case the amnesty was granted to the persons who are now resting under political disabilities; and, as the honorable gentleman from Pennsylvania has yielded me the floor, I understand it will not be an impropriety on my part or an invasion of the privilege which he has granted me, if I propose such an amendment. It is to strike out all after the seventh line of the first section of his bill, and insert, instead of the part stricken out, these words:

And shall be forever relieved therefrom upon their appearing before a judge of any court of the United States or any court of record of the State in which they are resident, and taking and subscribing the following oath, to be duly attested and recorded, to wit: "I, A B, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, and obey all laws made in pursuance thereof; and that I take this obligation freely, and without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion Whatever."

Mr. Randall: "I demand the previous ques tion on my motion."

The Speaker pro tempore: "The question before the House is upon the passage of the bill which was rejected and reconsidered. Pending which the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Randall) moves to commit the bill to the Committee on the Judiciary, with instructions to report it back with the amendment proposed by the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Banks); and upon that motion he moves the previous question."

The previous question was seconded and the main question ordered, and the motion to refer was agreed to.

Mr. Knott, of Kentucky, said: "Mr. Speaker, the Committee on the Judiciary, to which was referred the bill, with an accompanying amendment, have instructed me to report the bill and amendment back to the House in pursuance of the instructions of the House; and I now demand the previous question upon the bill and amendment."

The Clerk read as follows:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That all the disabilities imposed and remaining pon any person by virtue of the third section of the fourteenth article of the amendments of the Constitution of the United States, be, and the same are hereby, removed; and each and every person is and shall be forever relieved therefrom upon their appear ing before a judge of any court of the United States or any court of record of the State in which they are resident and taking and subscribing the following cath, to be duly attested and recorded, to wit: "I, A B, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, and obey all laws made in pursuance thereof, and that I take this obligation freely and without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion whatever."

Mr. Randall: "The previous question was seconded."

The question was taken, and it was decided

VOL. XVI.-18 A

in the affirmative-yeas 183, nays 92, not voting 16.

The Speaker: "The main question having been ordered, the question is on the passage of the bill reported from the committee."

The question was then taken; and there were -yeas 184, nays 97, not voting 9; as follows:

YEAS-Messrs. Ainsworth, Anderson, Ashe, Atkins, Bagby, John H. Bagley, Banks, Barnum, Beebe, Bell, Blackburn, Bland, Bliss, Blount, Boone, Bradford, Bright, John Young Brown, Buckner, Samuel D. Burchard, Cabell, John H. Caldwell, William P. Caldwell, Campbell, Candler, Cate, Caulfieid, Chapin, John B. Clarke of Kentucky, John B. Clark, Jr., of Missouri, Clymer, Cochrane, Collins, Cook, Cowan, Cox, Culberson, Cutler, Davis, De Bolt, Dibrell, Douglas, Durand, Durham, Eden, Egbert, Ellis, Ely, Farwell, Faulkner, Felton, Forney, Franklin, Fuller, Gause, Gioson, Glover, Goode, Goodin, Gunter, Andrew H. Hamilton, Robert Hamilton, Hancock, Haralson, Hardenbergh, Henry R. Harris, John T. Harris, Harrison, Hartridge, Hartzell, Hatcher, Henkle, Hereford, Abram S. Hewitt, Goldsmith W. Hewitt, Hill, Holman, Hooker, HopThomas L. Jones, Kehr, Kelley, Knott, Lamar, kins, House, Hunton, Hurd, Jenks, Frank Jones, Franklin Landers, George M. Landers, Lane, Levy, Lewis, Lord, Luttrell, Edmund W. M. Mackey, Levi A. Mackey, Maish, McFarland, McMahon, Meade, Metcalfe, Milliken, Mills, Money, Morey, Morgan, Parsons, 'Payne, Phelps, John F. Philips, Pierce, Morrison, Mutchler, Neal, New, O'Brien, Odell, Piper, Poppleton, Potter, Powell, Randall, Rea, Reagan, John Reilly, James B. Reilly, Rice, Riddle, Jon Robbins, William M. Robbins, Roberts, Miles Ross, Savage, Sayler, Scales, Schleicher, Schumaker, Seelye, Sheakley, Singleton, Slemons, William E. Smith, Southard, Sparks, Springer, Stenger, Stevenson, Stone, Swann, Tarbox, Teese, Terry, Thompson, Thomas, Throckmorton, Tucker, Turney, John L. Vance, Robert B. Vance, Waddell, Charles C. B. Walker, Gilbert C. Walker, Walling, Walsh, Ward, Warren, Erastus Wells, Whitehouse, Whitthorne, Wigginton, Wike, Alpheus S. Williams, James Williams, James D. Williams, Jeremiah N. Williams, Willis, Wilshire, Benjamin Wilson, Fernando Wood, Woodburn, Yeates, and Young-184.

