Thus short of their power, they would soon become restive. stream In 1868, he led the charge to impeach Johnson, who was narrowly acquitted in the Senate. Congress is the only power that can act in the matter. Thaddeus Stevens was a Republican congressman from Pennsylvania who became the face of the opposition to Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson's lenient approach to the South after the Civil War. The people have once more nobly done their duty. To be sure many subordinate items of the policy of each may be easily sketched. In this speech, Stevens called on his colleagues to support the proposed Fourteenth Amendmentarguing that it would help to bring about legal equality for African Americans. Start your constitutional learning journey. This I take to be the great question between the President and Congress. . Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. "Reconstruction," Hon. That is a matter of taste which every man must decide for himself. Nobody, I believe, pretends that with their old constitutions and frames of government they can be permitted to claim their old rights under the Constitution. That short delay would not be injurious. Finally, Stevens turned his attention to the plight of the former slaves who, though free, were without a hut to shelter them or a cent in their pockets. Rather than looking for Congress to help the Confederates, Stevens thought it more proper for Congress to shepherd the freedmen, providing them with the basic tools they needed in terms of education, legal protections, and security to establish themselves in their newfound freedom. During the war, as the powerful chair of the Ways and Means Committee, Stevens pushed Lincoln for emancipation of the slaves. In Territories Congress fixes the qualifications of electors; and I know of no better place nor better occasion for the conquered rebels and the conqueror to practice justice to all men, and accustom themselves to make and obey equal laws. Whatever law allows the white man to testify in court shall allow the man of color to do the same. Thaddeus Stevens,of Pennsylvania, on the abolition of slavery. Thaddeus Stevens was one of the main leaders of the Radical Republican faction in Congress during Reconstruction. acting in the Union, or of being counted as valid States, until Title Thaddeus Stevens Papers: Speeches and Writing File, 1835-1868; 1865; Names Stevens, Thaddeus, 1792-1868 Reconstruction "There was a dramatic need for another amendment" after the slavery-abolishing 13th Amendment was ratified at the end of 1865, Hetrick says. In the acquisition of true fame courage is just as necessary in the civilian as in the military hero. [Radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens was a Congressman from Pennsylvania who long opposed slavery and advocated for black suffrage. The states of the entire southern half of the nation had seceded, but they were again under federal jurisdiction after the Union victory. Lincoln had already authorized reconstructed governments in Arkansas, Louisiana, Virginia, and Johnson's home state of Tennessee, and Johnson continued Lincoln's goal of quickly restoring local sovereignty to the states. In this, Stevens was zealous, but well outside of the mainstream of Northern opinion, a fact that would shape the mixed record of accomplishment and frustration that followed. Thaddeus studied at Caledonian Secondary School in Vermont, entered the University of Vermont, but was suspended in the second year and entered Dartmouth College to study law-related studies and delivered the commencement speech as a commencement speaker at the 1814 . Death State: Washington, D.C. Death Country: United States, Article Title: Thaddeus Stevens Biography, Author: Biography.com Editors, Website Name: The Biography.com website, Url: https://www.biography.com/political-figures/thaddeus-stevens, Publisher: A&E; Television Networks, Last Updated: May 25, 2021, Original Published Date: April 2, 2014. How absurd that a mere executive officer should claim creative powers! Your donation is fully tax-deductible. The same law which gives a verdict in a White mans favor should give a verdict in a black mans favor on the same state of facts. Lincoln may have been the only one who could have made this arrangement work, but he was assassinated in April 1865, leaving his vice president, Johnson, as the executive in charge of Reconstruction. The next day Watson went to the employer of the colored man and complained. Congress alone can do it. The papers of lawyer and United States representative from Pennsylvania Thaddeus Stevens (1792-1868) consist of 4,750 items (7,769 images) in eight containers and one oversize folder. Congress seemed fully in control. Dead men cannot raise themselves. What can be plainer? In 1848, a third party called the Free Soil Party formed to highlight opposition to extending slavery into western territories that had not yet organized as states. Later that year, on August 11, Stevens died in Washington and was buried near his home in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The law of nations then fixed their condition. The first two years of Congressional Reconstruction saw Southern states rewrite their Constitutions and the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment. There are those who admit the justice and ultimate utility of granting impartial suffrage to all men, but they think it is impolitic. He focused much of his political attention