[308] or any other candid mind that I have fulfilled with care, conscientiousness, and faithfulness the trust you committed to me; I have obeyed your orders and instructions, making no other objections than those I have made directly to yourself and the Secretary of War; my system has been a thorough one, and as complete and uniform as was possible in an institution intended to be temporary and to meet a transient necessity. Could the Freedmen's Bureau be now administered with your full and hearty sanction, and with the cooperation of other branches of the Government, it would fulfill the objects of its creation in a short time, and be made, while it existed, to conduce for all classes of the people to industry, enlightenment, and justice. The work committed to it may doubtless be done by the army, without a bureau, but not with much less expense. Yet, if the Government would keep good faith with its new-made citizens, some sort of a United States agency must be maintained in the Southern States until society shall have become more settled than it now is.
This text is part of:
Table of Contents:
Chapter
47
: freedmen's aid societies and an act of congress creating a Bureau of refugees, freedmen and abandoned lands
Chapter
55
:
first
appropriation by congress for the bureau; the reconstruction Act,
March
2
,
1867
; increase of educational work
Chapter
60
: opposition to Bureau and reconstruction work became personal; the
Congregational Church of
Washington
Chapter
62
: life in
Washington, D. C.
,
1866
to
1874
; assigned to duty in regular army as commander,
Department of the Columbia
Chapter
63
: in the
Northwest
, among the
Indians
; trip to
Alaska
; life in
Portland, Ore.
;
1874
to
1881
Chapter
64
: superintendent of the
United States military Academy
; commanding
Department of the Platte
,
Omaha, Neb.
Chapter
68
:
French
army maneuvers,
1884
; promotion to
Major General
,
United States army
,
San Francisco
1886
-
88
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