laws equally
oppressive exist in some of the other States. Is there no necessity to
protect a freedman when he is liable to be whipped if caught away from
home? no necessity to protect a freedman in his rights when he is not
permitted to hold or lease a piece of ground in a State? no necessity
to protect a freedman in his rights, who will be reduced to a slavery
worse than that from which he has been emancipated if a law is
permitted to be carried into effect? Sir, these orders emanate and
this information comes from officers acting by presidential authority,
and yet the President tells us there is no danger of conflicting
legislation."

After having answered other objections of the President, Mr. Trumbull
said: "I have now gone through this Veto Message, replying with what
patience I could command to its various objections to the bill. Would
that I could stop here, that there was no occasion to go further; but
justice to myself, justice to the State whose representative I am,
justice to the people of the whole country, in legislation for whose
behalf I am called to participate, justice to the Constitution I am
sworn to support, justice to the rights of American citizenship it
secures, and to human liberty, now imperiled, require me to go
further. Gladly would I refrain speaking of the spirit of this
message, of the dangerous doctrines it promulgates, of the
inconsistencies and contradictions of its author, of his encroachments
upon the constitutional rights of Congress, of his assumption of
unwarranted powers, which, if persevered in and not checked by the
people, must eventually lead to a subversion of the Government and the
destruction of liberty.

"Congress, in the passage of the bill under consideration, sought no
controversy with the President. So far from it, the bill was proposed
with a view to carry out what were supposed to be the views of the
President, and was submitted to him before its introduction in the
Senate. I am not about to relate private declarations of the
President, but it is right that the American people should know that
the controversy which exists between him and Congress in reference to
this measure is of his own seeking. Soon after Congress met, it became
apparent that there was a difference of opinion between the President
and some members of Congress in regard to the condition of the
rebellious States and the rights to be secured to freedmen.

"The President, in his annual message, ha