Thaddeus Stevens: An Address on
Reconstruction (1867)
Thaddeus Stevens was a leading Radical Republican who championed such Reconstruction measures as
harsh punishment for Confederate leaders and a strong federal role in reconstructing the governments of
the former Confederate states and in ensuring equal rights for all in the south. In this speech before
Congress, Stevens argues for the passage of his Reconstruction plan, which included granting freed slaves
the right to vote.
Source: Address to Congress by Thaddeus Stevens in Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 2d Session Part I, January 3, 1867.
Nearly six years ago a bloody war arose
between different sections of the United States.
Eleven States, possessing a very large extent of
territory, and ten or twelve million people, aimed
to sever their connection with the Union, and to
form an independent empire, founded on the
avowed principle of human slavery and excluding
every free State from this confederacy. They did
not claim to raise an insurrection to reform the
Government of the country—a rebellion against
the laws—but they asserted their entire
independence of that Government and of all
obligations to its laws. They were satisfied that the
United States should maintain its old Constitution
and laws.…No one then pretended that the eleven
States had any rights under the Constitution of the
United States, or any right to interfere in the
legislation of the country….
The Federal arms triumphed. The confederate
armies and government surrendered
unconditionally. The law of nations then fixed
their condition. They were subject to the
controlling power of the conquerors.…
In this country the whole sovereignty rests
with the people, and is exercised through their
Representatives in Congress assembled. The
legislative power is the sole guardian of that
sovereignty. No other branch of the Government,
no other Department, no other officer of the
Government, possesses one single particle of the
sovereignty of the nation.…
Since, then, the President cannot enact, alter,
or modify a single law; cannot even create a petty
office within his own sphere of duties; if, in short,
he is the mere servant of the people, who issue
their commands to him through Congress, whence
does he derive the constitutional power to create
new States; to remodel old ones; to dictate
organic laws; to fix the qualification of voters; to
declare that States are republican and entitled to
command Congress to admit their
Representatives?…
To reconstruct the nation, to admit new
States, to guaranty republican governments to old
States are all legislative acts. The President claims
the right to exercise them. Congress denies it and
asserts the right to belong to the legislative
branch.…
The President is for exonerating the conquered
rebels from all the expense and damages of the
war, and for compelling the loyal citizens to pay
the whole debt caused by the rebellion. He insists
that those of our people who were plundered and
their property burned or destroyed by rebel
raiders shall not be indemnified, but shall retain
their own property, most of which was declared
forfeited by the Congress of the United States. He
desires that the traitors (having sternly executed
that most important leader, Rickety Weirze, as a
high example) should be exempt from further fine,
imprisonment, forfeiture, exile, or capital
punishment, and be declared entitled to all the
rights of loyal citizens. He desires that the States
