ons for and against the measure, their arguments are given at
length.

[Illustration: Hon. T. A. Hendricks, Senator from Indiana.]

Mr. Hendricks said: "At the last session of Congress the original law
creating that bureau was passed. We were then in the midst of the war;
very considerable territory had been brought within the control of the
Union troops and armies, and within the scope of that territory, it
was said, there were many freedmen who must be protected by a bill of
that sort; and it was mainly upon that argument that the bill was
enacted. The Senate was very reluctant to enact the law creating the
bureau as it now exists. There was so much hesitancy on the part of
the Senate, that by a very large vote it refused to agree to the bill
reported by the Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. Sumner,] from a
committee of conference, and I believe the honorable Senator from
Illinois, [Mr. Trumbull,] who introduced this bill, himself voted
against that bill; and why? That bill simply undertook to define the
powers and duties of the Freedmen's Bureau and its agents, and the
Senate would not agree to confer the powers that that bill upon its
face seemed to confer, and it was voted down; and then the law as it
now stands was enacted in general terms. There was very little gained,
indeed, by the Senate refusing to pass the first bill and enacting the
latter, for under the law as it passed, the Freedmen's Bureau assumed
very nearly all the jurisdiction and to exercise all the powers
contemplated in the bill reported by the Senator from Massachusetts.

"Now, sir, it is important to note very carefully the enlargement of
the powers of this bureau proposed by this bill; and in the first
place, it proposes to make the bureau permanent. The last Congress
would not agree to this. The bill that the Senate voted down did not
limit the duration of the bureau, and it was voted down, and the bill
that the Senate agreed to provided that the bureau should continue
during the war and only for one year after its termination. That was
the judgment of the Senate at the last session. What has occurred
since to change the judgment of the Senate in this important matter?
What change in the condition of the country induces the Senate now to
say that this shall be a permanent bureau or department of the
Government, when at the last session it said it should cease to exist
within one year after the conclusion of the war? Why, sir, it seems to
me