r of
disruption; it heals the wound that is still imperfectly closed; it
removes slavery, the element which has so long perplexed and divided the
country; it makes of us once more a united people, renewed and
strengthened, bound more than ever to mutual affection and support.

The amendment to the Constitution being adopted, it would remain for the
States whose powers have been so long in abeyance to resume their places
in the two branches of the National Legislature, and thereby complete
the work of restoration. Here it is for you, fellow-citizens of the
Senate, and for you, fellow-citizens of the House of Representatives,
to judge, each of you for yourselves, of the elections, returns, and
qualifications of your own members.

The full assertion of the powers of the General Government requires the
holding of circuit courts of the United States within the districts
where their authority has been interrupted. In the present posture of
our public affairs strong objections have been urged to holding those
courts in any of the States where the rebellion has existed; and it was
ascertained by inquiry that the circuit court of the United States would
not be held within the district of Virginia during the autumn or early
winter, nor until Congress should have "an opportunity to consider and
act on the whole subject." To your deliberations the restoration of
this branch of the civil authority of the United States is therefore
necessarily referred, with the hope that early provision will be made
for the resumption of all its functions. It is manifest that treason,
most flagrant in character, has been committed. Persons who are charged
with its commission should have fair and impartial trials in the highest
civil tribunals of the country, in order that the Constitution and the
laws may be fully vindicated, the truth clearly established and affirmed
that treason is a crime, that traitors should be punished and the
offense made infamous, and, at the same time, that the question may be
judicially settled, finally and forever, that no State of its own will
has the right to renounce its place in the Union.

The relations of the General Government toward the 4,000,000 inhabitants
whom the war has called into freedom have engaged my most serious
consideration. On the propriety of attempting to make the freed-men
electors by the proclamation of the Executive I took for my counsel the
Constitution itself, the interpretations of that ins