William H. Baker, Ballou, Blaine, Blair, Bradley, NAYS-Messrs. George A. Bagley, John H. Baker, William R. Brown, Horatio C. Burchard, Burleigh, Cannon, Cason, Caswell, Conger, Crapo, Crounse, Danford, Darrall, Davy, Denison, Dobbins, Dunnell, Eames, Evans, Fort, Foster, Freeman, Frost, Frye, Garfield, Hale, Benjamin W. Harris, Hathorn, Haymond, Hendee, Henderson, Hoar, Hoge, Hoskins, Hubbell, Hunter, Hurlbut, Hyman, Joyce, Kasson, Ketchum, King, Lapham, Lawrence, Leavenworth, Lynch, Magoon, MacDougall, McCrary, MoDill, Miller, Monroe, Nash, Norton, Oliver, O'Neill, Packer, Page, William A. Phillips, Plaisted, Platt, Pratt, Purman, Robinson, Sobieski Ross, Rusk, Sampson, Sinnickson, Smalls, A. Herr Smith, Starkweather, Strait, Stowell, Thornburgh, Martin I. Townsend, Washington Townsend, Tufts, Van Vorhes, Waldron, Alexander S. Wallace, John W. Wallace, Walls, G. Wiley Wells, Wheeler, White, Whiting, Willard, Charles G. Williams, William B. Williams, James Wilson, Alan Wood, Jr., and Woodworth-97.

NOT VOTING-Messrs. Adams, Banning, Bass, Chittenden, Hays, Kimball, Lynde, Rainey, and Andrew Williams-9.

So (two-thirds not having voted in favor thereof) the bill was not passed.

In the House, on January 6th, Mr. Hopkins, of Pennsylvania, said: "I am instructed by

the Committee on the Centennial Celebration to report the bill which I send to the Clerk's desk, and to move that the bill and report be printed and referred to the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union."

The preamble of the bill states that by an act of Congress entitled "An act to provide for the celebrating of the one hundredth anniversary of American independence by holding an international exposition of arts, manufactures, and products of the soil and mines in the city of Philadelphia and State of Pennsylvania in 1876," approved March 3, 1871, provision was made for the celebration of the centennial anniversary of the Declaration of American Independence by an exhibition of American and foreign arts, products, and manufactures, to be held under the auspices of the Government of the United States, in the city of Philadelphia, in the year 1876; that by an act of Congress entitled "An act relative to the centennial international exhibition to be held in the city of Philadelphia, State of Pennsylvania, in the year 1876," approved June 1, 1872, the centennial board of finance was incorporated, with authority to raise the capital necessary to carry into effect the provisions of the said act of March 3, 1871; that the President of the United States, in compliance with a joint resolution of Congress approved June 5, 1874, did extend, in the name of the United States, a respectful and cordial invitation to the governments of other nations to be represented and to take part in the international exposition to be held at Philadelphia under the auspices of the Government of the United States, and the governments so invited, to the number of thirty-eight, have accepted such invitation, and many of them are making extensive preparations to embrace the courtesies so extended to them, thereby rendering proper arrangements for the coming ceremonies on the part of the Government of the United States a matter of honor and good faith; and that the preparations designed by the United States Centennial Commission, and in part accepted by the centennial board of finance, are in accordance with the spirit of acts of Congress relating thereto, and are on a scale creditable to the Government and people of the United States.

