1868. |
1868. |
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Senate,1 when the Democratic members of the House, to the number of forty five, entered a formal protest against the whole proceedings.
On the 5th of March,
the Senate was organized as a jury for the trial of the President.
Chief-Justice Salmon P. Chase presided.2 On the 7th the President was summoned to appear at the bar; and on the 13th, when the Senate formally reopened, he did so appear, by his counsel, who asked for a space of forty days wherein to prepare an answer to the indictment.
Ten days were granted, and on the 23d the President's counsel presented an answer.
The House of Representatives, the accuser, simply denied every averment in the answer, when the President's counsel asked for a postponement of the trial for thirty days. They allowed seven days, and on Monday, the 30th of March, the trial began.
The examination of witnesses was closed on the 22d of April, and on the following day the arguments of counsel began.
These closed on the afternoon of Wednesday, the 6th of May, when the case was submitted to the judgment of the Senate.
Its decision was given on the 26th of the same month.
Every member of the Senate was present, and voted.
Thirty-five pronounced the President guilty, and nineteen declared him not guilty.
He escaped legal conviction by one vote.3
While the unseemly controversy between Congress and the President was going on, the work of reorganization, in accordance with the plans of Congress, was in steady motion, in spite of the interference of the Chief Magistrate; and at a little past midsummer,
a Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, which formed an important feature in the so-called “reconstruction” measures, was ratified by the requisite number of State Legislatures, and became a part of the “supreme law of the land.”
4
1 The following members of the House of Representatives were chosen to be managers, on its part, of the impeachment case: Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania; Benjamin F. Butler, of Massachusetts; John A. Bingham, of Ohio; George S. Boutwell, of Massachusetts; James F. Wilson, of Iowa; Thomas Williams, of Pennsylvania, and John A. Logan, of Illinois. The chief management of the case, on the part of the House, as prosecutor, was entrusted to Mr. Butler.
2 See clause 6, section 8, article I., of the National Constitution.
3 The vote of the Senate was as follows:--
For Conviction--Messrs. Anthony, Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Vermont, Morrill of Maine, Morton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Sumner, Thayer, Tipton, Wade, Willey, Williams, Wilson and Yates. These were all “Republicans.” For Acquittal--Messrs. Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Van Winkle and Vickers. Eight of these, namely: Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Saulsbury and Vickers, were elected to the Senate as “Democrats.” The remainder were elected as “Republicans.”4 This Amendment was a part of the “reconstruction” plan of the committee mentioned in note 2, page 615, and was first submitted to the lower house of Congress, in a report of that committee, on the 80th of April, 1866. It was amended by the Senate, and passed that body by a vote of 88 to 11, on the 8th of June. The House passed it on the 18th, by a vote of 120 yeas to 32 nays. The following is a copy of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution:--
Article XIV:, section 1.--All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Sec. 2. Representatives shall be appointed among the several States, according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed; but when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State (being 21 years of age and citizens of the United States), or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in said State. Sec. 3. No person shall be a Senator, or Representative in Congress, or Elector of President or Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State Legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States,. shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof;, but Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. Sec. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties' for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned: but neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave. But all such debts, obligations, and claims shall be held illegal and void. Sec. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this Article.
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