s with a view of taking charge of the
colored people or aiding them in their perilous condition, was rejected
by the President, and had to be passed over his veto. It was the same
with matters in reference to reconstruction. He began haranguing the
populace from the balcony of the Executive Mansion, in order to create
an ill-feeling and prejudice in the minds of the people against their
representatives.

"He, however, very suddenly changed his views as to the proper treatment
for the leaders of the rebellion. Instead of wishing them tried and
punished, as formerly, he thought a portion of Congress should be tried
and punished. He turned his back on his Union friends and made the
leading rebels and their sympathizers of the North his confidants.
Jefferson Davis and all those under arrest for treason were, under
his new programme, released. He denounced leading Republicans as
conspirators and traitors. He was cajoled by every conspirator of the
late rebellion. Finally the visits of certain men from Maryland and
Virginia became so frequent that it aroused a suspicion in the minds of
the Secretary of War and the Chief of Staff to the General of the Army,
and very soon this suspicion extended to the General himself that a new
conspiracy was being organized. The General was led to believe this,
first, on the ground that the President at one time wanted all the
leading men who had been paroled by the General arrested and tried by
the U. S. Court in Virginia. This the General of the Army had resisted
in such a manner as to cause quite a coolness between the two. The
same men that he at one time desired to see hanged had now become his
companions, confidential friends and advisers.

"Information was received about this time, through a source that could
not be doubted by the Secretary of War nor by the General of the Army,
of a programme which had been agreed upon by the President and certain
rebels claiming that their States were sovereign, were States now
as ever, with all their rights--that of representation included. The
President determined to issue his proclamation for an election of
Senators and Members of the House of Representatives from all the States
lately in rebellion, and if they came to Washington claiming their
seats, and should not be admitted by the Republican majority, he
would organize a Congress with the Southern members and the Northern
Democrats, and as President would recognize them as the Congress of the