The bill appropriates the sum of $1,500,000 for completing the centennial buildings and other preparations, which shall be paid on the drafts of the president and treasurer of the centennial board of finance, one-third immediately after the passage of the act and the remaining two-thirds in four equal monthly parts, provided that in the distribution of any moneys that may remain in the treasury of the centennial board of finance after the payments of its debts, as provided for by the tenth section of the act of Congress, and approved June 1, 1872, incorporating said centennial board of finance, the appropriation herein made shall share equally with the holders of

the said centennial stock, and the like percentage be paid into the Treasury of the United States as may be paid to the holders of said stock; and provided further that the Govern ment of the United States shall under no circumstance be liable for any debt or obligation of the United States Centennial Commission or centennial board of finance, or any payment in addition to the foregoing sum.

The bill with the accompanying report was ordered to be printed and referred.

Mr. Hopkins: "I move that the rules be suspended, and that the House resolve itself into Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union."

The motion was agreed to.

The House accordingly resolved itself into Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, Mr. Wood, of New York, in the chair, and resumed the consideration of the Centennial appropriation bill.

On January 18th the bill was considered.

Mr. Hopkins said: "Mr. Chairman, I do not know that any argument is needed to secure the passage of this bill; but, inasmuch as I am, to some extent, intrusted with its advocacy, I beg leave to submit some of the reasons which I think not only justify but imperatively demand the granting of this appropriation.

"Our aid is invoked in behalf of an international exhibition conceived by patriotic men as a fit way to commemorate the first centenary of American Independence. This undertaking was commenced when the busy hum of cheerful industry echoed throughout the land, when wealth and prosperity abounded in the North, and returning cheerfulness illumed the hitherto desolate South. But the storm of 1873 which swept over the country left its pathway black with general ruin and universal gloom. The wheels of industry stood still, trade became lifeless, human energies were palsied because confidence and hope were crushed. From that day until this there has been no break in the overhanging clouds. The enter prise under consideration, begun under such happy auspices, could not escape the mildew which blighted all things. Under adverse cir cumstances its officers and managers have struggled on with unflagging zeal, untiring energy, and recognized discretion and ability, to complete the original designs in a manner worthy of the grand event. The treasury of the commission is almost empty; individual effort has been exhausted; the centennial year has already dawned; but a few months remain until the exposition should be opened, and yet the buildings are not completed. In this extremity the Government is asked to lend its helping hand to save the undertaking from failure and the country from disgrace.

"If it can be shown that the national honor is involved in the success of this exhibition, I apprehend all opposition will be silenced and this bill will receive a unanimous and cordial support. Surely, no gentleman upon this floor

would stop to calculate the cost of preserving the good name of his country. Millions of money have been promptly voted, and lives, of far more value than all those millions, have been freely given in various wars to preserve the dignity and integrity of the nation; and there can be no extremity of financial distress which will cause a Congress of the United States to falter in appropriating money to save the Government from reproach. National unity is valueless without national honor. Would it not be better that these States should be dismembered, that this great and beautiful fabric of government should crumble into utter and irretrievable ruin, than the Union should be preserved unbroken and be subject to the well-deserved sneers of sister-nations? Are we liable to stand dishonored before the world by the failure of the centennial exposition? To answer that question we must examine the history of the enterprise.

