History of Nebraska - Chapter 15



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CHAPTER XV
NINTH LEGISLATURE -- CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION, 1864 -- POLITICAL 
CONVENTIONS, 1864 --TENTH LEGISLATURE -- REAPPOINTMENT OF GOVERNOR 
SAUNDERS -- POLITICS IN 1865 -- ELEVENTH LEGISLATURE -- THE FIRST STATE 
CONSTITUTION

   THE ninth session of the legislative assembly began January 7, 1864. 
The apportionment remained unchanged, and it had grown outrageously 
inequitable and at the expense of the South Platte. The Advertiser had 
groaned under the inequality in 1863, and the News insisted that Governor 
Saunders possessed and should exercise the authority to reapportion the 
legislative districts. Notwithstanding that irregularity of procedure was 
still common, the governor, whose capital residence was in the North 
Platte country, would have no mind to attempt to override the 
apportionment made by the legislature, clearly under the exclusive power 
conferred by the organic act, even in so clear a case of misrepresentation.

   Allen of Washington county was elected president of the council, 
receiving nine votes against two for Marquett of Cass county; and the 
disposition of the legislature to avoid drawing party lines was shown in 
the unanimous election of George B. Lake of Douglas county for speaker of 
the house.

   After a tribute to the soldiers, who were now first in the thought of 
the politician as well as the patriot, the governor's message hastens to 
get out of tune with the non-partisan votes of the territorial press and 
platforms by taking partisan credit for the passage of the homestead law:

   You had repeatedly memorialized congress on this subject without avail. 
In fact, its success, though so just to the settler and so wise as a 
measure of national policy, seemed hopeless while the reins of government 
were held by such men as controlled the administration, preceding the 
inauguration of our present chief magistrate. The honor of the prompt 
passage of this great measure is due to President Lincoln and his 
political friends in congress. I deem it but just that we who are so 
deeply interested in, and so largely benefited by the success of this 
measure, should obey the injunction of the sacred writer by rendering 
"honor to those to whom honor is due."(1)

   It is true that there had been opposition to homestead bills under 
democratic administration on the part of slaveholders, jealous of the 
growth of the unfriendly Northwest; but others, on conservative grounds, 
had hesitated to at once espouse this new and radical measure, and the 
sentiment in its favor had been of gradual growth. Today the wisdom of the 
law, as it has been administered, is questioned by many wise men, just as 
the unguarded land subsidies to railway companies have been condemned. 
Even the governor's high imaginings are inspired to an unwonted loftiness 
of flight in contemplation of this gift of empire without money and 
without price. "What a blessing this wise and humane legislation will 
bring to many a poor but honest and industrious family!" And there is a 
realism, too, in the executive sentimentality which Zola himself might 
have emulated. "The very thought to such people that they can now have a 
tract of land that they can call their own has a soul-inspiring effect 
upon them and makes them feel thankful that their lots [sicl have been 
cast under a government that is so liberal to its people."

   The message takes credit and foresees great gain and glory for Nebraska 
on account of the passage of the Pacific railway bill.

   In accordance with your memorial on the 

(1. House Journal, 9th ter. sess., p. 12.)

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[image caption: N. S. Harding was an early merchant at Nebraska City and a 
member of the state legislature]

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subject, congress also passed a bill, at the first regular session after 
the inauguration of the present administration, providing for the 
construction of the great Pacific railway, commencing on the 100th 
meridian, within the territory of Nebraska, thence westwardly to the 
pacific coast, with three branches from the place of beginning eastward to 
the Missouri river. One of these branch roads diverges southeasterly to 
the mouth of the Kansas river, in the state of Kansas, and also forming a 
connection with the Hannibal & St. Joseph railroad at Atchison; and the 
other two branches, so called, stretch across our territory -- one 
terminating at the capital of your territory, and the other opposite Sioux 
City -- thus forming a connection at all three points with some of the 
best roads of the northwest. With these magnificent works successfully 
prosecuted, connecting directly with the great cities of the Atlantic and 
Pacific, with the advantages of the homestead, of a virgin and fertile 
soil, of exhaustless salt springs, with a climate as salubrious as exists 
in the world -- none can hesitate to predict for Nebraska gigantic strides 
in the attainment of wealth and power.(2)

   The message discloses that the indebtedness of the territory has now 
reached $59,893, and the auditor's report shows that it is chiefly 
represented by bonds to the amount of $31,225, and warrants, $17,869.54. 
The message calculates that the debt of the territory is less by $18,
162.82 than it was two years before, but the result is reached by rather 
optimistic and original figuring. The resources counted to offset the debt 
consist of the uncollected levy of 1863, $17,330.23, of $4,407.76 in the 
hands of the treasurer -- by the auditor's account -- and the eternal 
bugbear of delinquent taxes, making a total of $41,829.59, which, deducted 
from the debt of $59,893, leaves, by the governor's optimistic arithmetic, 
an indebtedness of only $18,063.41 -- or a decrease since the end of 1861 
of $18,162.82, as above. Stating the problem another way, it appears that 
the indebtedness two years ago was $50,399.24, whereas now it is $59,893, 
an increase Of $9,493.76; but as the amount of taxes not collected by the 
territorial treasurer two years before was $13,173.01 against $37,421.83 
at this time, there is at least a nominal reduction as stated above. 
Moreover, there is a comparatively large balance of $5,375.48 in the hands 
of the territorial treasurer, and, the message tells us, warrants have 
risen to eighty or ninety cents on the dollar, from thirty-three to forty 
cents two years before.

   Notwithstanding that there had been a ruling by the federal authorities 
that school lands might be leased, but not sold, for the benefit of the 
school fund, the message complains that still "we must rely entirely on 
taxation or voluntary subscription for the education of our youths." In 
brief, the most palpable fact in the reports of the officers is that

[image caption: BENJAMIN E. B. KENNEDY One time mayor of Omaha]

poverty is still prevalent in the territory, and that partially on this 
account, and for the rest on account of inefficient organization, taxes 
cannot be collected with reasonable certainty or dispatch. The much used 
arguments in favor of statehood are repeated in the message, and the 
annual appeal for a penitentiary memorial to Congress shows its familiar 
face. The condition of the laws of the territory is set forth as follows:

   There seems to be a very general desire on the part of the citizens of 
the territory to have a general revision and codification of our laws, and 
to have all the laws that are now in force in the territory, together with 
all that may be passed at your session, bound in one volume. The present 
laws are made up from acts that extend through the whole of the eight 
sessions that have been held in the ter- 

(2. House Journal, 9th. ter. sess., p. 13.)

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ritory, and so many amendments and alterations to our laws have been made 
during that time that it is with difficulty that persons who are not 
professionally engaged in the business can find out what the existing laws 
are.(3)

   There was another attempt at this session to devise a practicable 
revenue law, and again an improvement of the election laws was attempted. 
General incorporation acts were passed, but they were not exclusive. 
Benjamin E. B. Kennedy of Douglas county chairman of the judiciary 
committee of the house, reported "as to the propriety of passing an act 
prohibiting the legislative assembly from passing any local or special 
laws therein enumerated," that the organic act, "which is our
constitution," recognized the right to pass special acts, and it would be 
impracticable to prohibit it; and while it would be commendable to 
discourage useless and unnecessary legislation, "yet it can scarcely be 
conceived that meritorious cases may not claim our serious consideration." 
So it was left to the state constitution to close the gates against this 
vicious flood of special legislation. The judiciary committee reported 
also that while they conceded "that great convenience would result from an 
adequate revision of our laws," yet, "with the debt-doomed treasury, and 
no guaranty that the federal government would meet the necessary expenses, 
your committee do not feet justified to recommend it."

   By the apportionment law of this session representation from the North 
Platte section was reduced from seven to six members in the council, and 
from nineteen to sixteen in the house. This arrangement did not allow all 
the South Platte was entitled to but, though in adjusting it the old 
sectional interests again came into collision, the contest was less bitter 
and the sectional lines less sharply drawn than usual. On a full vote the 
North Platte had at this time a majority of one in the council and the 
South Platte a like majority in the house. The council forced its 
amendment of the apportionment of the members of the house on that body, 
while the house accepted from the council its apportionment bill without 
attempting to change it; and yet the South Platte members of the council 
indicated their satisfaction with the apportionment for that body by 
voting against the amendment proposed and carried by the North Platte to 
limit the application of the bill to the next legislature. The laws for 
the encouragement of the growth of fruit, forest, and ornamental trees and 
grapes were changed so as to provide that their cultivation should not be 
held to increase the value of land for revenue purposes; and the 
unsuccessful attempt to pass an act for the encouragement of sheep-raising 
at the last session was carried out. Clay county was disposed of by 
attaching its north half to Lancaster and its South half to Gage. The 
organization of Lancaster was legalized and the officers chosen at the 
last election declared to be the legal officers; the county was detached 
from Cass, as to judicial purposes; and "the county of Seward and the 
counties westward" were attached to Lancaster for judicial purposes.

