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"Under this Act," an Act authorizing enrolments for nine months, not for three years

"shall receive the pay and rations now allowed by law to soldiers, according to their respective grades: Provided, That persons of African descent, who under this law shall be employed, shall receive ten dollars per month and one ration, three dollars of which monthly pay may be in clothing."

Now, Sir, you have the question precisely: Under what statute were these enlistments made? Were they under the nine months' statute, or under the three years' statute? To answer that question, look at the order of the War Department:

"Ordered, That Governor Andrew, of Massachusetts, is authorized, until further orders, to raise such number of volunteer companies of artillery for duty in the forts of Massachusetts and elsewhere, and such corps of infantry for the volunteer military service, as he may find convenient; such volunteers to be enlisted for three years, or until sooner discharged."

There is nobody

Here are no nine months' men. under the second statute, but all are clearly under the first by the plain language of the order. And this is none the less so, even if the second statute, so far as Africans are concerned, may be interpreted to sanction a longer term of enlistment.

Mark well, that "all persons who have been or shall be hereafter enrolled in the service of the United States under this Act shall receive the pay and rations now allowed by law to soldiers." (§ 15.) But were not the soldiers of the fifty-fourth and fifty-fifth Massachusetts regiments "enrolled in the service of the United States"? Unquestionably, if troops ever were enrolled.

But it is the proviso that follows which causes the mischief. "Persons of African descent, who under this law shall be employed, shall receive ten dollars," &c.

It is said that these colored soldiers were "employed," —that is all,—not "enrolled," but "employed"; and on this distinction the promise of Governor Andrew in the name of the National Government, and the honest expectations of the soldiers, are set aside.

The order of the Secretary of War is for "volunteer companies of artillery," also for "corps of infantry," "to be enlisted for three years," "and may include persons of African descent." The persons of African descent are to be included in the artillery or infantry "enlisted." Such persons are in advance declared men to be enlisted. And yet the argument which denies them their wellearned wages asserts that they are only "employed," and not enlisted. But if they are "employed," then are the "corps of infantry" in which they are included. "employed" also.

To me the conclusion seems irresistible, on the face of these facts, that these troops were enrolled or enlisted under the earlier statute. It is clear that Governor Andrew thought so at the time, and it is equally clear that the troops themselves thought so at the time.

But there remains behind another question. Is there anything in existing legislation to prevent the enlistment of a colored person under the statute of 1861? To this I answer positively in the negative, and I challenge contradiction. There is no color in that statute. There is no color in any statute raising troops for the army of the United States, nor any color in any statute raising sailors for the navy of the United States. Only in our militia statutes do you find the word "white."

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In all our army and navy statutes there is no such limitation. The statute of 1861, therefore, in point of law embraced all persons, whether black or white, and it was entirely at the option of the President, before the passage of the statute of 1862, to organize or receive colored troops under that statute. He hesitated. regretted at the time his hesitation. I thought it an error by which the country suffered. We endeavored to repair that error by the amendment introduced by the brave Senator from New York, who is no longer here [Mr. KING], which you will find in the statutes. of 1862. But I doubt if any person at the time, who had given attention to the subject, supposed this amendment necessary, except as an encouragement to a policy which the Government was too slow to adopt. For myself, I remember well my own feelings in voting for it. I accepted it as notice to the Administration that in the opinion of Congress the time had come when colored troops must be used. In point of law it was plain that it could not stand in the way of an enrolment under the earlier statute.

And the Secretary of War seems to have acted on this interpretation; for, in undertaking to raise colored troops, no allusion was made to the statute of 1862, but the language of his order in every particular pointed to the statute of 1861. Am I wrong, then, if I say that in point of law these colored troops have just the same right to the full pay of a soldier that any Senator on this floor has to his compensation? It is by just as good title, and as firm in the statute-book, as your own pay, Sir.

I suggested, the other day, that there were two classes of cases, one where the enlistments had been made in

good faith under the earlier statute, and a second class where they had been made under the later statute; and I suggested, that, if we were disposed to recognize the difference between these two classes, it might afford a solution to our present difficulties. I am not disposed, on any ground of sentiment, to impose an unnecessary tax upon the burdened treasury of my country, although there is no tax required by justice that I would hesitate to impose. If there are colored troops in our service, who, at the time they were mustered, had no reason to suppose that they were enlisted under the statute of 1861, who were led to believe that they came under the statute of 1862, that is, for the pay of ten dollars, I am not disposed to press for them any claim on ground of sentiment, that is, for the past. I take the past as it is; but for the future I insist that they shall be put upon an equality. True equality in the past is for the National Government to redeem its pledges, whether direct or only implied, whether there is an absolute promise, of which you have a record, or only an inference or understanding, founded, it may be, in misconception, but still embraced in good faith by innocent. parties. On this ground, at a proper moment, I shall be ready to propose an amendment something like the following, to come in immediately after the word "service" :

"Provided, That, with regard to all past service, it shall appear to the satisfaction of the Secretary of War that such persons, at the time of being mustered into service, were led to suppose that they were enlisted under the Act of Congress approved July 22, 1861, as volunteers in the army of the United States."

Mr. Fessenden could not concur in Mr. Sumner's construction of the

Act of 1862. Mr. Lane, of Indiana, thought, "if we place colored troops hereafter on an equality with the white troops, it is surely as much as they can ask, either from the justice or the generosity of this Senate; for no man, in his sober senses, will say that their services are worth as much, or that they are as good soldiers." Mr. Sumner replied:

MR. PRESIDENT, I hope the Senator from Indiana. will pardon me, if I refer to him for one minute. He is so uniformly generous and just that I was the more surprised, when I listened to his remarks just now. I was surprised at his lack of generosity and his lack of justice - he will pardon me- toward these colored soldiers. I was surprised- he will pardon meat his injustice. to the State of Massachusetts. He spoke disparagingly of the colored soldiers. He thought they had been paid enough. He thought that the gallant blood shed on the parapets of Fort Wagner had been paid enough; and he failed to see that the men who died for us on that bloody night, and were buried in the same grave with the devoted colonel who led them, now stood alive in this presence to plead for the equality of their race. How can I help regret that the Senator was led into such remark?

Also, in the ardor of his utterance, he will pardon me still further, the Senator undertook to say, that, if we entered on this payment, we should charge the Treasury with some one or two hundred millions in addition to its present burden. Why, Sir, that is an entire mistake. Even if we pay everything contemplated by the resolution, I am told that the whole will be little more than a million: much, I admit, to charge unnecessarily upon the Treasury, but not the very large sum which seemed to fill the patriotic vision of the Senator.