The first legislative act relative to this exbibition was passed March 3, 1871, and from the title to the concluding section the General Government is recognized as its sponsor and the guarantor of its success. The act is entitled 'An act to provide for celebrating the one hundredth anniversary of American Independence by holding an international exhibition of arts, manufactures, and products of the soil and mine in the city of Philadelphia and State of Pennsylvania in the year 1876.' "Here the object and the method are clearly indicated. The object is national, the mode of celebrating it is international. No act of Congress was needed to cause a spontaneous outburst of patriotic enthusiasm upon the part of American citizens during this eventful year. But in the exuberance of our pride we wanted all the nations of the world to come and compare their products and their progress with ours, and then go home filled with amazement and admiration. That seems to be the spirit which pervades this act. The very nature of the contemplated celebration made it subject to governmental control and entitled to Government aid.

"The first section of the act provides— That an exhibition of American and foreign arts, products, and manufactures shall be held under the auspices of the Government of the United States.

"Here, again, the international character of the celebration appears; and it is distinctly stated under whose auspices it will take place. "Section 2 provides for commissioners to prepare and superintend the execution of a plan for holding the exhibition.'

"Sections 3, 4, and 5, provide that these commissioners shall be appointed by the President of the United States, and shall hold their meetings in the city of Philadelphia.'

"Section 6 enacts that this commission shall report to Congress, among other things, a plan or plans of buildings for the exhibition. Here, then, we have a commission created by Congress, required to report to Congress, ap

pointed by the President, and charged with the duty of preparing buildings and regulations for the reception and exhibition of foreign as well as domestic products. In addition to all this, the President is directed to notify all nations of the time and place for holding the exhibition.

"It seems to me that it would be impossible to frame a statute whereby the United States Government could be more fully identified with and made responsible for any enterprise than is done by the language of this act.

"Nor is its force weakened by the only section to which I have not yet referred. It is therein provided-with amazing inconsistency

that the United States shall not be liable for any expenses attending such exhibition or by reason of the same.' This act, in a spirit of exultation which was natural and proper, had declared in its preamble that it behooves the people of the United States to celebrate, by appropriate ceremonies, the centennial anniversary of this memorable and decisive event which constituted the 4th day of July, A. D. 1776, the birthday of the nation; and, having determined what would be a fitting celebration of the great event, having appointed agents to prepare a world's fair, and having secured to the Government exclusive control thereof, it reaches this feeble and petty anti-climax that the Government shall bear none of the burden. All of the glory, but none of the expense! A national anniversary to be celebrated within our borders by all the nations of the earth, and this great Government inaugurating and controlling it, and yet refusing to contribute to the necessary expense ! The spectacle is indeed humiliating.

"Following up the history of this celebration, we find an act relative to the centennial international exhibition was passed on June 1, 1872, by which a board of finance was incorporated. The Secretary of the United States Treasury was required to prepare certificates of stock for this corporation, and counterfeiting these certificates was made a crime of equal enormity with counterfeiting the currency of the United States. This act also requires that reports of the progress of the work, from time to time, shall be made to the President of the United States. Here again we encounter the guardian angel of the Treasury, with drawn sword, declaring that we shall have an international celebration of a national event, but that no money shall be taken from the national Treasury to defray the necessary expense thereof. The Government will sanction this enterprise, gotten up for its glory and for its benefit, but not a dollar of its funds shall be expended in the cause. It seems impossible to reconcile such inconsistencies and harmonize such parsimony with a spirit becoming to this great commemoration.

"The act of June 5, 1874, contains this same inharmonious provision, which is made utterly nugatory by the context. That act directs the

President to extend, in the name of the United States, a respectful and cordial invitation to the governments of other nations to be represented and take part in the international exposition to be held at Philadelphia under the auspices of the Government of the United States.'

"The international character of the exhibition is again affirmed; the jurisdiction of the General Government over it is again distinctly avowed; provision is made for invitations to foreign powers in the name of the United States.'

"Still further, Congress directed that an appropriate medal should be struck at a Government mint for the centennial board of finance. It also provided for the free importation of goods intended to be placed on exhibition.

