imputation that the President approved the whole or any part of it. To
this request I never received a reply.


_Congress and General Grant's Report_

Congress met early in December. At once the Republican majority in
both houses rose in opposition to President Johnson's plan of
reconstruction. Even before the President's message was read, the
House of Representatives, upon the motion of Thaddeus Stevens of
Pennsylvania, passed a resolution providing for a joint committee of
both houses to inquire into the condition of the "States lately in
rebellion," which committee should thereupon report, "by bill or
otherwise," whether, in its judgment, those States, or any of them,
were entitled to be represented in either House of Congress. To this
resolution the Senate subsequently assented. Thus Congress took the
matter of the reconstruction of the late rebel States as to its final
consummation into its own hands.

On December 12, upon the motion of Mr. Sumner, the Senate resolved
that the President be directed to furnish to the Senate, among other
things, a copy of my report. A week later the President did so, but he
coupled it with a report from General Grant on the same subject. The
two reports were transmitted with a short message from the President
in which he affirmed that the Rebellion had been suppressed; that,
peace reigned throughout the land; that, "so far as could be done,"
the courts of the United States had been restored, post-offices
reëstablished, and revenues collected; that several of those States
had reorganized their State governments, and that good progress had
been made in doing so; that the constitutional amendment abolishing