Though the President is commander-in-chief, Congress is his commander; and, God willing, he shall obey.  He and his minions shall learn that this is not a government of kings and satraps, but a government of the people, and that Congress is the people. * * * To reconstruct the nation, to admit new States, to guarantee 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.  They have determined to defend these rights against all usurpers.  They have determined that, while in their keeping, the Constitution shall not be violated with impunity.  This I take to be the great question between the President and Congress.  He claims the right to reconstruct by his own power.  Congress denies him all power in the matter except that of advice, and has determined to maintain such denial.  “My policy” asserts full power in the Executive.  The policy of Congress forbids him to exercise any power therein.

Beyond this I do not agree that the “policy” of the parties is defined.  To be sure, many subordinate items of the policy of each may be easily sketched.  The President * * * desires that the traitors (having sternly executed that most important leader Rickety Wirz, 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 created by him shall be acknowledged as valid States, while at the same time he inconsistently declares that the old rebel States are in full existence, and always have been, and have equal rights with the loyal States.  He opposes the amendment to the Constitution which changes the basis of representation, and desires the old slave States to have the benefit of their increase of freemen without increasing the number of votes; in short, he desires to make the vote of one rebel in South Carolina equal to the votes of three freemen in Pennsylvania or New York.  He is determined to force a solid rebel delegation into Congress from the South, which, together with Northern Copperheads, could at once control Congress and elect all future Presidents.

Congress refuses to treat the States created by him as of any validity, and denies that the old rebel States have any existence which gives them any rights under the Constitution.  Congress insists on changing the basis of representation so as to put white voters on an equality in both sections, and that such change shall precede the admission of any State. * * * Congress denies that any State lately in rebellion has any government or constitution known to the Constitution of the United States, or which can be recognized as a part of the Union.  How, then, can such a State adopt the (XIIIth) amendment?  To allow it would be yielding the whole question, and admitting the unimpaired rights of the seceded States.  I know of no Republican who does not ridicule what Mr. Seward thought a cunning movement, in counting Virginia and other outlawed States among those which had adopted the constitutional amendment abolishing slavery.