“Mr. Chairman, in view of all this legislation, can Congress escape from the responsibility which it has again and again assumed in regard to this international exhibition? Will the mere declaration of a purpose to withhold pecuniary aid relieve it from the odium which a failure would incur, especially in view of all it has done to encourage and patronize the enterprise and give it a national character at home and abroad?

an

"The success or failure of this exposition would not be so grave a matter if its effects could be confined to our own citizens and their relations to our own Government. But the dignity and honor of the United States among other nations is involved. In July, 1873, the President issued his proclamation that international exhibition' would be held, and ' in behalf of this Government and people cordially' commended it to all nations. The Secretary of State promptly communicated the proclamation to foreign powers, and conveyed to each one the President's hope that an active interest would be aroused, and that the occasion would be improved by the interchange of national sentiment and friendly intercourse.' "This diplomatic circular and presidential proclamation were construed by some into an invitation, which a number of foreign governments accepted promptly, heartily, and, as one of the greatest and most powerful of them said, 'with sincerest thanks.' When the more cordial invitation of 1874 went out by authority of Congress it awakened an interest which hitherto had languished; and now thirty-eight foreign governments have declared their purpose of participating in this our national anniversary. Commissioners have been appointed from among their most distinguished men, and several of these governments have made generous appropriations, that they may be creditably represented.

These are nations from all parts of the habitable globe; some of them. almost older than history; many of them venerable with the gray of centuries; most of them habituated to and believing in monarchical government; but all coming to do honor to the young Re

public. From the Orient and the Occident, from the Arctic and the Antarctic, they will come. But of them all there will be no sublimer spectacle than the presence of Great Britain, with the most amazing and most admirable magnanimity, joining in the celebration of an event which lost her these vast possessions. The benignant mother comes to honor the refractory child and to rejoice in her growth and prosperity. Second only to this will be the presence of the mighty monarchy of Russia, whose august and liberalminded emperor boldly declares to all the world that he regards the event which we are about to celebrate as one of the grandest facts in the history of humanity.'

"All of these thirty-eight nations will come bearing in their hands the cordial invitation' of the United States. This being so, is not this Government bound by every consideration of hospitality, of honor, and of self-respect, to make suitable provision for their entertainment?

"Mr. Chairman, the question has been asked, Where do we derive the power to make this appropriation? I answer by asking, Where did Congress derive the power to embellish and decorate the grounds and buildings of the Government? Where did it derive the power to purchase the works of art which adorn these Halls and add to their attractiveness? Where did it derive the power to purchase the magnificent library of which we boasti Where did it derive the power to fit out expeditions to explore the polar seas and to travel to foreign countries to observe the transit of Venus? Where did it derive the power to appropriate money on three different occasions to promote international exhibitions held in other countries? Where did it derive the power to encourage art, to promote science, to advance practical and useful industry, to maintain an Agricultural Department or a horticulttural garden, a National Observatory, or a Signal Corps?

"I might further answer this question by asking one which was frequently suggested during the recent eventful years of our country's his tory, and whose most satisfactory answer was found in the patriotic impulses of the people. Many things have been done perhaps not within the strict letter of the Constitution; but we have high authority for saying, 'The letter killeth, the spirit giveth life.' The power which saved a nation's life can save a nation's honor.

"But, Mr. Chairman, I do not admit there is the slightest doubt about the constitutional power to make this appropriation. I do not propose to go into any extended argument on that point, but I hold in my hand a volume containing the messages of the early Presi dents of this country, the fathers and founders of the Republic, the men whose great brains conceived and whose hands draughted this Constitution and transmitted it to us as the

most priceless legacy they could leave to posterity. These men were familiar with the powers delegated to Congress, and the extent and scope of those powers, and yet we find that Washington, who presided over the Constitutional Convention; Madison, who of all others was most conspicuous in draughting it; and Jefferson, who understood it quite as well as either, all concurred in asking and recommending to Congress appropriations analogous to this.

