History of Buchanan County, Iowa, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 125

Author: Williams bros., Cleveland, pub. [from old catalog]; Riddle, A. G. (Albert Gallatin), 1816-1902
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, Williams brothers
Number of Pages: 574

USA > Iowa > Buchanan County > History of Buchanan County, Iowa, with illustrations and biographical sketches > Part 125

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The eager boy and girl came back the grave and thoughtful man and woman, with a world of new images,

FORTIETH CONGRESS.

some perfect, many broken, others vanishing shadows. They had touched the old world of magic and memory. It had laid its hand on them lightly, to be sure, but they were not just the same, though no one could detect or suspect the difference. I close the little diary with regret ; regretting also that I have but traced its dead outline, its dry sketches. It details briefly, with a bright, brief episode of an interesting, busy life ; presents little cabinet pictures, bits of warmth and color, to linger in the memory and my reader's fancy.

He came back to find that an election had been lost; some lunacy had put that sham plank in the Repub- lican State platform, which, whatever it said, was popu- larly construed that the United States bonds should be paid in the national currency-greenbacks. It was always an abominable name ; a fragmentary party has rendered it unendurable. The bonds were to be paid in paper, no matter at what discount. To the eradication of this pernicious heresy and lunacy which had smitten the entire State in his absence, he was henceforth to be consecrated.

Jefferson, the county seat of Ashtabula, the old home of his great predecessor, Giddings, of Benjamin F. Wade, and of several conspicuous personages; a seat of culti- vated men, and the home of the Howells and Howlands; also where the returned representative had warm friends and admirers, which he had seldom visited, tendered him that modern social invention, a reception, which he accepted. Of course there would be some speech making. In the speech of welcome the platform was referred to, and it was more than intimated that his unqualified acceptance, or at least acquiescence, would be a condition of his continued public service. I know not that there was special design in it, it looked like that. His very clear and forcible speech of March, 1866, set forth his views, as then fixed and determined, and this was to be taken back or silenced. It was besides, not just the thing under the guise of courtesy and hospitality. Invite a man to a feast and pleasantly ask him to permit his host to poison his meat. They had forgotten Warren. They never forgot the lesson of this night. In his reply, cour- teously, to be sure, he never could be other, he exposed and denounced the policy of the platform; told them that he would hold his seat on no such condition ; that the dogma was false, pernicious and fraudulent. In short, he administered a most wholesome lecture, which came near being a castigation. I was never advised of the social aspects of that festive occasion; I presume it was enjoyable. Garfield is the most social and festive of men. With such a world --- overrunning humor, wit and hearty good fellowship, as well as being the most mag-

nanimous and forgiving of mortals, the time must be hard which his presence did not make a good time.

That ended this vacation, and with it we tag out the European episode.

Mr. Garfield now went on to the regular long session of the Fortieth congress. It held an extra session before he went to Europe. To that we now return, and present an uninterrupted glance at the entire congress. It will be remembered that there was now not only no harmony, between the Republican congress and President Johnson, but open war.

CHAPTER IV.

FORTIETH CONGRESS.

Extraordinary Character .- Impeachment .- Speech on the Military Governments .- General Hancock. - Preparing His Presidential Can- didacy .- Arraignment of him .- Their Position now .- Speech on Impeachment .- The Currency Speech .- Arlington Oration .- Taxa- tion of the Bonds .- Reply to Butler and Pike .- Chairman of the Military Committee.

THE Fortieth congress was one of the most remarkable in our annals. It impeached the President, and sat more times than any under the constitution. It commenced on March 4, 1867, not in obedience to a proclamation of the executive, but in spite of him, and with the declared pur- pose of protecting the Republic from its executive. Its first session sat until July 20th, when it took a recess until November 2 1st, and sat from that date to the hour of the regular session. That session continued until July 27th, took a recess to September 2Ist, another to November roth, when it adjourned finally.

The senate welcomed the return of Simon Cameron. Fessenden was received at the last congress. Prominent among the new senators were Roscoe Conkling and Jus- tin S. Morrell, from the house; Garrett Davis, from Ken- tucky, greatest talker of senators or common men; Charles D. Drake, of Missouri, who was to fill an impor- tant place ; Oliver P. Morton, one of the great forces of that body, strong, fibrous, a moulder of measures and leader of men; Nye, of Nevada, a coarse wit, humorist and wag; and some others.

