, although he might say more.

It is as if, in abolishing the Inquisition, the inquisitors had been continued under another name, and Torquemada had received a fresh license for cruelty.

It is as if King William, after the overthrow of James the Second, had made the infamous Jeffreys Lord Chancellor.

Common sense and common justice cry out against the outrage; and yet this is the Presidential “policy” now so passionately commended to the American people.

And now the President, in the exercise of the One Man Power, decrees that communities lately in rebellion shall be taken at once into our “copartnership.” I object to the decree as dangerous to the Republic.

I am not against pardon, clemency, or magnanimity, except where they are at the expense of good men.

I trust that they will always be practised; but I insist that recent rebels shall not be admitted, without proper precautions, to the business of the firm.

And I insist also that the One Man Power shall not be employed to force them into the firm.

You do not forget, that, in accepting his nomination as Vice-President, he rushed forward to declare that the Rebel States must be remodelled, that confiscation must be enforced, and that Rebels must be excluded from the work of…

But the President himself is his own worst counsellor, as he is his own worst defender.

He does not open his mouth without furnishing evidence against himself.

The people, wrapt in affliction at the great tragedy, trembled as they beheld a drunken man ascend the heights of power.

More than once I ventured to press the duty and renown of carrying out the principles of the Declaration of Independence, and of founding the new governments on the consent of the governed, without distinction of color.

Sumner, there is no difference between us; you and I are alike.” Need I say that I was touched to the heart by this annunciation, which seemed to promise a victory without a battle?

Accustomed to controversy, I saw clearly, that, if the President declared himself for the Equal Rights of All, the good cause must prevail without controversy.

As I walked away, that evening, the battle of my life seemed ended, while the Republic rose before me, refulgent in the blaze of assured freedom, an example to the nations.

I could not help rejoining, that he need not be at Nashville, for at Washington his hand was on the long end of the lever with which he could easily move all Tennessee,--referring, of course, to the powerful, but legitimate, influence the…

On one occasion the President announced himself a “Southern man” with “Southern sympathies,” thus quickening that sectional flame which good men hoped to see quenched forever.

Alas! if, after all our terrible sacrifices, we are still to have a President who does not know how to spurn every sectional appeal and make himself representative of all!

Unhappily, whatever the President said or did was sectional.

Under auspices of the President, a new campaign was planned against the Republic, and they who failed in open war now sought to enter the very citadel of political power.

Victory, purchased by so much loyal blood and treasure, was little better than a cipher.

Slavery itself revived in the spirit of Caste.