Mr. Tucker, of Virginia, said: "Mr. Chairman, what do you propose to celebrate in this centennial year? Do you propose to have a material exhibition only, or an exhibition worthy of the great moral principles which are illustrated by the anniversary of our independence?

"If I mistake not, three great principles underlie or are involved in the Declaration of Independence: the principle of individual liberty, the principle of local government in its struggle against centralized power, and the exemption of the American destiny from the controlling influence of European polity. I will cordially unite with gentlemen anywhere, North or South, East or West, in celebrating the centennial anniversary in the maintenance and illustration of these three principles, so vital and essential to the full success of our republican institutions.

"Let me feel that the liberty of the citizen is secured against despotic power; let me be assured that the freedom and independent action, the autonomy of the States, as Chief-Justice Chase has expressed it, is well guarded against the arbitrary and usurping exercise of Federal authority; let me see that American destiny is guided alone by its own polity, and free from the interference and intrusion of European counsels; and then, indeed, sir, we may have a real centennial anniversary!

"The gentleman who preceded me (Mr. Frye) has said that the Constitution and constitutional questions are an enigma to him. I am not surprised at it, looking at his mode of interpreting it. Any gentleman who will ever raise a constitutional question after this bill shall have passed upon the interpretation adopted to sustain its constitutionality, will really be worthy of commiseration.

"I say, sir, that the spirit of the centennial is obedience to the Constitution. And when gentlemen tell me that the centennial exhibition is to be a manifestation of the inventive power of the American mind, I answer that the greatest invention of American genius has been left out of view entirely. And what is that? The greatest invention of American genias is this: the absolute subordination of governmental power to the rigid, inflexible, and unbending rule of the Constitution. In no other country on the earth has this principle of one inflexible law, supreme over all ordinary acts of legislation, ever been inaugurated among men. And I say that the gentlemen around me will better keep the centennial an

niversary by a strict and honest adherence to the Constitution of the country than by all the material exhibition that can be aggregated in Philadelphia.

“Mr. Chairman, I have said that one of the great principles which are illustrated in this centennial year is, jealousy of the centralization of power. In the great preamble and resolutions of 1774, which were adopted by the Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia, the language used has the true old English ring in its bold assertion of right against power: The deputies of the colonies do, 'As Englishmen, their ancestors, in like cases have usually done, for asserting and vindicating their rights and liberties, declare that the inhabitants of the English colonies in North America, by the immutable laws of Nature, the principles of the English Constitution, and the several charters and compacts, have the following rights,' etc.

"Then follow the cardinal rights of life, liberty, and property; the trial by jury; exemption from standing armies; and they place preeminently among these cardinal rights the right of the people of each colony to determine its own internal policy by its own provincial Legislature, without interference on the part of the Imperial Government of Great Britain.

"These were the institutional rights and liberties which they claimed, demanded, and insisted on, as indubitable, and 'which could not be legally taken from them, altered, or abridged by any power whatever, without their own consent by their representatives in their several provincial Legislatures.'

"It is thus clear that jealousy of centralizing power was the key-note of our Revolution. It was embodied in the Articles of Confederation. It was not lost sight of in the Constitution of the United States. And gentlemen will find, although they seem to think that a constitutional question is unworthy of deliberation on this floor, that the great distinction between delegated and reserved powers is contained in that tenth amendment: All powers not delegated to the United States by this Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.' This is, therefore, a Government of granted and enumerated, not of original and unlimited, powers. It is not like the governments of the countries to which gentlemen refer for precedents. It is not like the Government of Great Britain, whose Parliament is omnipotent. It is a Government of granted and enumerated powers. And I claim this, not upon reference to any of the doctrines of 1798 and 1799, which I suppose are not in very good odor in some portions of this Hall, but I do it upon grounds stated by the Supreme Court of the United States. Mr. Justice Story, in the case of Martin vs. Hunter (1 Wheaton, 304), uses this language:

The Government of the United States can claim no powers which are not granted to it by the Con