George F. Edmunds entered the Thirty-ninth. The house became enriched by the presence of General But- ler. It also received General Morgan, of Ohio. General Logan, who resigned his seat for the war in the Thirty- seventh congress, resumed it in the Fortieth.

LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD

The session was not fruitful in the perfection of laws. Its main purpose was to watch over and care for the ex- ecutive, whom it impeached and tried, and passed some of its important acts over his veto.

The regular session opened on the second of Deeem- ber, and was but a continuance of the extra session in spirit and purpose. Obviously the pending contest-the first in our history, between the great Republican major- ity-in effect, the congress, the legislative departments and the executive- was to be pursued to a final issue, to the exclusion of many more important matters. This was in some measure due to the mere utspent momentum of the war. The great war leaders could not at once arrest it. They may have misjudged of the point at which its forces should be conducted off. The executive with a temper as unaccommodating, in utter disregard of the essential spirit of the constitution, seemed to place himself directly across the way of the representatives of the people and of the States. There was no effort to placate, no toleration, not even forbearance, on the part of congress, and so the collision came, and ended as it began. In the great future, when the air becomes clear, and the light white, and distance gives needed perspeet- ive, the events of the struggle will be estimated, and the men adjudged. The great contest which, coming ere the great agitations of the rebellion had ceased, for the time re-convulsed the Republic.

Of the last work of the Thirty-ninth congress, was the "aet to provide for the more efficient government of the rebel States," passed over thie veto. This it was which made them military departments, governed by a general, certainly the best governments the most of them have had since the war. This law came up for amendment at the regular session. The discussion of this amendment and of the act, covered about all the ground of the pending controversy.

Mr. Ashley's resolution of impeachment had failed, but the matter was in no way even interrupted. Garfield voted against that. On the seventeenth of January, 1868, in a foreible speech of twenty minutes, he gave his views of the pending situation, and it is a good spec- imen of how much a strong man can do in twenty min- utes. As showing his opinion of the main issue I quote a paragraph :

"Some of our friends say, since the President is the chief obstacle, impeach him. As the end is more important than the means, so is the rebuilding of law and liberty, on the ru. . s of anarchy and slavery, more important than the impeachment of Andrew Johnson. * *

"Let no min suppose that because t','s house did not resolve to proceed with impeachment that it will ab andon the loyal men of the South to the tender mercies of the rebels, or to the policy of the Pres- ident and his party."

This is the speech in which he calls attention to the course of a certain major-general (Haneoek) of the Union army, while at the head of the department for the government of Louisiana and Texas, under the law referred to, of which, doubtless, mueh may be said. This passage is given in full :

I will not repeat the long catalogue of obstructions which the President has thrown in the way, by virtue of the power conferred upon him in the reconstruction law of 1867; but I will allude to one example where he has found in a major-general of the army a facile instrument with which more effectually to obstruct the work of reconstruction. This case is all the more painful, because an otherwise meritorious officer, who bears honorable scars earned in battle for the Union, has been made a party to the political madness which has so long marked the conduct of the President. This general was sent into the district of Louisiana and Texas with a law of congress in his hand, a law that commands him to see that justice is administered among the people of that country, and that no pretence of civil authority shall deter him from performing his duty, and yet we find that officer giving lectures in the form of proclamations and orders on what ought to be the relation between the civil and military departments of the govern- ment. We see him issuing a general order, in which he declares that the civil should give way before the military. We hear him declaring that he finds nothing in the laws of Louisiana and Texas for a guide to his conduct. It is for him to execute the laws which he was sent there co administer. It is for him to aid in building up civil governments, rather than preparing himself to be the presidential candidate of that party which gave him no sympathy when he was gallantly fighting the battles of the country.

This is now his position confronting this aceusing tri- bune of the people, a candidate for the same high place. It is seen that in this speech, General Garfield bears honorable testimony to the high character and military fame of the major-general.