on civil rights, eventually. An Address Delivered to the Citizens of Lancaster, Sept. 6, 1865. The 1857 Dred Scott decision in the. In either case, it is very plain that it requires the action of Congress to enable I them to form a State government and send representatives to Congress. Explore our new 15-unit high school curriculum. Congress denies him all power in the matter, except those of advice, and has determined to maintain such denial. power, we shall deserve and receive the execration of requisite qualifications of age, residence, and citizenship; But the Constitution limits only the action of Congress, and is not a limitation on the States. Congress refuses to treat the States created by him as of any validity, and denies that the old rebel States have any existence which gives them any rights under the Constitution. If there be any who are afraid of the rivalry of the black man in office or in business, I have only to advise them to try and beat their competitor in knowledge and business capacity, and there is no danger that his white neighbors will prefer his African rival to himself. Now, sir, if that decision be the law, then it becomes the more necessary that we should proceed to take care that such a construction as that shall not open the door to greater injuries than have already been sustained. In rebuilding, it is necessary to clear away the rotten and defective portions of the old foundations, and to sink deep and found the repaired edifice upon the firm foundation of eternal justice. .I need not depict the ruin that would follow. Even that is not left to the Commander-in-Chief. The veto power is no exception; it is merely a power to compel a reconsideration. By 1861, as the civil war began, Stevens was responsible for its financing as chairman of the committee on ways and means. Such shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.Constitution United States, art.I, sec. Steven called for action and change but deadlock in congress blocked his agenda. They were subject to the controlling power of the conquerors. How far their liabilities remained there was more difference of opinion. . I pronounce it no nearer to a true Republic now when twenty-five million of a privileged class exclude five million from all participation in the rights of government. He was the second son born to Sarah and Joshua Stevens, who disappeared when his son was a young boy, leaving his wife and children to fend for themselves with very little money. learn the principles of freedom and eat the fruit of foul Thaddeus Stevens review: the Radical Republican America should remember In the first place, it is just. Thaddeus Stevens speech of December 18 1865; Address of a convention of Negroes held in Alexandria Virginia August 1865; Alexander Stephens on Reconstruction April 11 1866; Report of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction June 20 1866; Charles Sumner Opinion on the trial of Andrew Johnson 1868 . endobj In failing health, Stevens requested that he be buried among Negroes resting in a cemetery in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The Reconstruction Act also divided the South into five military districts under commanders empowered to employ the army to protect black property and citizens. There is more reason why colored voters should be admitted in the rebel States than in the Territories. This is a bill designed to enable loyal men, so far as I could discriminate them in these States, to form governments which shall be in loyal hands, that they may protect themselves from such outrages as I have mentioned. if we leave them to the legislation of their late masters, <> Congress must create Since the surrender of the armies of the confederate States of America a little has been done toward establishing this Government upon the true principles of liberty and justice; and but a little if we stop here. There is not one word in the Constitution that gives one particle of anything but judicial and executive power to any other department of Government but Congress. Such is the law of God and such ought to be the law of man. Forego a bottle of soda and donate its cost to us for the information you just learned, and feel good about helping to make it available to everyone. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. Site contains certain content that is owned A&E Television Networks, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Since, then, the President cannot enact, alter, or modify a single law; cannot even create a petty office within his own sphere of duties; if, in short, he is the mere servant of the people, who issue their commands to him through Congress, whence does he derive the constitutional power to create new States; to remodel old ones; to dictate organic laws; to fix the qualification of voters; to declare that States are republican and entitled to command Congress to admit their Representatives? Southern pride would not long brook a hopeless minority. It cannot be denied that this terrible struggle sprang from the vicious principles incorporated into the institutions of our country. ascendency to the party of the Union; and so as to render I would not for a moment inculcate the idea of surrendering a principle vital to justice. There are several good reasons for the passage of this bill [Military Reconstruction Act]. Now different degrees of punishment are inflicted, not on account of the magnitude of the crime, but according to the color of