ifth_, that the States
shall adopt the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution; and _sixth_,
that the amendment shall become a part of the Constitution of the
United States. All this is required to be done before representation
is accorded to the States lately in rebellion, and then no
representative presenting himself for admission, can be received
unless he can take the test oath."

--Mr. Eldridge of Wisconsin denounced the whole measure as most wicked
and abominable. "It contains," said he, "all that is vicious, all that
is mischievous in any of the propositions which have come either from
the Committee on Reconstruction or from any gentleman upon the other
side of the House."

--Mr. Elijah Hise of Kentucky declared that, "under such a system as
this bill proposes, the writ of _habeas corpus_ cannot exist, because
even if the civil tribunals are not entirely abolished, they will
exist only at the will of the military tyrant in command."

--Mr. Davis of New York spoke of the danger of suddenly enfranchising
the whole body of rebels. "The State of Kentucky," he said, "has
enfranchised every rebel who has been in the service of the Confederate
States. What to-day is the condition of affairs in that State? Why,
sir, her political power is wielded by rebel hands. Rebel generals,
wearing the insignia of the rebel service, walk the streets of her
cities, admired and courted; while the Union officers with their
wounds yet unhealed, are ostracized in political, commercial and
social life."

--Mr. Niblack of Indiana, one of the leading Democrats of the House,
thought the bill had been much improved by the action of the Senate.
"Though," said he, "it still retains many of the first features to
which I objected when it was before the House for discussion, it is
not now properly a military bill, nor is it properly a measure of
civil administration. It is a most extraordinary attempt to blend the
two principles together."

When a vote was reached, the House rejected the Senate amendment--_ayes_
73, _noes_ 98. This result was effected by a coalition of all the
Democrats with a minority of extreme Republicans. But thirteen
days of the session remained, and it looked as if by a disagreement of
Republicans all legislation on the subject of Reconstruction would be
defeated. Under the pressure of this fear Republican differences were
adjusted, and the Senate and the House found common ground to stand
upon by adding two