Alfred H. Stone Collection
Volume: 6

8. J. B. Henderson, Reconstruction. Speech of Hon. J. B. Henderson, of Missouri, Delivered in the Senate of the United States, June 8, 1866: ([Washington, DC]: [Government Printing Office], [1866]). (12 p.)

Speech in favor of a bill that eventually became the Fourteenth Amendment. Mr. Stone has marked several passages, such as this one. “The negro is the object of that unaccountable prejudice against race which has its origin in the greed and selfishness of a fallen world. That prejudice belongs to an age of darkness and violence, and is a poisonous, dangerous exotic when suffered to grow in the midst of republican institutions, where we boast as asylum for the oppressed of every land.” And this passage as well. “What will you do with them [Negroes]? You have three alternatives before you, and only three. You must kill them, colonize them, or ultimately give them a part of your political power. For this last alternative the country is not yet prepared. With the two former humanity and common sense will successfully struggle.”