ntucky, Mr. Grinnell remarked: "As it is asserted that this
Freedmen's Bureau is a partial, unnecessary, speculating affair, I
wish to call attention to the fact that in the State of Kentucky,
during the last five months, more white refugees than freedmen, in the
proportion of seven and one-fourth to one, have received rations at
the hands of the Government; that this bureau has kept in schools in
the State of Kentucky fourteen thousand black people."

In further illustration of the work accomplished by this
instrumentality, he said: "This bureau is in charge of 800,000 acres
of land and 1,500 pieces of town property. It has issued more than
600,000 rations to refugees, and 3,500,000 to freedmen. It has treated
2,500 refugees in hospitals, and decently buried 227 of them. It has
treated 45,000 freedmen, and made the graves for 6,000 of the number.
Transportation has been furnished to 1,700 refugees and 1,900
freedmen. In the schools there are 80,000 people that have been
instructed by this bureau. And now it is proposed to leave all these
children of misfortune to the tender mercies of a people of whom it is
true by the Spanish maxim, 'Since I have wronged you I have hated
you.' I never can. Our authority to take care of them is founded in
the Constitution; else it is not worthy to be our great charter. It
gives authority to feed Indian tribes, though our enemies, and a just
interpretation can not restrain us in clothing and feeding unfortunate
friends. In providing schools, we can turn to the same authority which
led to the gift of millions of acres of the public domain for the
purpose of establishing agricultural colleges in this country."

He referred to Russia for example of what should be done in such an
emergency: "We should be worse than barbarians to leave these people
where they are, landless, poor, unprotected; and I commend to
gentlemen who still cling to the delusion that all is well, to take
lessons of the Czar of the Russias, who, when he enfranchised his
people, gave them lands and school-houses, and invited school-masters
from all the world to come there and instruct them. Let us hush our
national songs; rather gird on sack-cloth, if wanting in moral courage
to reap the fruits of our war by being just and considerate to those
who look up to us for temporary counsel and protection. Care and
education are cheaper for the nation than neglect, and nothing is
plainer in the counsels of heaven or the world's