   In 1860 an act was passed authorizing the auditor of the territory to 
sell, for the benefit of the school fund, a large amount of cast iron 
which composed columns intended for the capitol, but which could not be 
used on account of the lack of money to carry out the original plans for 
the building. The sum of $971.78 was realized from the sale, but the 
secretary of the territory made demand on the auditor for the money, on 
the ground that was part of the funds of the general government for the 
completion of the capitol. This legislature accordingly authorized the 
auditor to turn the money over to the secretary. In view of the fact that 
the city of Omaha had invested more in the capitol than the amount of the 
federal appropriation, this action was rubbing in the close dealing of the 
federal father with his impecunious territorial wards.

   There was little manifestation of partisanship in this legislature, 
though the ambitious leaders on the republican side were apt in pushing 
resolutions in approval of the national administration. A joint resolution 
by Marquett extending thanks to the Nebraska soldiers in the field passed 
without opposition, and the measure enabling them to vote, also introduced 
by Marquett, met with general 

(3. House Journal, 9th ter. sess., p. 20.)

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support; Marquett and Little -- republican and democrat -- agreed in 
reporting it from their committee, and the vote of only one councilman -- 
Campbell of Otoe county -- was recorded against it. Marquett also pressed 
a joint resolution favoring Lincoln and Andrew Johnson for nomination as 
president and vice president, which Mason unsuccessfully tried to 
sidetrack by a motion to refer to the committee on agriculture; but it was 
passed by a party vote. A joint resolution approving the Emancipation 
Proclamation and the general policy of President Lincoln's administration, 
including especially the arming of negroes and the amnesty proclamation, 
passed the council by a vote of 8 to 3, and the house by 29 to 5.

   The memorial to Congress praying for appropriate legislation for the 
admission of the territory as a state passed the council promptly and 
without division, but in the thirty-five votes recorded in the house the 
opposition counted eleven, and they were about evenly divided between 
republicans and democrats. The attitude of the democrats toward the war, 
at this time was indicated by a substitute offered by Kennedy of Omaha for 
resolutions "on the state of the Union." Mr. Kennedy's resolutions 
declared in favor of the vigorous prosecution of the war, but also that 
its "only object should be to put down the wicked rebellion," and that, 
"in the patriotic language of the immortal Crittenden, the war ought not 
to be waged on our part for any purposes of conquest or subjugation, or 
purposes of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or established 
institutions of those states, but to defend and maintain the supremacy of 
the Constitution and to preserve the Union with all the dignity, equality, 
and the rights of the several states unimpaired; and as soon as these 
objects are accomplished the war ought to cease." This substitute was of 
course defeated, but it received nine democratic votes out of the total 
vote of thirty-seven on the question. The extreme bitterness of feeling of 
certain prominent republicans of the South Platte toward the dominant 
D's -- Daily and Dundy -- was indicated by the following resolution 
introduced in the council by Oliver P. Mason of Otoe county:

   Whereas, A petition has been circulated for the signatures of members 
of the council and house of representatives requesting the Senate of the 
United States to confirm Elmer S. Dundy as associate justice of the 
supreme court of the territory of Nebraska; therefore,

   Resolved By the council of the territory of Nebraska, that E. S. Dundy 
ought not to be confirmed as associate justice of the supreme court of the 
territory of Nebraska.

   The resolution was called up the day after its introduction and laid 
over under the rules, but it was never pressed to a vote.

   In quick response to the memorial of the legislature an enabling act 
was passed by Congress and approved April 19, 1864. This act authorized 
the governor of the territory to order an election of members of a 
constitutional convention, the election to be held on the 6th of the 
following June and the convention on the 4th of July. The number of 
members of the convention was to be "the same as now constitute both 
branches of the legislature."

   Pro-state sentiment was strong enough in Omaha to defeat the regular 
ticket for delegates to the constitutional convention headed by Dr. 
Miller, and to elect a set of pro-state delegates headed by Hadley D. 
Johnson. But Omaha interests preferred the territorial status rather than 
to run risks of capital removal which any change would involve; and at the 
election, while all the rest of the North Platte counties voted for 
statehood, Douglas gave eighty majority against it. All the South Platte 
counties voted against statehood, except Richardson, which gave 140 
majority in its favor.

   The convention met, organized, and then, by a vote of 35 to 7, 
adjourned sine die. This was a remarkable reversal of the action of the 
legislature in adopting the joint resolutions in favor of statehood. It is 
to be accounted for by the fact that the real leaders of the democratic 
party were not in the legislature, and that republicans, ambitious for the 
offices that might accrue to them through admission, and trusting to 
popular acquiescence in the desire of the national administration to 
profit by the

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[image caption: B. H. Fuller was a pioneer of Pawnee county, Nebraska, in 
which he held different county offices.]

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addition of the unquestionably loyal members from Nebraska to its forces 
in Congress, overlooked the hostility of the people to assumption of the 
burdens of statehood. The hope of the republicans was the fear of the 
democrats, and the position of the latter was frankly avowed.

   The vote of Nebraska as a state may be counted to elect Abraham to a 
second term; and besides, it is admitted there are some who suppose the 
territory to be republican, and in the event of its so being they begin to 
look forward to the good time coming when, under the aegis of a 
constitutional provision, negro equality shall culminate in miscegination, 
and numberless fat offices shall be bestowed upon the faithful leaders of 
the party as a reward for services, sufferings, and wear and tear of 
conscience in singing hallelujahs to an administration the most imbecile, 
reckless, profligate and corrupt that has ever existed. The democracy will 
oppose the whole thing from "stem to stern." . . . Our taxes are about as 
high as we can bear, and if we come in they must be ten fold higher . . . 
It will require $60,000 a year to uphold a state government. Hitherto 
territories have been admitted after a census has shown a sufficient 
population to entitle them to a representative in congress. No inquiry as 
to the number of people, none as to their wishes.

   When the Omaha Republican showed the inconsistency of the democratic 
organ by pointing out that its editor, Alfred H. Jackson, had himself 
offered the statehood resolutions and memorial at the late session of the 
legislature, all he could say in reply was that his resolution was 
intended to let the people decide whether they wanted a constitutional 
convention or not, while the act of Congress required them to vote 
directly on the question of accepting or rejecting the constitution which 
the convention had been authorized to frame. The democratic press 
effectively emphasized the objection of increased expense involved in 
sustaining a state government. It was argued that the present taxes were 
five mills on the dollar, aggregating $45,163.86; and that the state would 
have to raise $58,000, now annually paid by congressional appropriation, 
besides the $45,000 now raised by taxation.

   Dr. George L. Miller was president and J. Sterling Morton chairman of 
the committee on resolutions of the democratic territorial convention 
which was held at Plattsmouth, June 22, for the purpose of choosing 
delegates to the national convention, and of taking action on the question 
of statehood. The resolutions adopted congratulated the democracy of 
Nebraska that an overwhelming majority of the members of the 
constitutional convention stood pledged to adjourn sine die without 
action, thus saving an expense of $25,000 involved in preparing a 
constitution; that it had forestalled an election (on the question of 
adopting the constitution) at which the "money of the administration 
poured out like water would have been employed upon the corruptible"; that 
it had forestalled drafts for the army, and that an "iniquity has been 
emphatically rebuked, which would have made 30,000 people the sovereign 
equal of New York, Ohio, or Illinois, in order that three electoral votes 
might be added to the purchase by which a corrupt administration is 
seeking to perpetuate its power." It was also resolved that the authors of 
the resolutions have "heard with astonishment that certain federal office-
holders in this territory propose to force the burden of a state 
government upon this people by cunningly devised oaths to be administered 
to the convention." While the resolutions commended "the independent and 
truly patriotic members of the republican, and other parties who lent us 
their aid to thwart these purposes of unequaled infamy, it must be 
remembered that the plan by which these inestimable benefits are assured 
to us was conceived, carried forward and accomplished by the democracy of 
Nebraska." It will be seen that the "threatenings and slaughter" which 
breathe through these heroics are entirely at outs with the general 
negative and acquiescent mood and policy heretofore assumed by the 
democrats during the war, as well as with the action of the leading 
democratic members of the legislature touching this subject. But whatever 
we may think of the discretion of the resolutions, they were distinctly 
Mortonian, and they show that in his youth, as always after, Morton was no 
fool who would

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[image caption: Daniel H. Wheeler was a pioneer of Plattesmouth, Nebraska, 
and prominent in politics]

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halt at the stumbling block of consistency. The statesman who has a mind 
to hesitate before consistency is already lost. Besides, how recently had 
Morton been for statehood with much less population than at this time. The 
democratic party was now in such an uncertain condition that it could win 
nothing but negative victories, and the republicans assisted it in winning 
this one by timid approval of the statehood proposition which amounted to 
less than half-heartedness. A party organ, for example, kept its 
ammunition in store during the whole campaign, and then after it was lost 
exploded it all at once in the following fashion:

   What have the copperheads, then, succeeded in cajoling their 
"republican friends" into:

   First, a resistance to the draft; the main argument used was "If we 
have a state we'll have a draft."
   Second, they have assisted to defeat the constitutional amendment, to 
pass which the vote of three members of congress from Nebaska was 
necessary; . . . which the copperheads style as one of the "president's 
infamous projects."
   Third, they have virtually said to the government: We are mean enough 
to force you to support us while we know you need every dollar you can 
scrape to whip out the rebellion.

