On the other hand, every danger of conflict is avoided when the settlement of the question is referred to the several States.  They can, each for itself, decide on the measure, and whether it is to be adopted at once and absolutely or introduced gradually and with conditions.  In my judgment the freedmen, if they show patience and manly virtues, will sooner obtain a participation in the elective franchise through the States than through the General Government, even if it had power to intervene.  When the tumult of emotions that have been raised by the suddenness of the social change shall have subsided, it may prove that they will receive the kindest usage from some of those on whom they have heretofore most closely depended.

But while I have no doubt that now, after the close of the war, it is not competent for the General Government to extend the elective franchise in the several States, it is equally clear that good faith requires the security of the freedmen in their liberty and their property, their right to labor, and their right to claim the just return of their labor.  I can not too strongly urge a dispassionate treatment of this subject, which should be carefully kept aloof from all party strife.  We must equally avoid hasty assumptions of any natural impossibility for the two races to live side by side in a state of mutual benefit and good will.  The experiment involves us in no inconsistency; let us, then, go on and make that experiment in good faith, and not be too easily disheartened.  The country is in need of labor, and the freedmen are in need of employment, culture, and protection.  While their right of voluntary migration and expatriation is not to be questioned, I would not advise their forced removal and colonization.  Let us rather encourage them to honorable and useful industry, where it may be beneficial to themselves and to the country; and, instead of hasty anticipations of the certainty of failure, let there be nothing wanting to the fair trial of the experiment.  The change in their condition is the substitution of labor by contract for the status of slavery.  The freedman can not fairly be accused of unwillingness to work so long as a doubt remains about his freedom of choice in his pursuits and the certainty of his recovering his stipulated wages.  In this the interests of the employer and the employed coincide.  The employer desires in his workmen spirit and alacrity, and these can be permanently secured in no other way.  And if the one ought to be able to enforce the contract, so ought the other.  The public interest will be best promoted if the several States will provide adequate protection and remedies for the freedmen.  Until this is in some way accomplished there is no chance for the advantageous use of their labor, and the blame of ill success will not rest on them.