Then came another "act of usurpation" as it was called, on the part of the President, which led to formal articles of impeachment. These were thoroughly dis- eussed, and on the third of March Mr. Garfield ad- dressed the committee in his usually well-considered, fresh, strong way. He had not before deemed it expedi- ent to impeach the President, though he believed him guilty. There was now no alternative. The immediate cause was the removal of Secretary Stanton, and the ap- pointment of General Lorenzo Thomas. The question turned on his power under the constitution, and the civil tenure act, of March 2, 1867, enacted for the special purpose of preventing the very or any similar aet, by the executive. In this speech the constitution is scanned; the statute carefully and discriminatingly examined, and it was shown that Stanton was removed in violation of the law, and Thomas, meekest and most amiable of mortals, was appointed in violation of the constitution. It is difficult to see how either conclusion can be avoided ; certainly not the first. The President was impeached and afterwards tried, with a result which thoughtful men antic-

FORTIETH CONGRESS.

ipated, although thoughtful men did not agree as to its merits. The good and evil of it were perhaps balanced.

CURRENCY.

On the fifteenth of May, Mr. Garfield delivered his first exhaustive speech on the currency, which probably did as much as any single speech, to enlighten both con- gress and the country, on the nature and character of money, its paper relative, their office, the laws which control their use-the whole brought out with breadth and elearness. Whatever of history and so-called science as illustrated by writers on political economy-all the liter- ature of the question-he had mastered and brought their united lights, made his own, to bear on the subject. The speech occupied two hours for its delivery. The house is true to itself. To one of its own men-one of its wise and modest children, who always respects it, and never kicks up rows in the family, it is kind and true. Here was its favored one with his great roomy head, full of wise, distilled knowledge, almost wisdom, with the gatherings of the world's experience, gleaned in far journeys to remote regions, by knowing hands, with wise and clear thought of his own. The inexorable Sphinx had propounded its riddle, and he was to instruct them how to answer it. They gave him his time. He used it justly, and to the profit of all. No one will look to my hasty work for a full statement of his doctrines. They are now part of the common thought, have crys- tallized into law, and command as well as instruct. Yet hereafter will be found a fuller statement of them.

From the great and fierce warfare of the house, to sweet and peaceful Arlington, where, massed rank on rank, sleep the Republic's dead, what a change ! Here, on the thirtieth of the ensuing May, General Garfield delivered the first of the annual commemorative orations. The choice was apt and the duty aptly performed. Not out of the broad lines of his daily thought was it, and it fell naturally in the order of his labors. The reader shall judge of this; the following is the last fourth, entire.

And now, consider this silent assembly of the dead. What does it represent? Nay, rather, what does it not represent ? It is an epitome of the war. Here are sheaves reaped, in the harvest of death, from every battlefield of Virginia. If each grave had a voice to tell us what its silent tenant last saw and heard on earth, we might stand, with uncovered heads, and hear the whole story of the war. We should hear that one perished when the first great drops of the crimson shower began to fall, when the darkness of that first disaster at Manassas fell like an eclipse on the Nation ; that another died of disease while won- rily waiting for winter to end ; that this one fell on the field, in sight of the spires of Richmond, little dreaming that the flag must be carried through three more years of blood before it should be planted in tl : citadel of treason ; and that one feli when the tide of war had swert us back, till the roar of rebel guns shook the dome of yonder capitel, and re-echoed in the chambers of the executive mansion. We should

hear mingled voices from the Rappahannock, the Rapidan, the Chicka- hominy, and the James ; solemn voices from the Wilderness, and tri- umphant shouts from the Shenandoah, from Petersburgh, and the Five Forks, mingled with the wild acclaim of victory and the sweet chorus of returning peace. The voices of these dead will forever fill the land like holy benedictions.

What other spot so fitting for their last resting-place as this, under the shadow of the capitol saved by their valor? Here, where the grim edge of battle joined; here, where all the hope and fear and agony of their country centered; here let them rest, asleep on the Nation's heart, entombed in the Nation's love!