   The professed fear by the democrats of cunningly devised oaths" was an 
insinuation that it was the plan of Secretary Paddock to administer an 
oath to the members of the convention which would aid them to remain in 
session until a constitution should be framed.

   The delegates to the national democratic convention, chosen by the 
Plattsmouth convention, were J. Sterling Morton, Andrew J. Poppleton, 
Joseph I. Early, Erastus B. Chandler, and John Rickley. The opposition 
classed all these delegates as "unadulterated Vallandighammers," an 
imputation which was excused if not fully justified by the inexplicably 
hostile expression of the democratic press and platforms of the territory 
against the national administration and its war measures; and which 
continued unabated from this time on until the amendments to the 
constitution were adopted.

   The republican territorial committee met February 12, 1864, and by its 
own act disbanded to go into the new "union" party, and forty of the fifty-
two members of the legislature endorsed their action; and afterwards six 
members of the old organization -- Floris Van Reuth of Dakota county; 
Eliphus H. Rogers, Dodge; Dr. Gilbert C. Monell, Douglas; Daniel H. 
Wheeler, Cass; William H. H. Waters, Otoe; David Butler, Pawnee -- met and 
chose themselves delegates to the Union national convention at Baltimore. 
The Republican rebelled against this action as usurpation, and the self-
appointed delegates afterward submitted to the choice of delegates to a 
convention.

   At the meeting of the committee, held April 26th, all the members were 
present by person or proxy except two, and they adopted a "union" platform 
as follows:

   Resolved, That the only basis of this union organization shall be 
unquestioned loyalty, and unconditional support of the congress of the 
United States in their war measures, especially in confiscating the 
property [of] rebels in arms, unconditional support of the proclamations 
of President Lincoln, especially his emancipation proclamation, the arming 
of negroes, or any other constitutional measure deemed necessary by the 
administration to crush out this wicked rebellion, with the least cost of 
time, treasure and blood of loyal men.
   And whereas, since the adoption of this platform, the rebel authorities 
have practiced brutal barbarities upon our colored soldiers, we hereby 
affirm the duty of this government to afford white and colored soldiers 
equal protection, and to retaliate strictly upon white rebels any 
barbarity practiced upon colored soldiers of the union army. A colored man 
once freed by this government and enlisted as a soldier in its defense, is 
entitled to its protection in all respects as a free citizen.
Adjourned, sine die.
G. C. MONELL, Chairman.
D. H. WHEELER, Secretary.

   The adage, "practice makes perfect" had ample opportunity for self-
vindication in the making of perfect political citizens in the year 1864, 
which was even more than commonly a crowded hour of politics. After the 
legislature came the discussion of statehood, then the conventions 
relating thereto, and all the

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[image caption: T. S. Clarkson was at one time postmaster of Omaha and was 
manager of the Trans-Mississippi exposition, Omaha, Nebraska.]

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time there was raging a fierce contest, especially in the now confident 
republican, or union party, over the nominations for delegate to Congress. 
The principal republican aspirants were Turner M. Marquett of Cass county; 
Phineas W. Hitchcock, Gilbert C. Monell, and John I. Redick, of Douglas 
county; Thomas W. Tipton of Nemaha county; Benjamin F. Lushbaugh of Platte 
county; and Algernon S. Paddock, secretary of the territory -- of whose 
candidacy it was irreverently said, "His claims are based upon his extreme 
politeness . . . The polite, polished, elegant, accomplished, affable, 
courteous, pleasant, smiling, gracious A. S. Paddock." An estimate of 
Hitchcock by the same judge was as much more laconic as it was less 
pleasant and picturesque -- but that was formulated after his nomination.

   The union convention for nominating a delegate to Congress met at 
Nebraska City, August 17th. Mr. Paddock came within one vote of securing 
the nomination on the eighth ballot, Tipton within five on the sixth 
ballot, and Marquett within five on the eleventh ballot. The Nebraskian 
said of Daily that "if he is no longer king he is king-maker," which 
should be interpreted to mean, in substance, that the unnatural allegiance 
to him on the part of the alien North Platte in his last desperate 
campaign was remembered and paid for in the making of Hitchcock, who was 
nominated on the thirteenth regular ballot.

   At the democratic territorial convention held at Nebraska City, 
September 16th, Charles H. Brown of Omaha favored the nomination of 
William A. Little, of the same place, for delegate to Congress, while John 
B. Bennett of Otoe county presented the name of Dr. George L. Miller, also 
of Omaha. Mr. Brown withdrew Mr. Little's name, since, as he said, the 
democracy outside of Douglas county favored another man, and Dr. Miller 
was thereupon nominated by acclamation. Thus it appears that at this early 
time Mr. Brown, a man of very positive opinions, of unswerving purpose, 
and of dogged pertinacity in forwarding them and in standing against his 
opponents, had conceived a hostility to Dr. Miller which he cherished, 
with an important influence on the politics of the commonwealth, to the 
day of his death.

   In challenging Mr. Hitchcock to a series of joint debates in the 
canvass, Dr. Miller sought to make the most of the fact that his opponent 
continued to hold the federal office of United States marshal, and 
occupied the equivocal position of ostensible candidate of the "union" 
party, which was in fact the republican party with a pseudonym. Dr. Miller 
first addressed his opponent by the title of United States marshal, then 
as republican nominee and United States marshal, and again as nominee of 
the "union" party and republican United States marshal. But whatever 
advantage accrued to the democratic candidate by virtue of his ability, 
prestige, and capacity for public discussion had been yielded by the 
unwise copperheadism, as it was effectively called, of his platform; and 
also by the influence of the suicidal national democratic platform of that 
year --t hough it is likely that any pronounced democrat running on any 
platform would have been submerged in the tide of general opposition to 
his party which then ran strongest in the new Northwest. Mr. Hitchcock 
received a majority of 1,087 over Dr. Miller out of a total vote of 5,885. 
This bitter bourbonism, which was now adopted by the democrats of the 
territory to their certain undoing, was in part due to the influence of 
Vallandigharn and Voorhees on Morton, who had been admired and assisted by 
them in his contest with Daily in 1861. The baneful reactionary course of 
these eminent party leaders, which, not at all strangely, influenced the 
scarcely mature and impressionable young man, would have spent itself 
ineffectually against the strong individuality and independent judgment of 
his mature years -- now more strongly developed in the whilom pupil than 
in his early preceptors. The mature Morton, thirty-five years afterward, 
strenuously opposed and rebuked a like wayward radicalism on the part of 
Voorhees in the great struggle over the money question.

   The tenth session of the legislature convened January 5, 1865.

   Mr. Mason was elected temporary president

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of the council, receiving seven votes against six cast for B. E. B. 
Kennedy. This vote represented the relative strength of the two parties, 
though Allen, classed as a republican, sometimes wabbled to the democratic 
side. There was no opposition to the election of Mr. Mason as permanent 
president; John S. Bowen was also unanimously elected chief clerk. Casper 
E. Yost, subsequently a prominent republican politician and editor, makes 
his appearance in politics at this session as enrolling clerk of the 
council.

   The number of representatives at this ses-

[image caption: PHINEAS WARRENER HITCHCOCK Sixth delegate to Congress 1864-
1866; United States Senator 1871-1877]

sion was only thirty-eight, Otoe county returning four instead of five. 
Party lines were not rigidly drawn in the organization. Samuel M. 
Kirkpatrick of Cass county was elected speaker and John Taffe chief 
clerk -- both by acclamation.

