therefore, not merely with surprise, but with profound regret, and even
with mortification, that the North found the South in an utterly
impracticable frame of mind. They would do nothing: they would listen
to nothing. They had been inspired by the President with the same
unreasoning tenacity and stubbornness that distinguished his own
official conduct. They believed that, even against the popular verdict
in the North, the President would in the end prevail. They had
unbounded faith in the power of patronage, and they constantly exhorted
the President to turn every opponent of his policy out of office, and
give only to his friends the honors and emoluments of the National
Government. They had full faith that this would carry consternation
to the Republican ranks, and would establish the President's power on
a firm foundation.

Unless, therefore, the Loyal States were willing to allow the Rebel
States to come back on their own terms, in a spirit of dictation to the
Government of the Union, they were under the imperious necessity of
providing some other basis of reconstruction than the one which the
South had unitedly rejected. Congress was charged, in the name of
loyalty, to see that no harm should come to the Republic, and the point
was now reached where three ways were open: _first_, Congress might
follow the Administration, and allow the States to come in at once
without promise, without condition, without guarantee of any kind;
_second_, it might adopt the plan of Mr. Stevens, which had just been
narrowly defeated, and place the Southern States under military
government, with no date assigned for its termination by National
authority, and no condition held out by which the South itself could
escape from it; _third_, it might place the Southern States temporarily
under a military government, for the sake of preserving law and order
and the rights of property, during the prescribed period of
reconstruction--upon the basis that all loyal men, regardless of color
or previous condition of servitude, should take part in the movement.

Reduced to the choice of these three methods, the considerate,
well-pondered, conclusive judgment of the Republican party was in favor
of the last named, and the last named was adopted. If, therefore,
suffrage was prematurely granted to the negro; if, in consequence, harm
came to the Southern States; if hardship was inflicted upon Southern
people, the responsibility for it cannot be