Iv.
The following condensed summary of Anti-Slavery measures in Congress, which Vice-President Wilson gives in the close of his work on that subject, is here quoted, to convey to the reader more distinctly, their scope and magnitude:When the Rebellion culminated in active hostilities, it was seen that thousands of slaves were used for military purposes by the rebel forces. To weaken the forces of the Rebellion, the 37th Congress decreed that such slaves should be forever free.As the Union armies advanced into the Rebel States, slaves, inspired by the hope of personal freedom, flocked to their encampments, claiming protection against Rebel masters, and offering to work or fight for the flag whose stars for the first time gleamed upon their vision with the radiance of liberty. Rebel masters and Rebels sympathizing with masters sought the encampments of the loyal forces, demanding the surrender of the escaped fugitives; and they were often delivered up by [490] officers of the army. To weaken the power of the insurgents, to strengthen the loyal forces, and assert the claims of humanity, the 37th Congress enacted an article of war, dismissing from the service officers guilty of surrendering these fugitives.
Three thousand persons were held as slaves in the District of Columbia, over which the nation exercised exclusive jurisdiction: the 37th Congress made these three thousand bondmen freemen, and made slave-holding in the capital of the nation for evermore impossible.
Laws and ordinances existed in the national capital, that pressed with merciless rigor upon the Colored people: the 37th Congress enacted that Colored persons should be tried for the same offences, in the same manner, and be subject to the same punishments, as white persons; thus abrogating the ‘Black Code.’
Colored persons in the capital of this Christian nation were denied the right to testify in the judicial tribunals, thus placing their property, their liberties, and their lives, in the power of unjust and wicked men: the 37th Congress enacted that persons should not be excluded as witnesses in the courts of the District, on account of color.
In the capital of the nation, Colored persons were taxed to support schools, from which their own children were excluded; and no public schools were provided for the instruction of more than four thousand youth: the 38th Congress provided by law that public schools should be established for Colored children, and that the same rate of appropriations for Colored schools should be made, as are made for the education of white children.
The railways chartered by Congress excluded from their cars Colored persons without the authority of law: Congress enacted that there should be no exclusion from any car, on account of color.