   The message was on the whole a plain, common sense, and useful 
document, but the governor's inadequacy when he drops into rhetoric in an 
attempt at a glowing picture of the status of the war and the progress of 
the Union arms creates in the reader a longing for the apt and eloquent 
tongue of Governor Black, ordained by nature for tasks like this, but now, 
alas, moldering in a gallant soldier's grave. The governor's sketch of the 
than troubles of 1864 now serves as history:

   From facts which have come to the knowledge of this department, it is 
deemed certain that these Indian depredations and disturbances were the 
result of combined action between several tribes, instigated, aided and 
counseled by lawless white men who hoped to share in the plunder which 
would result from their robberies and massacres. It is by no means certain 
that these coadjutors of the savages were not the emissaries of the rebel 
government, prompted to their inhuman work by the hope of creating a 
diversion in favor of their waning cause in the south. Portions of the 
Sioux, Cheyennes, Arapahoes, Kiowas, Comanches, and Apaches, were 
evidently confederated for the purpose of attacking the frontier 
settlements and emigrant trains in Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, and 
southeastern Idaho. Suddenly and almost simultaneously, without the 
slightest warning, ranchmen and emigrants were attacked at no less than 
four different points, remote from each other, thus proving, beyond the 
possibility of doubt, that the plan had been matured and the coöperation 
of different tribes secured in the work of destruction.

   The necessities of the general government had caused the withdrawal, 
from time to time, of nearly all the United States troops stationed in 
this territory for its defense, so that when the outbreak commenced we 
possessed no adequate force to suppress it. The few United States 
volunteers within reach did their duty nobly. The Nebraska first, rendered 
illustrious by so many brilliant achievements in the south, and the second 
Nebraska veteran cavalry, promptly responding to the call of the 
executive, moved at once to the post of danger; and the militia, with 
equal alacrity, hastened to the relief of their brethren on the more 
exposed frontier and the emigrants upon the plains. These efforts were 
crowned with substantial success. The feeble settlements were protected 
from the impending danger, the Indians, with very few exceptions, were 
driven from our border, and the various lines of communication between the 
Missouri river and the mountains and mining districts of the West were 
again opened to the traveler and emigrant. It is to be regretted that 
these savages were not more severely punished so as to ef-

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fectually deter them from a repetition of their barbarities in the future.

   The statement of territorial finances in the message shows a slight 
decrease of the debt, but, owing to the chronic and considerable 
delinquency of the counties a formidable part of the resources still 
consists of past due taxes. The message forcibly urged the passage of a 
general herd law; but while such a measure was pushed hard in the 
legislature, the pastoral sentiment of the people was still so dominant 
that it failed of passage, though in its stead special herd laws, applying 
to such counties as desired them, were enacted. The message states the 
condition and prospects of railway building at that time as follows:

   It will be gratifying to you and the people of the territory to know 
that the work on the great Union Pacific railroad, which is to pass 
through the entire length of Nebraska, is progressing at a very 
commendable rate. The work of grading, bridging and preparing the ties is 
progressing much more rapidly than had been anticipated by our most 
sanguine people. I feel fully authorized to say that unless some 
unforeseen misfortune attends this great enterprise more than fifty miles 
of road westward from Omaha will be in readiness for the cars before your 
next annual meeting . . . Another line of railroad, which is designed to 
connect with this route within the limits of our territory, has recently 
been surveyed on the south side of the Platte river. This line is designed 
to be an extension of the Burlington and Missouri River railroad, and from 
the favorable reports made by the engineers there can scarcely be a doubt 
that work will soon be commenced on that line also.

   The governor reopened the question of state government thus:

   During your last session a joint resolution was passed, asking Congress 
to pass an act to enable the people of Nebraska to form a constitution 
preparatory to an early admission into the union as one of the independent 
states. Congress passed the act, but it was done near the close of the 
session, and there was scarcely time enough allowed between the date of 
the reception of the bill in the territory and the election of the members 
of the convention for the people to learn of its passage -- certainly not 
enough to enable them to consider thoroughly and dispassionately the 
principles of the bill or the terms on which it was proposed to admit the 
territory into the family of states. Under these circumstances, a large 
majority of the people decided that the members of the convention should 
adjourn without forming or submitting any constitution whatever. This 
decision of the people, under the circumstances, was just what might. have 
been anticipated. It, however, is no proof that when convinced that 
liberal terms are proposed by the general government they would not 
readily consent to take their place in the great family of states.

   It is further stated that the strongest argument against a state 
government was that "we ought not to tax ourselves for anything which the 
general government is willing to pay," and this argument is disapproved on 
the ground that the general government's resources were taxed to the 
utmost on account of the war expenses.

   But Morton, whose sense of humor and scent for satire bubbles over in 
these early days, sees comedy, chiefly, in this ostensibly sober state 
paper:

   The News judges from its appearance that the impression was taken on 
type 21 years of age and coal tar used instead of printing ink, the paper 
of the texture and appearance of a superannuated shirt-tail. The printers 
have done ample justice to the matter printed, and the matter printed is 
in most perfect accord with the style of its printing . . . The next extra 
good thing is on "the freedmen of the war!" Alvin desires the people of 
Nebraska to find suitable employment for said sable citizens, and the 
people unanimously agree that the aforesaid charcoal images of God may be 
suitably employed boarding round among the abolition officials of 
Nebraska. In short the nigger is the biggest and whitest thing in the 
message.

   The governor had seriously suggested in the message that the 
legislature should undertake to find employment for slaves recently set 
free.

   The auditor (and school commissioner) gives in his report an account of 
the first leasing of the school lands of the commonwealth:

   Under instructions from this office, the clerk of Sarpy county, during 
last year, leased a number of tracts of lands, and will probably realize, 
when all collected, near $200.00 for the one year. I have had numer-

Page 342

[image caption: Franklin Sweet was a member of the legislature from 
Merrick county, Nebraska, and a captain in the Union army during the Civil 
War.]

Page 343

ous applications for leases of these lands and could I have a general law, 
under which the rents could be promptly collected, I have no doubt that 
several thousand dollars could be obtained annually from that source.

   The legislature at this session authorized the issue of bonds to an 
amount not exceeding $36,000 to provide payment of the militia called out 
by the governor's proclamation of April 11, 1864, on account of the Indian 
uprising; authorized the governor to arrange with the state of Iowa for 
the care of the insane of the territory; amended the militia law, but 
still required all able-bodied men between the ages of eighteen and forty-
five to be enrolled; provided for the election of the auditor and 
treasurer biennially, instead of annually, after the year 1866; 
disconnected Buffalo, Hall, and Merrick counties from Platte county, and 
allowed them one member of the house of representatives; attached Saunders 
county to Cass for judicial, election, and revenue purposes; legalized the 
organization of Jones county and declared its organization complete; 
attached all that part of Polk county north of the Platte river and west 
of the Loup Fork river permanently to Platte county; and adopted memorials 
to Congress for an appropriation to pay the expense of the Indian war, and 
for the building of a hospital for the insane. The legislature also 
graciously responded to the coyly expressed hint of the message that a 
recommendation for the reappointment of the governor would not be 
offensive, and threw in a similar request on behalf of the secretary. This 
action, tending toward harmonizing and building up the republican party, 
was and is characteristic of the solidarity of that organization, and was 
in sharp contrast to the constant and bitter strife between the leaders of 
the democratic party through all the territorial days.

   In July, 1866, Congress appropriated $45,000 to be applied in 
reimbursement of expenditures "for the pay, equipment, and maintenance of 
territorial troops in the suppression of Indian hostilities and protection 
of the lives and property of citizens of the United States," in the year 
1864. The allowance for troops was limited to the companies called out by 
the governor and placed under control of the general commanding the troops 
of the United States in the territory. The claim presented by the 
territory "somewhat exceeded" the amount of the appropriation. In his 
message of May 17, 1867, Governor Butler stated that Governor Saunders had 
succeeded in collecting $28,000 on this account, and in his message of 
January 8, 1869, he complains that the balance is still unadjusted.

   Governor Saunders was reappointed in April, 1865, and served until he 
was superseded by David Butler, the first governor of the state, in 1867. 
In the same month, Judge William Kellogg, of Peoria, Illinois, was 
appointed chief justice of the territory in place of William Pitt Kellogg, 
who had been appointed collector of the port of New Orleans. His party 
organ gave the gentleman of Louisiana "returning board" fame the following 
unequivocal send-off: "W. P. Kellogg was a very pleasant gentleman for 
whom we always entertained a feeling of friendship, but he neglected his 
duties as judge by his almost uniform absence at term time. We are 
mistaken in the temper of the bar of this territory, and especially of 
this city, if they quietly submit to those things four years longer." It 
is said by contemporaneous citizens that the second Judge Kellogg 
resembled his predecessor in name chiefly, and though an acute politician 
was also a good judge.

   The republican territorial convention for 1865 was held at Plattsmouth, 
September 19th. Jefferson B. Weston of Gage county nominated John 
Gillespie, of Nemaha county and "of the Nebraska First" regiment, for 
auditor, and Thomas W. Tipton of Nemaha county nominated Augustus Kountze 
for treasurer, and both were chosen by acclamation. The nomination of Mr. 
Gillespie was the first formal recognition of the soldier element in 
Nebraska politics, which afterward became a settled practice of the 
republican party.

