e brought Thomas and Train into the same
district. I was nominated by the Republican Convention, and Thomas
then became the candidate of the "People's Party," and at the election
he was supported by the Democrats. His course in the Thirty-seventh
Congress on the various projects for compromise had alienated many
Republicans, and it had brought to him the support of many Democrats.
My active radicalism had alienated the conservative Republicans. As a
consequence, my majority reached only about 1,400 while in the
subsequent elections, 1864-'66-'68 the majorities ranged from five to
seven thousand.

Among the new members who were elected to the Thirty-eighth Congress
and who attained distinction subsequently, were Garfield, Blaine and
Allison. Wilson, of Iowa, had been in the Thirty-seventh Congress and
Henry Winter Davis had been a member at an earlier period. Mr.
Conkling was a member of the Thirty-seventh Congress, but he was
defeated by his townsman Francis Kernan under the influence of the
reactionary wave which moved over the North in 1862. At that time Mr.
Lincoln had lost ground with the people. The war had not been
prosecuted successfully, the expenses were enormous, taxes were heavy,
multitudes of families were in grief, and the prospects of peace
through victory were very dim. The Democrats in the House became
confident and aggressive.

Alexander Long, of Ohio, made a speech so tainted with sympathy for
the rebels that Speaker Colfax came down from the chair and moved a
resolution of censure. Harris, of Maryland, in the debate upon the
resolution, made a speech much more offensive than that of Long. As a
consequence, the censure was applied to both gentlemen and as a further
consequence, the friends of the South became more guarded in
expressions of sympathy. It is true also, that there were many
Democrats who did not sympathize with Harris, Long, and Pendleton.
Voorhees of Indiana was also an active sympathizer with the South. I
recollect that in the Thirty-eighth or Thirty-ninth Congress he made a
violent attack upon Mr. Lincoln, and the Republican Party. The House
was in committee, and I was in the chair. Consequently I listened
attentively to the speech. It was carefully prepared and modeled
apparently upon Junius and Burke--a model which time has destroyed.

Of the members of the House during the war period, Henry Winter Davis
was the most accomplished speaker. Mr. Davis' head was a stu