The view from this spot bears some resemblance to that which greets the eye at Rome. In sight of the Capitoline hill, up and across the Tiber, and overlooking the city, is a hill, not rugged nor lofty, but known as the Vatican mount. At the beginning of the Christian era, an imperial cirens stood on its summit. There, gladiatorial slaves died for the sport of Rome; and wild beasts fought with wilder men. In that arena, a Galileean fisherman gave up his life a sacrifice for his faith. No human life was ever so nobly avenged. On that spot was reared the proudest Christian temple ever built by human hands. For its adornment, the rich offerings of every elime and kingdom have been contributed. And now, after eighteen centuries, the hearts of two hun- dred million people turn towards it with reverence when they worship God. As the traveler descends the Apennines, he sees the dome of St. Peter rising above the desolate Campagna and the dead city, long be- fore the seven hills and ruined palaces appear to his view. The fame of the dead fisherman has outlived the glory of the Eternal city. A noble life, crowned with heroic death, rises above and outlives the pride and pomp and glory of the mightiest empire of the earth.

Seen from the western slope of our capitol, in direction, distance and appearance, this spot is not unlike the Vatican mount; though the river that flows at our feet is larger than a hundred Tibers. Seven years ago, this was the home of one who lifted his sword against the life of his country, and who became the great imperator of the rebel- lion. The soil beneath our feet was watered by the tears of slaves, in whose heart the sight of yonder proud capitol awakened no pride, and inspired no hope. The face of the goddess that crowns it was turned towards the sea, and not towards them. But, thanks be to God, this arena of rebellion and slavery is a scene of violence and crime no longer! This will be forever the sacred mountain of our capital. Here is our temple; its pavement is the sepulchre of heroic hearts; its dome, the bending heaven; its altar candles, the watching stars.

Hither our children's children shall come to pay their tribute of grateful homage. For this are we met to-day. By the happy sugges- tion of a great society, assemblies like this are gathering, at this hour, in every State in the Union. Thousands of soldiers are to-day turning aside in the march of life to visit the silent encampments of dead com- mades who once fought by their side.

From many thousand homes, whose light was put out when a soldier fell, there go forth to-day, to join these solemn processions, loving kın- dred and friends, from whose hearts the shadow of grief will never be lifted till the light of the eternal world dawns upon them.

And here are children, little children, to whom the war left no father but the Father above. By the most sacred right, theirs is the chief place to-day. They come with garlands to crown their victor fathers. I will delay the coronation no longer.

Thus elevated and refreshed, we return to the national arena.

TAXING THE BONDS.

It will be remembered that laws which created the various bonds issued by the government during the war, prohibited their taxation by all national, State, and mu-

LIFE OF JAMES A. GARFIELD.

nicipal legislation; exemption was thus an inherent ele- ment of their existence; it was a property of theirs, and not an external and effaceable mark. Their taxation was of the class of assaults to which their payment in depre- ciated paper belonged. The proposition in various forms had been brought before the house by amendment to pending bills, and also by resolutions. The questions involved were the power to tax and the morality of so doing. Among the advocates of taxation were Fred- erick C. Pike, of Maine, who should have known better, and does now, and General Butler, of whom it is hard to say what he does or may know, in a straightforward way. They had both made elaborate speeches in favor of the policy. To these, jointly and severally, General Garfield replied on the fifteenth of July, in the course of which he gave an abstract of the English history and practice of taxation, which was necessary to dislodge positions fortified from alleged English methods on the other side, during which his opponents questioned him and took inany issues, to conduct which, on his side, required that roomy knowledge in which a man can turn, knowing all the ground, and all the resources of both sides. Both were able, adroit, and skilful debates, and Butler, aided by clerks and secretaries, whom he always uses, generally has in hand all there is. I do not state the matter unjustly in saying, that in the play of authori- ties, precedents, historical instances and illustrations, Gar- field's opponents were worsted, as well as in dialectics, direct and conclusive. Garfield is the fairest of debaters, and one of the most just and generous of opponents. It cannot be claimed that his speech on this occasion put an end to this, or of the impish brood of bad faith and repudiation, the spores of which hung suspended in the air; but it placed it out of the field of practical enlight- ened discussion. The subject will find further mention.

