The life and public services of Abraham Lincoln ... together with his state papers, including his speeches, addresses, messages, letters, and proclamations, and the closing scenes connected with his life and death. By Henry J. Raymond. To which are added anecdotes and personal reminiscences of President Lincoln, by Frank B. Carpenter.

240 THE LIFE, PUBLIC SEIVICES, AND
teen votingr ill favor of striking it out, and twenty-two
against it.
Thle subject of confiscating the property of rebels excited still d-eeper interest. A bill for that purpose was
taken up in the Senate, on the 25th of February, for discussion. By one, of its sections all the slaves of any person, anywhere in the United States, aiding the, rebellion,
were declared to be flrever free, and subsequent sections
provided for colonizing slaves thus enfranchised. The
bill was advocated on the ground that in no other way
could the property of rebels, in those States where the
judicial lauthority of the United States had been overborne, be rieac:hed; while it was opposed on tllhe ground
that it was unconstitutional, and that it would tend to
render the Southern people still more united and desperate in their re bellion. By the confiscation act of the previous session, a slave who 1had been employed in aiding
the rebellion was declared to be free; but the fact that he
had been thus employed must be shown by duc judicial
process; by tills bill all the slaves of any person who
had l been thus engaged were set free without the interventi(on of any judicial process whatever. This feature
of the bill was warmly opposed by some of the ablest
and most reliable of the supporters of the Administration,
as a departure from all recognized rules of proceeding,
and as a direct interference with slavery in the States,
in violation of the most solemn pledge of the Government, the Republican party, and individual supporters
of the Administration. Senator Collamer, of Vermont,
urged this view of the case with great cogency, citing Mr.
Sumner's opinion expressed on the 25th of February,
1861, when, on presenting a memorial to the Senate in
favor of abolishing slavery, he had added: "In offering
it, I take this occasion to declare most explicitly that I
do not think that Congress has any right to interfere with
slavery in a State;" and quoting also Senator Fessenden' s
declaration in the debate on abolishing slavery in the
District of Columbia, when he said: "I have held, and
T hold to-day, and I say to-day what I have said in my