   The democratic territorial convention of 1865 met at Plattsmouth, 
September 21st. The democrats of the country were now beginning to see in 
Andrew Johnson's patriotism -- or apostasy -- a ray of hope for 
resurrection

Page 344

from their self-interment of 1864, and Morton proceeded with alacrity to 
encourage the embarrassment which was encompassing the republicans of the 
territory. At the head of the committee on resolutions, composed as to the 
rest, of Edward P. Child of Douglas county and John Rickley of Platte 
county, he reported the following platform, which was adopted by the 
convention:

   1. Resolved, That the measures adopted by President Johnson for the 
restoration of the southern states to their rightful position in the 
union, and his recent public expressions on that subject are wise, safe, 
humane and patriotic, that they coincide with the time-honored theories of 
the democracy of the nation upon the relations of the states to the 
general government, of which theories the present chief executive has, in 
times past, been an eloquent and powerful champion; that the sentiments 
recently expressed by him towards the people of the south are an emphatic 
rebuke and repudiation of the policy, theories and public expressions of 
the republican party on the subject of the relation not only of the 
northern but of all the states to the federal power, and that the 
pretended endorsement, by the late convention of republican office-holders 
in this territory, of the views and measures of the president is a flat 
contradiction of the policy they have, until now, advocated, and deserves, 
therefore, to be treated with that contempt and distrust which honest, men 
always pay to deceitful words which stultify those who utter them.
   2. Resolved, That the qualifications of electors should hereafter, as 
heretofore, be regulated by each state for itself and that the attempt of 
the republican party to compel the southern people to admit negroes to the 
elective franchise is as unjust and unwarrantable an interference with the 
reserved rights of the states as it would be to force California to permit 
Chinamen to vote, and that the silence on this great question of the 
republican officeholders in their late convention when pretending to speak 
for their party, and when speaking in vague and general terms of the 
policy of the president towards the south, clearly shows that they are 
dishonest in what they do say and that they are holding their opinions 
upon this subject in reserve, to be suited to the uncertain developments 
of these shifting times.
   3. Resolved, That negroes are neither by nature nor by education, 
entitled to political nor social equality with the white race, that we are 
opposed to permitting them to hold office in this territory themselves or 
to vote for others for office; that we are bitterly hostile to the project 
of amending the Organic Act so as to permit them to vote, now sought to be 
secretly accomplished by republicans, and we denounce as cowardly and 
deceptive, alike to friends and foes, the silence of the officeholders' 
convention on this most important point.
   4. Resolved that we deem the vote of the people, but lately taken, by 
which they declared themselves in overwhelming majorities opposed to the 
admission of this territory as a state into the union, as decisive of that 
question, and are astonished at the persistent renewal of the effort of 
republican office-holders to force such a change of our condition upon us; 
that in order again to test the popular opinion on that subject, which 
should always be determined by the people in their primary capacity, we 
demand that all laws hereafter enacted, whether by the legislative 
assembly or by congress, providing for a convention to frame a 
constitution, require a vote to be taken at the time of the election of 
delegates, whether or not a convention shall sit for that purpose.

   These drastic resolutions were voted upon separately, and all adopted 
without dissent. The declaration of the status of the negro is not much 
out of harmony with the present general public opinion which has been 
reached after forty years of painful experiment along the lines of an 
opposite theory, and the established practice today in every southern 
state is in accordance with Morton's harsh dictum. Each of the two 
platforms here reproduced was prepared by a young and ambitious leader of 
the respective parties, and whatever might be said questioning the wisdom 
or discretion of Morton's declaration, its virility, strength, and 
boldness put the other, which was principally political fishing, in 
conspicuous contrast. And yet this prudent preaching of the one was to 
open to its author the gates of official preferment, while the vigorous 
but discordant ingenuousness of the other would be a bar against his 
political success. At this distance the denunciation of negro suffrage for 
this northern territory seems like gratuitous flying in the face of 
popular prejudice or sentiment. The question never has been of practical 
importance in Nebraska. The abuse heaped upon Morton by the republican 
news-

Page 345

papers on account of this platform and his other similar declarations was 
unusual even in those days of unbridled license of the political press.

   And yet it would be unjust to deny to the republican leaders of that 
day, such as Turner M. Marquett, Oliver P. Mason, George B. Lake, John M. 
Thayer, Robert W. Furnas, and Algernon S. Paddock, most of whom were 
recent deserters from the democratic party, a measure at least of that 
philanthropic desire for the amelioration of the condition of the negro 
race, and belief that the ascendency of the republican party at that time 
was essential to the attainment of that object, and even for the 
preservation of the Union, which so largely actuated the rank and file of 
their party. But, on the other hand, it would be unjust to deny to the 
democratic leaders, such as George L. Miller, J. Sterling Morton, Andrew 
J. Poppleton, Eleazer Wakeley, James M. Woolworth, George W. Doane, 
Charles H. Brown. and Benjamin E. B. Kennedy, as well as their party 
followers, the sincere belief that radical republicanism would hurtfully 
enfranchise the negro and obstruct the real restoration of the Union. 
Furthermore, it should be said, to the everlasting credit of these veteran 
democrats, alive and dead, that their unswerving allegiance to their 
party, through its many years of ill-repute, plainly meant to them 
political self-sacrifice and seclusion, while by cutting loose from their 
unpromising moorings and floating with the popular republican tide they 
would have gathered both honors and emoluments. Nor may we of today 
felicitate ourselves that the political fustian and buncombe of those 
early days has changed in great measure, either in quality or quantity. A 
well-known English writer illustrates their present prevalence in a recent 
article entitled "Rot in English Politics": ". . . The Disraelian myth, 
which has changed the most un-English of all our prime ministers into an 
almost sacramental symbol of patriotism, has been worth many a legion to 
Lord Salisbury. The Primrose League is ridiculous enough, but men who want 
big majorities must not scorn the simply ridiculous, nor do they."

   The democratic candidate for auditor was John S. Seaton -- who, like 
his opponent, belonged to the "old Nebraska First" -- and for treasurer, 
Saint John Goodrich. The republican, nominally the "union" ticket, was 
successful, Kountze having a majority of 852 and Gillespie of 694. With 
the soldier vote added Kountze had 3,495 votes and Goodrich 2,573. 
Bitterness to the extent of scurrility characterized the campaign. The 
Advertiser in particular, after Furnas left it, was mainly a mess of 
scurrilous epithet of which this is a scarcely adequate sample:

   The consequences of inviting the disfranchised renegades of the other 
states to Nebraska City, as was done by the Nebraska City News, just after 
the adoption of the new constitution of Missouri, are becoming more 
apparent every day in the theft, larceny and rowdyism of that city, which 
is alarmingly on the increase. Men have been knocked down on the streets 
of that city and robbed; men, boasting of being disfranchised Missourians, 
perambulate the streets in bands and make it unsafe for unarmed 
pedestrians. Horse stealing is again on the rampage. Three horses were 
stolen on the night of the 14th from that city; one from Julien Metcalf, 
which he has since recovered, and two (over which we shall shed no briny 
tears) from J. Sterling Morton. This is rather a steep contribution on 
Morton for their assistance in "voting down the bluecoated, brass-buttoned 
yankees."

   The same organ assailed the democratic territorial platform, and Morton 
"a pupil of Vallandigham," as the author of it, in language which it would 
be rather complimentary to call billingsgate. And this illustrates the 
ferocity of the appeal to war passions:

   The so-called democracy of this county, after due consideration and 
discussion, have hoisted the name of Joseph I. Early as a candidate for 
councilman, for the purpose of contesting the seat of Hon. J. W. Chapman
. . . Mr. Early proclaimed, in a public speech at Nebraska City, last 
fall, that he looked upon Abraham Lincoln as a tyrant and usurper of 
power, and denounced the union soldiers as robbers, thieves and murderers. 
He also said publicly that he had assisted in the notorious Baltimore mob, 
and that he would yet assist in hanging Abraham Lincoln.

   And there was little restraint in the discharge of explosive epithet 
through the col-

Page 346

[image caption: H. S. Kaley was an early legislator and lawyer, Red Cloud, 
Nebraska]

Page 347

umns of the democratic press. A sample Mortonism from the News will 
suffice: "As Mr. Goodrich [democratic candidate for treasurer] has had no 
government contracts, owns no untaxable United States bonds, is not a 
distant relative of the man who killed Christ, and does not run a bank, we 
presume he is not as rich, though he may be quite as honest, as Mr. 
Kountze or any other moneylender of the Jewish persuasion in Nebraska." 
But in the reckless game of politics it did not matter that Mr. Kountze 
was, by profession, a Lutheran and a prominent member of the Lutheran 
church.

