Congress of the United States, convened in the
Capitol at Washington on the fourth of December, 1865. Since the
adjournment of the Thirty-eighth Congress, events of the greatest
moment had transpired--events which invested its successor with
responsibilities unparalleled in the history of any preceding
legislative body.

Abraham Lincoln, sixteenth President of the United States, had been
slain by the hand of the assassin. The crime had filled the land with
horror. The loss of its illustrious victim had veiled the nation in
unaffected grief.

By this great national calamity, Andrew Johnson, who on the fourth of
March preceding had taken his seat simply to preside over the
deliberations of the Senate, became President of the United States.

Meanwhile the civil war, which had been waged with such terrible
violence and bloodshed for four years preceding, came to a sudden
termination. The rebel armies, under Generals Lee and Johnston, had
surrendered to the victorious soldiers of the United States, who in
their generosity had granted to the vanquished terms so mild and easy
as to excite universal surprise.

Jefferson Davis, Alexander H. Stephens, and some other leaders in the
rebellion, had been captured and held for a time as State prisoners;
but, at length, all save the "President of the Confederate States"
were released on parole, and finally pardoned by the President.

The President had issued a proclamation granting amnesty and pardon to
"all who directly or indirectly participated in the rebellion, with
restoration of all rights of property, except as to slaves," on
condition of their subscribing to a prescribed oath. By the provisions
of this proclamation, fourteen classes of persons were excepted from
the benefits of the amnesty offered therein, and yet "any person
belonging to the excepted classes" was encouraged to make special
application to the President for pardon, to whom clemency, it was
declared, would "be liberally extended." In compliance with this
invitation, multitudes had obtained certificates of pardon from the
President, some of whom were at once elected by the Southern people,
to represent them, as Senators and Representatives, in the
Thirty-ninth Congress.

The President had further carried on the work of reconstruction by
appointing Provisional Governors for many of the States lately in
rebellion. He had recognized and entered into communication with the
Legislatures of these States, prescri