the man is declared to
be faithless to his party who does."

Having spoken at considerable length against the pending measure, Mr.
Raymond said: "For these reasons, sir, reasons of policy and of
authority, I do not think we ought to pass this bill. I do not believe
it would be at all effective in securing the objects at which we aim,
or that it would conduce in the slightest degree to promote peace and
secure equal rights among the people upon whom it is to take effect.
And I can not help believing that it contains provisions directly at
war with specific and peremptory prohibitions of the Constitution."

Mr. Raymond defended the Secretary of State against the accusations of
Mr. Schofield. Mr. Seward was not "a perfidious old man," but one
"venerable, not more for age than for the signal services to his
country and the cause of freedom every-where, by which his long and
laborious life, devoted wholly, from early manhood, to the public
service, has been made illustrious." The Secretary of State acted
under law. If Congress expected him to act under the theory that
three-fourths of the loyal States were sufficient for the ratification
of the Constitutional Amendment, they should pass a law to that
effect.

"The man," said Mr. Shellabarger, "who is now the acting President of
the United States, once said to me, in speaking of a bill like the one
now before the House, that it was a measure to dissolve the Union.
That proposition has been so often repeated by members upon the other
side of this hall, that I have thought the House would probably pardon
me if I should attempt to condense into a few sentences a suggestion
or two in regard to that declaration, repeated so often and worn out
so thoroughly as it is."

Mr. Shellabarger maintained the right of governments to withhold from
those who discard all the obligations pertaining to their citizenship
the powers and rights which come alone from performing these
obligations. "This identical principle," said he, "was asserted at the
origin of your Government in the legislation of every one of the
States of the Confederation; was repeated and reenacted by three, at
least, of the first Congresses under the Constitution, and has been
virtually reenacted by being kept in force by every subsequent
Congress which ever met under the Constitution."

"I see such diversity of opinion on this side of the House," said Mr.
Stevens, "upon any question of reconstruction, that, if I do no