those who would oppress or injure them on
account of their loyalty.

3. It places the new State governments of the South upon the solid
basis of justice and equal rights.

This plan received in Congress the support of many members of
Congress who did not uniformly vote with the Union party, and was
acceptable to some of its most distinguished adversaries. In the
Senate, Reverdy Johnson, a Maryland Democrat, voted for it, and
made effective speeches in its support. The loyal press of the
North, without exception, upheld it.

In the South, its success was everywhere gratifying and unexampled.
Its enemies had said that it would organize anarchy in the rebel
States--that it would immediately inaugurate a war of races between
whites and blacks--and compared the condition of the South under it
to the condition of India under English oppression, and to Hungary
under the despotism of Austria.

But the course of the public press, and the conduct, the letters,
and speeches of public men in the rebel States, vindicated the
wisdom and justice of the measure. I will quote only from rebel
sources.

In Virginia, the Charlottesville _Chronicle_ addressed its readers
as follows:

"FOR WHITE FOLKS AND COLORED FOLKS.--Every colored person may now
go where and when he pleases. He is a free man and a full citizen.
This is not all; by another bound they have become voters. They
will take part in the government of the country. No people was ever
so suddenly, so rapidly lifted up.

"Shall we all live happily together, or shall we hate each other,
and quarrel and bear malice?

"Let us all try and get on together. The land is big enough. Let
the whites accommodate themselves to the new state of things. Let
them be polite and kind to all, and be always ready to accord to
every man, whether white or colored, his full rights. We make bold
to say that the behavior of the colored people of this State, since
they were set free, has surprised all fair-minded white people. We
do not believe the white people, under the same circumstances,
would have behaved so well by twenty per cent. They have shown the
greatest moderation. They have passed from plantation hands to
freedom and the ballot without outward excitement."

The Richmond _Examiner_, the orga