   Of the twenty-three counties voting at this election only six -- 
Dakota, Dixon, Douglas, Otoe, Platte, and Sarpy -- were democratic, all of 
them but Platte of the older and border counties. Otoe remains the banner 
democratic, and Nemaha the banner republican county. The remarkable and 
persistent political differences between these two adjoining and border 
counties is explained by the fact that the dominating early settlers of 
Otoe were of the south and so of southern sympathy, which then involved 
democratic politics, while Nemaha was earlier dominated by northern men. 
This difference is further explained by a retort of the Advertiser to an 
assertion, attributed to Morton, in the News of June 8th, that "radicalism 
in Nemaha county has by its intolerance and bigotry, by fierce fanaticism 
and zealous hatred of democracy, driven one million dollars of Missouri 
capital out of the boundaries of Nemaha and into Otoe county." The reply 
quotes from the News of July 1, 1865, as follows: "The disfranchised 
citizens of Missouri will unquestionably seek new homes. The over-riding 
of honor and equity, and the entire lack of charity exhibited by the 
abolition rulers of the state having deprived them of all privileges of 
citizenship, they will take up their bed and go to some more hospitable 
region. We invite them to Nebraska." And then the Advertiser adds: "This 
invitation was not, and never will be endorsed by the union men of Nemaha 
county, and we have never heard a sound union man regret that the above 
invited class went to Otoe instead of this county." Five counties -- 
Cuming, Hall, Merrick, Pawnee, and Seward -- cast no democratic vote, 
while Lancaster with one hundred republican against eight democratic votes 
gave good earnest of her future political propensities.

   ELEVENTH LEGISLATURE. The eleventh legislative assembly convened 
January 4, 1866. The councilmen of the previous session held over with the 
exception of Bayne of Richardson county, who had removed from the 
territory, and George Faulkner was chosen in his place at a special 
election. There was a stout partisan contest over the choice of a 
president of the council. Porter of Douglas receiving 6 votes and Chapman 
of Cass 6. On the fourth day of the struggle and on the thirty-eighth 
ballot, the democrats and two republicans voted for Oliver P. Mason, who 
was already temporary president, and elected him permanent president. The 
democrats "accorded the presidency to Mason, and elected the remainder of 
the officers from their party." William E. Harvey, former auditor of the 
territory, was chosen chief clerk, receiving 11 votes against 1 for John 
S. Bowen. The house was composed of thirty-eight members.

   Gen. Harry H. Heath presented credentials from Kearney, Lincoln, and 
Saline counties, but a majority of a select committee appointed to examine 
them reported that he was ineligible, inasmuch as he held the office of 
brigadier-general of volunteers in the United States army, and the report 
was sustained by the house by a vote of 19 to 18. So the counties named 
were without representation at this session. James G. Megeath of Douglas 
county was elected speaker, receiving 25 votes against 9 cast for George 
B. Lake, also of Douglas county.

   George May of Cass county was elected chief clerk. The members of each 
house were nearly evenly divided politically, but the republican organ at 
the capital scolded at conditions which should have resulted in a 
democratic majority of one in each house while the "Union Republican 
party" was in a majority of at least 1,000 in the territory. The demo-

Page 348

[image caption: Charles H. Brown was a member of the constitutional 
convention, 1875, and prominent in early Nebraska politics.]

Page 349

cratic organ said that the democrats had a majority of two in the house, 
and that they elected all the officers but one.

   The governor's message set forth the status of the Indian war as 
follows:

   It was hoped that with the close of the rebellion these troubles would 
cease; but this hope has proved groundless. Emboldened by success, the 
savage tribes who have committed these outrages upon the lives and 
property of emigrants, and upon the Overland Stage Line and Pacific 
Telegraph, have become exceedingly reckless and daring in their murderous 
forays; and outrages the most atrocious and wanton in their character are 
of frequent occurrence. Nothing will in my judgment give us peace upon the 
plains but the employment of the most vigorous measures to hunt out and 
severely punish the authors of these outrages. And I trust and believe, 
from the information in my possession, that it is the purpose of the 
general government, early in the coming spring, to send a force against 
them sufficient to compel them to sue for peace, or drive them from all 
the great lines of travel between the Missouri river and the Rocky 
mountains.

   It appears from the message that, exclusive of the militia bonds to the 
amount of $36,000, the indebtedness of the territory was now $53,967.80 -- 
less by $3,891.56 than that reported the year before. The governor 
congratulates the taxpayers on the fact that the resources to meet this 
indebtedness amount to $91,945.70, disregarding with naïve optimism the 
troublesome fact that a very large part of this handsome sum represents 
unavailable delinquent taxes. The governor reports that, under an 
arrangement made during the year with the trustees of the Iowa hospital 
for the insane, nine patients had been sent there from the territory; 
that, with the assistance of Benjamin E. B. Kennedy and George B. Lake, he 
had examined the work of Experience Estabrook in revising the laws by 
authority of the act of the last session of the legislature and that the 
revision faithfully complied with the requirements of the act. The message 
reported that fifty-five miles of the Union Pacific railway had been 
completed, that grading and bridging were finished as far as Columbus -- 
ninety-five miles:

   Upon the north, congress has provided for a branch from Sioux City, and 
to the south of us the same just and liberal policy has endowed two other 
branches with liberal donations, thus insuring their construction at an 
early day. One of these branches is the extension of the Burlington and 
Missouri River Railroad, now permanently located to run west from 
Plattsmouth to the 100th meridian; the other is the extension of the 
Hannibal and St. Joseph railroad from St. Joseph, in a northwesterly 
direction uniting with the main line (in the language of the bill,) at the 
100th meridian "in the territory of Nebraska."

   The message urges the familiar arguments for state government. With the 
passion of the public men of that period for peroration, the governor 
closes his message with a highly colored congratulatory passage on the 
return of peace.

   Near the beginning of the session General Estabrook made a report on 
the manner in which he had done the work of revision, and afterward a 
joint committee, consisting of Kennedy, Allen, and Griffey, of the 
council, and Lake, Brown, Thorne, Crounse, and Cadman of the house, was 
appointed to further consider the revision. The careful work of General 
Estabrook brought the statutes for the first time into practical form. The 
legislature of 1866 made such amendments and additions to the revision of 
General Estabrook as were needed, and the result was embodied in the 
revised statutes of 1866. George Francis Train's Credit Foncier of 
America, an echo or counterpart of the famous Credit Mobilier, was 
incorporated at this session. John M. S. Williams, James H. Bowen, 
Augustus Kountze, George Francis Train, and George T. M. Davis, Train's 
father-in-law, were by the act appointed commissioners to organize the 
company, which was almost universal in its scope of business, but designed 
especially "to make advance of money and credit to railroad and other 
improvement companies." Under the provision for erecting cottages 
considerable building of that kind was done by the company at Omaha and 
Columbus.

   Statehood was the most important question considered at this session. 
Though party lines were not strictly drawn, the republicans generally 
favored, and the democrats opposed

Page 350

[image caption: WILLIAM REMINGTON. MRS. WILLIAM REMINGTON. William 
Remington was the first sheriff of Saline county, Nebraska]

Page 351

the proposed change to state government. The opposition was led on the 
outside by the two most prominent democratic leaders, J. Sterling Morton, 
then editor of the News, and Dr. George L. Miller, who had recently 
started the Omaha Herald, and in the legislature by Benjamin R. B. Kennedy 
of the council and the aggressive Charles H. Brown of the house. Mr. Brown 
formulated the democratic opposition in resolutions which he introduced in 
the house, and into the belly of which, Douglas -- like, he injected a 
stump speech:

   Whereas, certain official politicians have assiduously sought, through 
specious arguments, to create a sentiment in favor of, and induce the 
people to change their simple and economical form of government, which 
heretofore has been and now is a blessing, for one which will have many 
new, useless and burdensome offices, to be filled by persons ambitious to 
occupy places of profit and trust, even at the expense of the tax payers, 
and which will in its organization and operation necessarily be burdensome 
and ruinous to an extent which none can foresee, and consequently 
involving a taxation which will eat out the substance of the people; . . .

   And whereas, the people of this territory but a short time ago, with 
almost entire unanimity, expressed their unqualified disapproval and 
condemnation of any attempt to force on them the grinding taxation 
incident to, and schemes of politicians for, state government, and have 
not since then, by ballot or otherwise, expressed a wish for increased and 
increasing burdens and taxation;

   And whereas, personal interest and selfish considerations are strong 
inducements and powerful incentives for individual or combined action, and 
certain politicians have industriously sought again to force state 
government upon the people, and compel them again, at great expense and 
trouble, whether they wish or not, to consider that question, and through 
fraud and chicanery fasten this incubus upon them;

   And whereas, his excellency, Alvin Saunders, the chief executive 
federal officer of this territory, has with great consideration, after the 
rebuke given but a brief period ago by the people to political schemers 
for state organization, again, by plausible arguments, thrust in his 
annual message at this session, this repudiated question upon the 
legislative assembly for its action, and has sought in an unusual manner, 
to force a constitution no matter "by whatever body or by whomsoever
made," upon the people of this territory, without giving them even the 
small privilege, to say nothing of their absolute and most unqualified 
right to select whomsoever they might see fit to comprise that body, 
through whose actions they might entrust so grave and vital a question as 
making a constitution;

   Therefore, be it resolved, as the sense of this House, that it is 
unwise to take any steps which will throw this question upon the people 
without their first having asked for its submission to them.