their skin. Whatever means of redress is afforded to one shall be afforded to all. But I never dreamed that all punishment could be dispensed with in human society. acquiring an education, understanding the common laws . If impartial suffrage is excluded in the rebel States then everyone of them is sure to send a solid rebel representative delegation to Congress, and cast a solid rebel electoral vote. Congressional Globe, 39th Cong., 2nd sess., Jan. 3, 1867, pp. And yet certain of our distinguished friends propose to admit State after State before this becomes a part of the Constitution. No one then pretended that the eleven States had any rights under the Constitution of the United States, or any right to interfere in the legislation of the country. A gentleman from Richmond, who had personal knowledge of the facts, told me the circumstances of the murder. The leader of the Radical Republicans in the House, Stevens was a lawyer, politician, and staunch abolitionist. Ooops. ; Hon. The former course would show valor and folly; the latter moral and physical courage, as well as prudence and wisdom. There are degrees of tyranny. He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1814, removed to York, Pennsylvania, was admitted to the bar (in Maryland), and for fifteen years practiced at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. If it be just, it should not be denied; if it be necessary, it should be adopted; if it be a punishment to traitors, they deserve it. The entire speech appears below. Of course the rebels claimed no such rights; for whether their States were out of the Union as they declared, or were disorganized and out of their proper relations to the Government, as some subtle metaphysicians contend, their rights under the Constitution had all been renounced and abjured under oath, and could not be resumed on their own mere motion. Stevens entered the political sphere in 1833, serving for four years in the state legislature as a member of the Anti-Masonic Party. Biography and associated logos are trademarks of A+E Networksprotected in the US and other countries around the globe. Let us at least escape that condition. ?]J2Tw7@F VQ"EQ[?-p_' (E*@zEg* UWQ?-]B[zel}%&H&HR[l`l6$zU~_}s:P)}zVYg7/kxQUDkzd|gno@>nN;q{DG 5%Z. The following speech lays out what he felt Congressional Reconstruction should encompass. . Thaddeus Stevens (April 4, 1792 - August 11, 1868) was a . <>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S>> 3 which possibly now, on looking at it, I might deem intemperate, but which I then deemed necessary to rouse the public attention and cast odium upon the worst institution upon earth:. We have unchained them from the stake so as to allow them locomotion, provided they do not walk in paths which are trod by white men. In failing health, Stevens had requested to be buried in Shreiner-Concord Cemetery in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, because the state accepted all races. I am now confining my arguments to negro suffrage in the rebel States. Stevens successfully prevented the first few new state governments implemented under Lincoln and Johnson's Reconstruction plan from being recognized, refusing to seat the senators and representatives elected by those states. If they do not enfranchise the freedmen, it will give to the rebel States but thirty-seven Representatives. practice justice to all men, and accustom themselves to make My only objection to it is that it is too lenient. In the Reformation there were men engaged as able and perhaps more learned than Martin Luther. An anti-Masonic member of the state legislature (183341), he proved himself a friend of banks, internal improvements, and public schools and a foe of Freemasons, Jacksonian Democrats, and slaveholders. That they will hardly get. Their subjects had liberty of motion and of labor, but the laws were made without and against their will; but I must declare that, in my judgment, they were as really free governments as ours is to-day. That time ought to be present now. with those to whom Congress shall extend the right of President Lincoln, Vice President Johnson, and both branches of Congress repeatedly declared that the belligerent States could never again intermeddle with the affairs of the Union, or claim any right as members of the United States Government until the legislative power of the Government should declare them entitled thereto. He defended the system of segregation developed in the South after Reconstruction (including lynching); segregation was not challenged until the 1950s and 1960s. Thaddeus Stevens seen as one of the fathers of 14th Amendment It matters but little, with this admission, whether you call them States out of the Union, and now conquered territories, or assert that because the Constitution forbids them to do what they did do, that they are therefore only dead as to all national and political action, and will remain so until the Government shall breathe into them the breath of life anew and permit them to occupy their former position. We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right,contact us! No said he , I claim the right to chastise the scoundrel. He followed the colored man, took out his revolver, and deliberately shot him dead in the presence of that community. Under such governments, while electing members Beyond this I do not agree that the policy of the parties are defined. . The white Union men are in a great minority in each of those States.