I have gone through with two sessions of this congress, and have not yet stated that Garfield was placed at the head of the military committee. The speaker insisted he must have the chairmanship of an important com- mittee, as a ribbon to his button-hole at the least. And there was no other, without injustice to men of longer service, and I have written in vain, if it is not apparent that no man living appeared less solicitous as to the place nominally assigned him. Well, he was chair- man of the military committee, and on the twenty-sixth of February, 1869, made his famous report on the re- organization of the army, long an imperative necessity, awaiting the hand of a master. It makes a closety printed document of one hundred and thirty-two pages, with an index. He called before him all the heads of the different departments of the army, quartermaster

general, commissary general, paymaster general, surgeon general, as also the adjutant general, and all of the rest, among them General Hancock, and searched into and lit up every corner of the service, from the general down, and tabulated all the results, subjoined with a history of each department, from its organization to the day of the report; making thus a complete magazine of all the needed information on all the branches, as well as fur- nishing much curious matter, with a complete statement of expenditures for the fiscal year.

The Fortieth congress under the constitution ended with the third of March, 1869.

The Republicans failed to secure the conviction of the President before the high court of impeachment. They had elected Grant to the presidency over Sey- mour, to which General Garfield contributed as largely as any single individual.

In the vacation the Cincinnati Commercial sent a re- porter to Jefferson to secure his address on a memorable occasion, and he found time also for other work, to be mentioned elsewhere.

CHAPTER V.

BANKING AND THE CURRENCY.

The Forty-first Congress .- Return of the South .- Accessions to the Houses .--- Black Friday .- Investigation and Report. - The Census. -The Currency .- His Bill .- Speech. - Nature of Money .- Need of Banks .- Glance at his Later Labors.

This congress was memorable for the return of the seceding States to their places under the constitution, as integers of the Union. Under the law, it assembled on the fourth of March, 1869, inaugurated the President, raised its two flags over the two houses, and resumed the business of the Republic.

In the house James G. Blaine was elected speaker, Mr. Colfax having been reduced to the post of vice- president.

The senate received Carl Schurz to its chamber, also from the reconstructed States, Hiram R. Revells from Mississippi, and William Pitt Kellogg from Louisiana, and senators from other States. Georgia remained ab- sent.

The accessions to the house, with the exception of Omer D). Conger, were more numerous than great, by the difference between number and size. Mr. Conger proved not only an able man, but, since Joe Root, no one with such a rasping wit has appeared in the house.

Mr. Garfield was placed at the head of the banking

BANKING AND CURRENCY.

and currency committee, with John Lynch, his second. Otherwise it was not above a good average. The first session lingered to the twenty-second of April.

BLACK FRIDAY.

A noticable thing of the ensuing vacation was the Black Friday of Wall street, falling on the twenty-fourth of September. On the re-assembling of congress, a memorial concerning it, demanding action by that body, was presented, and referred to Garfield's committee. At the holiday vacation he went to New York; became the guest of General McDowell, his friend, the command- ant of that department, where he remained incog. Se- curing an interview with a man having some information, and from whom he learned the name of one having more, he, by several intermediate steps, got up or down, to the immediate core of the matter. He finally secured an interview with J. B. Hodgkins of the gold board, who managed to smuggle him into the gold room, where a committee was trying Speyer, the Israelite, in whom there was guile, and the then supposed author of the fraud involved, or one of the conspirators, who were. Here he remained, listening, remembering and writing down when he went away, and then returning for another hearing, until he was compelled to return to Washington. Then he sent the sergeant-at-arms to occupy his place, near the witnesses, who were subpoenaed and hurried off to Washington, the moment they left the gold room trial, and were thus prevented from being communicated with, till they came to Garfield's hands, and were examined be- fore his committee. Among them were the reticent Jay Gould, as silent and inserutable as Grant, the gorgeous and expressive Jim Fisk, with diamond cluster and seal skin overcoat. His discourse sparkled with figures of speech .* An able report on the first of March con- cluded the investigation.

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History of Buchanan County, Iowa, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 125

Author: Williams bros., Cleveland, pub. [from old catalog]; Riddle, A. G. (Albert Gallatin), 1816-1902 Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Cleveland, Williams brothers Number of Pages: 574

Author: Williams bros., Cleveland, pub. [from old catalog]; Riddle, A. G. (Albert Gallatin), 1816-1902
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, Williams brothers
Number of Pages: 574