   The resolutions were indefinitely postponed by a vote of 20 to 14. A 
joint resolution submitting a constitution to the people passed the 
council by a vote of 7 to 6, Mason, the president, giving the casting 
vote. The vote did not follow party lines, though only two democrats, 
Griffey of Dakota and Porter of Douglas, voted aye. The resolution passed 
the house, 22 to 16, the four democrats from Douglas county and four of 
the five members from Otoe county voting nay. It is curious that a motion 
in the house to strike out of the proposed constitution the restriction of 
the suffrage to whites received only two affirmative votes, while 36 were 
cast against it.

   The constitution was not prepared by a committee of the legislature or 
other legally authorized persons, but was the voluntary work of the 
politicians who were bent on statehood. Chief Justice William Kellogg was 
styled "our amiable constitution maker"; and Isaac S. Hascall, in a speech 
in the senate, February 20, 1867, said that the constitution was framed by 
nine members of the legislature, five of them democrats, and Judge William 
A. Little, Judge William Kellogg, Hadley D. Johnson, Governor Alvin 
Saunders, General Experience Estabrook, and others of Omaha. The Herald 
says that "the constitution was founded by three or four men who locked 
themselves up in their rooms to do their work." The Press of Nebraska City 
called it Kellogg and Mason's constitution and stoutly protested against 
the white restriction. While this

Page 352

state document of gravest importance was clandestinely and arbitrarily 
framed it was carried through the legislature in an indefensibly bold and 
arbitrary manner. The constitution did not even enter the legislature 
through the natural channels of the judiciary, or any other committee, but 
was injected by Porter of Douglas, that task being assigned to him, 
doubtless, because he was the only democrat of his delegation or of 
prominence who favored its submission at all. It was then referred to a 
special committee consisting of Bennett, Porter, and Chapman, who 
recommended it for passage, the same day, when it was at once passed, the 
council refusing, by a vote of 6 to 7, to hear it read the third time. The 
house even refused to let the important document go to a committee at all, 
the motion of Robertson to refer it to the committee on federal relations 
being defeated by 14 to 24, and two attempts to amend, made in the regular 
session, were frustrated by Lake's insistent motions to table. This 
fundamental law of a commonwealth was not even considered in committee of 
the whole in either house. It was cut by outside hands, and without time 
for drying was railroaded on its legislative passage. Even the republican 
Nebraska City Press was moved to say that "a few broken down political 
hacks about Omaha seem determined upon their mad scheme of forcing a 
constitution before the people through the legislature." The records of 
the procedure in the legislature fall little if at all short of bearing 
out the strictures of the strenuously partisan Herald:

   The constitution . . . was rushed through the legislature in such haste 
that not one man in six had a moment allowed to examine the instrument. . .
Democrats who favored the measure and democrats and republicans who 
opposed were denied the privilege of either amending or examining the 
constitution. Not one man in twenty in the legislature has ever read the 
constitution. This constitution was never printed. It was not even 
referred to a committee of either House. Even discussion of the stray 
paragraphs which members caught the sense of from the hurried reading of 
the clerk was denied to members under the resistless pressure brought to 
bear by the majority to rush it through.

   Mr. James M. Woolworth said in an address before the territorial 
educational association that the minimum price of five dollars an acre at 
which public school lands might be sold under the constitution was not an 
adequate protection, as he knew of several quarter-sections worth from 
fifty dollars to three hundred dollars per acre; and he complained that 
under the provision lands might be sold, not to the highest but to the 
lowest bidder. In the same address Mr. Woolworth called attention to the 
fact that the proposed constitution made no proper provision for a system 
of public instruction or for safeguards to the public school lands and 
funds. He urged that it should be amended in these particulars. In a 
letter to the Herald, Mr. Woolworth stated that he had said in the 
address, in question that on the question of suffrage he would vote with 
Dr. Monell and General Bowen, and that he was in favor of sending a 
proposition to amend the constitution on the suffrage question to the 
people, if the state should be admitted; and also that he was in favor of 
providing means of education for blacks as well as whites, but 
particularly wanted the constitution amended in respect to its educational 
provisions. "If it is not attended to now," he said, "the school lands 
will in a very few years be swept away. Some men will get rich and the 
schools will be forever poor."

   By the beginning of 1866 the vigorous patriotism or perversity of 
Andrew Johnson was fast stirring national politics into a condition which 
resembled potpourri, and the grotesque political antics of the federal 
office-holders it, particular revealed their agony of suspense though 
uncertain toward which course prudence pointed, yet most of them yielded 
to present pressure, and unconditionally "Johnsonized." On the whole their 
attitude chiefly, illustrated the overpowering influence of temporary 
advantage in determining men's allegiance and the choice, or even the 
creation, of their principles. Edward B. Taylor, editor of the Omaha 
Republican, and also superintendent of Indian affairs, rising -- or 
sinking -- to a sense of his duty to do something for the. administration, 
commensurate with the honors

Page 353

and emoluments of this sonorously entitled office, denounced the Morrill 
bill, or force law, as an attempt to force negro suffrage on the 
territory, as a distinct outrage on our rights as American citizens, and 
as being against the sentiment of nineteen-twentieths of the people. The 
Sumner amendment to the Colorado enabling act requiring, as a condition 
precedent to admission, acceptance by the legislature of negro suffrage 
was denounced as "an outrage upon the independence and rights of the 
people of Colorado." This was the same condition which was afterward 
imposed upon and accepted by the Nebraska legislature, on the approval of 
the Republican -- the constitution placed before the people in 1866 not 
having provided for negro suffrage. Even the Advertiser, which, since 
Furnas quit it, had been phenomenally radical and regular, was now 
standing out against negro suffrage and for Johnson's policy.

   But while the republicans, distracted in the doubt on which side the 
spoils lay, were divided as to the question of Johnson's policy, the 
democrats were so seriously divided on the question of statehood as to be 
unable to take advantage of the weakness of the majority party. The 
circulation of petitions for signature, asking the legislature to frame a 
constitution and submit it to the people, had drawn from Morton 
denunciation of the proposed statehood as "a scheme of office-aspiring 
politicians." Dr. Miller's attitude at this time was not so much that of 
opposition to statehood as it was to acquiring it through republican means 
and on republican conditions. He insisted that the people did not wish the 
legislature to form a constitution, but that they wanted a chance for a 
direct vote for or against state government. He argued against the 
statehood proposition on account of the manner in which it had been thrust 
upon the people, but wanted the policy of the party settled by a state 
convention; and he charged that Chief Justice Kellogg and Governor 
Saunders were the managers of the statehood scheme. The Republican, eager 
in its own misery to discover as much company of a like sort as possible, 
declared that at first a caucus of democratic members of the legislature 
did not oppose the state movement, but Morton cracked his whip and changed 
it all, and Dr. Miller had to fall in.

   From the circumscribed local point of view the aggressive and bitter 
opposition to negro suffrage by the democratic leaders -- by this time 
most of the leading strings could be traced into the hands of Morton and 
Miller, to be held there for some thirty years to come

[image caption: JOHN GILLESPIE Last territorial auditor and first state 
auditor of Nebraska, October 10, 1865, to January 10, 1873]

-- was inexplicable, since it had been the argument of Douglas, subscribed 
by his followers, that nature had fortified Nebraska against any 
considerable influx of negroes; and while this policy was hurtful to the 
party, as offending a growing popular anti-slavery sentiment, it was 
wholly unnecessary "to legislate against the law of God," as Daniel Web-

Page 354

ster had unanswerably stated the case. But, on the other hand, the 
prevailing public sentiment at the North just at that time, following 
Lincoln's expression of caution and deprecation, was against negro 
suffrage. We find the Herald, quoting a letter written by ex-Governor 
William A. Richardson, taking strong ground against negro suffrage, and 
showing that Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, and Wisconsin had voted 
against it at the last elections, while "at least thirty other states are 
in rebellion according to this test, and five or six are 'loyal.'" While 
the mainspring of the

[image caption: WILLIAM KELLOGG Fourth chief justice, Nebraska territory]

action of the republican leaders in pressing to adoption the fifteenth 
amendment to the constitution, some time after, may have been the selfish 
motive of gaining political control of the southern states, yet its 
success was based upon a strong and genuine sentiment in its favor in the 
North, and particularly in the Northwest. So, while it may be conceded 
that the democratic leaders of Nebraska, in pressing anti-suffrage as an 
issue, were in line with general democratic judgment and with national 
democratic policy, as keeping in touch with the inevitably dominant race 
of the South, yet it is plain that they pressed it with gratuitous ardor 
and unwise bitterness as affecting local politics. But whatever the reader 
may think as to the wisdom or unwisdom of Dr. Miller's anti-suffrage 
fulminations he feels that they are couched in rhetoric of extraordinary 
freshness and force. Thus, an observation by the Nebraska City News that 
the Morrill bill "provided that niggers shall vote in all the
territories," and that by Sumner's amendment to the act for the admission 
of Colorado it will be imposed also upon the states, touches off this 
broadside from the Herald:

