oll-call the vote stood 32 to 107
in favour of reference, Raymond and William A. Darling of New York
City being the only Republicans to vote against it. It was a heavy
blow to the leader of the Conservatives. It proved the unpopularity of
Johnson's policy and indicated increasing estrangement between the
President and his party. Moreover, it was personally humiliating. On a
test question, with the whole power of the Administration behind him,
Raymond had been able, after weeks of work, to secure the support of
only one man and that a colleague bound to him by the ties of personal
friendship.

The division in the party spread with the rapidity of a rising thunder
cloud. On February 6 Congress passed the Freedman's Bureau Bill,
designed to aid helpless negroes, which the President vetoed. A month
later his treatment of the Civil Rights Bill, which set in motion the
necessary machinery to enforce the Thirteenth Amendment, shattered the
confidence of the party. "Surely," declared Senator Trumbull of
Illinois, "we have authority to enact a law as efficient in the
interest of freedom as we had in the interest of slavery."[1051] But
the President promptly vetoed it, because, he said, it conferred
citizenship on the negro, invaded the rights of the States, had no
warrant in the Constitution, and was contrary to all precedent.

[Footnote 1051: _Congressional Globe_, p. 474.]

The President had developed several undesirable characteristics, being
essentially obstinate and conceited, the possessor of a bad temper,
and of a coarse and vulgar personality. His speech on February 22, in
which he had invoked the wild passions of a mob, modified the opinions
even of conservative men. "It is impossible to conceive of a more
humiliating spectacle," said Sherman.[1052] "During the progress of
events," wrote Weed, "the President was bereft of judgment and reason,
and became the victim of passion and unreason."[1053] But up to this
time the party had hoped to avoid a complete break with the Executive.
Now, however, the question of passing the Civil Rights Bill over his
veto presented itself. Not since the beginning of the government had
Congress carried an important measure over a veto. Besides, it meant a
complete and final separation between the President and his party.
Edwin D. Morgan so understood it, and although he had heretofore
sustained the President, he now stood with the Radicals. Raymond also
knew the gravity of the situation.