He publicly condemned the Confederacy and even initiated the exclusion of traditional Southern senators and representatives from a congressional meeting in 1865. We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back. As a leader in Congress, Stevens fought to end slavery and promote civil rights and racial equality. wrapinknot - wrapinknot by ragtag online; ! Not all of the ideas Stevens voiced in his speech were implemented. Have not loyal blacks quite as good a right to choose rulers and make laws as rebel whites? Thaddeus Stevens (1792-1868) was the most famous Radical Republican in the House of Representatives (1849-1853, 1859-1868). The President is for exonerating the conquered rebels from all the expense and damages of the war, and for compelling the loyal citizens to pay the whole debt caused by the rebellion. They have torn their constitutional States into atoms, and built on their foundations fabrics of a totally different character. . The Candidates in the 2024 U.S. Presidential Race, Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads, Name: Thaddeus Stevens, Birth Year: 1792, Birth date: April 4, 1792, Birth State: Vermont, Birth City: Danville, Birth Country: United States. Born in Danville, Vermont, in 1792, Stevens grew up poor, yet he graduated from Dartmouth College and became an attorney before entering politics in 1833. Speech on Reconstruction Domestic Policy Education Federal Government Race and Equality Religion in America Rights and Liberties State Government by Thaddeus Stevens January 03, 1867 Edited and introduced by Scott Yenor Cite Part of these Core Document Collections Reconstruction View Study Questions 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. 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. It were better to shelter the household and trust to the advancing progress of a higher morality and a purer and more intelligent principle to underpin the defective corner. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. Ask, what is the policy of Congress? and the answer is not always at hand. %PDF-1.5 suffrage. occasion for the conquered rebels and the conqueror to No one then supposed that those States had any governments, except such as they had formed under their rebel organization. Holding them like clay in the hands of the potter, we must see that no vessel is made for destruction. Congress alone can do it. Early in his career, he developed a hatred for bondage and, subsequently, defended many fugitives without charging them legal fees. The Black Codes passed in those states to keep the freed slaves from exercising their new freedoms further angered the Radical Republicansand even most moderate Republicans. In failing health, Stevens had requested to be buried in Shreiner-Concord Cemetery in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, because the state accepted all races. After the war Stevens emerged as one of the most militant of the Radical Republicans, consistently striving for justice for the black masses. As a member of the joint Committee on Reconstruction, he played an important part in the preparation of the Fourteenth (due process) Amendment to the Constitution and the military reconstruction acts of 1867. I. This amendment once adopted cannot be annulled without two thirds of Congress. 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. The two powers mutually prepared to settle the question by arms. x\YF~W$cGGH-Ky41}@P v>~{"_-(LlQUQXkga_QU As a politician in Pennsylvania, he supported free public education and suffrage for African Americans. With other Radical Republicans, he agitated for emancipation, black fighting units, and black suffrage. power, we shall deserve and receive the execration of Do you avow the party purpose? The material spans the years 1811-1927, with the bulk of the collection dating from 1850 to 1868. . describe a time when you were treated unfairly. It fixes the basis of representation in Congress. They were expected to suggest a plan for rebuilding a shattered nationa nation which though not dissevered was yet shaken and riven by the gigantic and persistent efforts of six million able and ardent men; of bitter rebels striving through four years of bloody war. To Stevens, the procedure by which a territory becomes a state was the logical blueprint for this process. Image Details The Joint Committee on Reconstruction, comprising members from the House and Senate, gathered testimony on conditions in the South from 144 witnesses. In that time, too, the loyal Congress could mature their laws and so amend the Constitution as to secure the rights of every human being and render disunion impossible. No sane man believed that they had any organic or municipal laws which the United States were bound to respect. An Address Delivered to the Citizens of Lancaster, Sept. 6, 1865. It would not be wise to prevent the raising of the structure because some corner of it might be founded upon materials subject to the inevitable laws of mortal decay. During the dictatorship of Pericles his laws were just, but Greece was not free. UJxCA**]=#TSWr];227~|}&Y&QHV +JG{4ef1R+2#{2yTy$H. . Whose especial duty is it to do it? Thaddeus Stevens, "Reconstruction" Speech, September 6, 1865. Later that year, on August 11, Stevens died in Washington and was buried near his home in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. law. 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. Such a course would soon surrender the Government into the hands of rebels. acquiring an education, understanding the common laws to the territorial Legislatures, they will necessarily mingle To those white leaders, voting rights for the freedmen, as advocated by Radical Republicans, were out of the question. Explore our new 15-unit high school curriculum. What are the great questions which now divide the nation? How absurd that a mere executive officer should claim creative powers! . Petition to US Congress for Womens Suffrage, President Andrew Jacksons Message to Congress On Indian Removal, Canada Bans Commercial Fishing in Lakes St. Clair and Erie, Great Britain Withdraws from the Concert of Europe. . The Reconstruction Act also divided the South into five military districts under commanders empowered to employ the army to protect black property and citizens. Not in the Executive, for he only executes and cannot make laws. It has always been observed that the larger the number of the rulers the more cruel the treatment of the subject races. Thaddeus Stevens, (born April 4, 1792, Danville, Vermont, U.S.died August 11, 1868, Washington, D.C.), U.S. . The confederate States claimed no rights unless they could conquer them by the contest of arms. Astrological Sign: Aries, Death Year: 1868, Death date: August 11, 1868. In the speech below which Stevens gave in the U.S. House of Representatives on January 3, 1867 supporting the Reconstruction bill then being debated, he issued a response to those who said his call was radical and incendiary with a now famous quotation: " I am for negro suffrage in every rebel State. Rather than debate the presidential plan, Stevens took a different tack, questioning the very propriety of having the executive branch direct Reconstruction policy. Dead States cannot restore their existence "as it was." Impartial suffrage, both in electing the delegates and ratifying their proceedings, is now the fixed rule. . Unless the law of nations is a dead letter, the late war between two acknowledged belligerents severed their original compacts and broke all the ties that bound them together. If we fail in this great duty now, when we have the And yet I am amazed and alarmed at the impatience of certain well-meaning Republicans at the exclusion of the rebel States until the Constitution shall be so amended as to restrain their despotic desires. But this step forward is an assault upon ignorance and prejudice, and timid men shrink from it. To reconstruct the nation, to admit new States, to guaranty republican governments to old States are all legislative acts. . Now, Mr. Speaker, unless Congress proceeds at once to do something to protect these people from the barbarians who are now daily murdering them; who are murdering the loyal whites daily and daily putting into secret graves not only hundreds but thousands of the colored people of that country; unless Congress proceeds at once to adopt some means for their protection, I ask you and every man who loves liberty whether we will not be liable to the just censure of the world for our negligence or our cowardice or our want of ability to do so? They did not claim to raise an insurrection to reform the Government of the country -a rebellion against the laws-but they asserted their entire independence of that Government and of all obligations to its laws. . ?]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. What madness! endobj 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. Thaddeus Stevens was a Radical Republican leader and one of the most powerful members in the U.S. House of Representatives. No State could order the election of members until Congress had ordered a census and made an apportionment. Such is the law of God and such ought to be the law of man. Biography and associated logos are trademarks of A+E Networksprotected in the US and other countries around the globe. I can hardly believe that any person can be found who will not admit that every one of these provisions is just. There they can Omissions? In monarchical Governments, where the sovereign power rests in the Crown, the king would have fixed the condition of the conquered provinces. Since the conquest they have been 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. presenting themselves from a recognized State possess the Ooops. Melancthon and others were ripe scholars and sincere reformers, but none of them had his courage.