   Thus negro suffrage is inevitable . . . It will be more manly to accept 
negro suffrage from congress by legal enforcement than to humiliate 
ourselves by its voluntary adoption as the price of admission to the 
union. That territory upon which congress imposes nigger voting because it 
has -- under radical ruling -- the power to do so, will become strongly 
democratic, but that community that voluntarily adopts it as the price of 
statehood will be very wofully radical ever after. We prefer living in a 
democratic territory where niggers vote to a residence in a radical state 
where they also vote. We could perhaps put up with niggers voting if at 
the same time their less white friends, the radicals were defeated in the 
territory. But it would be almost unendurable to live in the state of 
Nebraska and have niggers and radicals vote themselves victory . . . 
Gentlemen can take their choice . . . We take nigger only when forced to 
it by congress and therefore are for remaining as at present a territory.

   The Nebraska City Press, which, through the least among the leading 
republican organs of the territory, merited the distinction of having been 
the only clear-sighted or disinterested one among them, in that it had not 
Johnsonized, added to the discord by attacking the Republican for its 
strictures on Sumner's amendment, and clinched its denunciation with the 
prevalent argumentum ad hominem, to the effect that the editor of the 
Republican was an unregenerate Breckenridge democrat of 1860. At the close 
of the legislature, the democratic organ congratulated the territory on 
the failure of "the radicals to make the election laws even more offensive 
than they were then," and gave two of the republican

Page 355

members of the house the following parting attention.

   The bloody orator of Otoe (Mason) goes back to his radical brethren 
howling his own discomfiture, and utterly disgusted with the vain 
exhibition he has made in the legislature of mingled malice and vanity, 
while Crounse of Richardson, after his performance in the investigating 
committee and getting behind his privilege as a member of the House to 
assail Mr. Morton, has demonstrated the breadth of his estimate of what 
constitutes a gentleman.

   The character of the investigation referred to is disclosed in the 
report of the minority of the committee made by Mr. Crounse and adopted by 
the house, in part as follows:

   Mr. Speaker: The undersigned, a minority of the committee appointed by 
the chair to investigate charges of bribery and corruption made in 
relation to the passage of the joint resolution submitting a state 
constitution to the people of Nebraska, in submitting their report, would 
premise that, in their opinion, this investigation was instituted by that 
branch of this House opposed to state organization urged on by outside 
politicians, with a view to damage personal reputation and by such unfair 
means defeat the success of state organization if possible. As proof of 
this we refer to the following facts which appear in the testimony: One J. 
Sterling Morton, editor of the "Nebraska City News," a would-be leader of 
the democracy of the territory, and active anti-state man, before, during 
and since the submission and passage of the joint resolution, has spent 
most of his time on the floor of this House caucusing with members, 
drafting buncombe political resolutions for members to introduce in the 
House, by which its time was occupied to the exclusion of more legitimate 
and profitable business. The appointment of this committee would seem to 
have been directed with a view to this end; the very chairman, the Hon. 
Mr. Thorne, appears, by the evidence, to have been an instrument used by 
said J. Sterling Morton to introduce a resolution "blocked out" by him, 
and directed against state. The Hon. Mr. Brown, as appears by the House 
journal, was the introducer, if not the framer, of another preamble and 
resolution against state of a most insulting character, and which was most 
summarily disposed of by this House . . .

   The Hon. Mr. Robertson, of Sarpy county, it appears, was one of the 
instigators of this investigation. Too ambitious to put some capital into 
this enterprise, he came before the committee, and by his first testimony 
seemed willing to attach the motive of bribery and corruption to a 
transaction which appears, by the concurrent testimony of several other 
witnesses, to be a simple business matter. By further examination, when 
placed by his own testimony in the peculiar position of allowing himself 
to be approached two or more distinct times, with what he was pleased to 
term an improper offer without showing any resentment, he chose, on 
discovery, to state it in its true light, and by his own testimony, 
corroborated by that of all the other witnesses called to the same 
subject, it is shown that what occurred between himself and the Hon. 
Messrs. Mason and Bennett, of Otoe county, was purely a business 
transaction, and that it was not calculated to influence him in his vote, 
nor so understood by any of the parties,

   The last testimony taken was that of Mr. Bennett, of the Council, who 
states that Mr. Morton, aforesaid, during the pendency of the question of 
submitting the question of the constitution to the people, approached him 
with a proposition signed by fifteen anti-state men, including Messrs. 
Tuxbury, Gilmore, Paddock, and others of the House, proposing that if 
state men would separate the question of state from that of election of 
state officers, the fifteen would go for the suspension of the rules and 
pledge themselves that the bill should not be defeated. At the same time 
Mr. Morton promised to secure a like pledge from the anti-state members of 
the Council. Whether Mr. Morton had at the time a fee-simple in and full 
control over the anti-state members of both branches of the legislature, 
we leave for the members of this body to conclude. But it is but justice 
to Mr. Bennett to say that he did not entertain these propositions, but 
has at all times advocated state organization on principle and not a 
subject to be trafficked away . . .

   But the minority, in their haste to submit this report in the very 
short time allowed by order of this House, cannot undertake to review the 
testimony further. But enough is shown, we think, to convince this body 
that great effort has been made to defeat the wish of the majority in the 
submission of the constitution to the people; and while we can discern 
much connected with the passage of the bill that is not strictly proper, 
yet we have failed to discover anything of the character of the direct 
bribe or so intended.

   Mr. Robertson we consider a gentleman beyond the suspicion of accepting 
a bribe, or being improperly influenced in his action as a legislator. The 
other gentlemen designed to

Page 356

[image caption: CHARLES H. DIETRICH Governor and United States senator]

Page 357

be affected by this inquiry are possessed of too much good sense and 
discretion to undertake to bribe Mr. Robertson.(4)

   The Herald undertook to place various politicians as follows: 
"Estabrook (now a republican) is for nigger and against Johnson, and so is 
Alvin Saunders. Our amiable constitution-maker, Mr. William Kellogg (chief 
justice) is for Johnson, and so will be Paddock, Dundy, Hitchcock, Taylor, 
'for the present,' as Gen. Heath was against negro suffrage when he spoke 
his first piece in Omaha in front of the postoffice." The same aggressive 
organ at this time rejoices over Johnson's defeat of the freedman's bureau 
bill; and gives account of a meeting at the court house in Omaha to 
indorse the veto, which was addressed by Hadley D. Johnson, Charles H. 
Brown, Isaac S. Hascall, George W. Doane, and William A. Little. The 
instrument provided that it should be submitted to the people for their 
approval or rejection, June 2, 1866, and that state officers, judges of 
the supreme court, a member of the federal House of Representatives, and 
members of a legislature, to be convened on the fourth day of July 
following, should be elected on the same day. The constitution was by its 
own acknowledgment submitted in accordance with the enabling act of 1864. 
At the convention of the "Union" party, held at Plattsmouth, April 12, 
1866, David Butler was nominated for governor of the prospective state; 
Thomas P. Kennard for secretary of state; John Gillespie for auditor; 
Augustus Kountze for treasurer; Oliver P. Mason for chief justice; and 
Lorenzo Crounse and Geo. B. Lake for associate justices of the supreme 
court. Turner M. Marquett was nominated for member of Congress, receiving 
32 votes against 15 for John I. Redick. In the contest for the nomination 
for governor, Butler received 27 votes and Algernon S. Paddock 26. The 
platform was chiefly confined to a statement of the advantages of state 
government as follows: First, it would promote the settlement of the 
territory; second, it would bring the school lands under control of the 
people; third, it would enable Nebraska to select lands for the various 
public institutions before they should be absorbed by foreign speculators 
and by the location of agricultural college scrip issued to other states. 
It was contended, also, that the question was not a party issue. The 
growing difficulty with Andrew Johnson had now reached the non-committal 
stage, and on that subject the resolutions were silent. To the politicians 
the question whether or not the president would continue to control the 
official patronage was paramount, and they waited the issue. 

(4. House Journal, 11th ter. sess., pp. 203-205.)

Page 358

[image captions: CHARLES ISAAC BROWN, MRS. CHARLES ISAAC BROWN, WARREN 
SAUNDERS. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Isaac Brown were early residents of Harlan 
county, Nebraska. Warren Saunders was an early settler of Cedar county, 
Nebraska.]