And here occurs the Bingham Amendment, which, however intended, is only an engine of Rebel power. This is its true character, and nothing else. Howsoever it may seem, it must be regarded in its consequences. We must look from the word to the thing. It is not enough to see how it reads; we must see how it works. According to its text, the present Legislature, whose natural existence has been changed by wrongful addition and wrongful subtraction proceeding directly from the old Rebellion, is terminated at a specified day in the coming autumn, and a new election is ordered, without taking into consideration the past or the future,--without considering that thus far it has sat as a provisional Legislature only, although chosen to sit under the State Constitution,--without considering how it has been despoiled of its legislative character and just rights by hostile influence, and how a new election will be a direct appeal to this same hostile influence, giving to it a letter of license and unloosing the Ku-Klux-Klan. The Bingham Amendment is in few words, but they are words of despair to the loyal men of Georgia, and words of cheer to the disloyal. I have listened to the arguments in its favor. Do I mistake, when I say that they all resolve themselves into technicality? At one moment we have allegations of “irregularity,” and at another of “estoppel”; and such technicalities play their part, while the good people of Georgia are sacrificed. We are estopped, so it is said, by the Act of December 22, 1869, which, failing to provide for the re-performance of certain conditions-precedent, recognized the validity of the legislative acts by which they had been performed. Very well,--suppose the legislative acts are recognized as valid, what then? Because the ratification of the Constitutional Amendments is recognized, does it follow that Congress is thereby “estopped”--such is the word--in completing the work of Reconstruction? I cannot comprehend this reasoning. It would be of value in a county court, but it is out of place in the Senate of the United States, on a question of Reconstruction. To my mind, all this is a matter of supreme indifference. The powers of Congress are above any such incident, and nothing has occurred to impair them in any way. They exist now as at the beginning, awaiting the discretion of Congress. Do you ask where these powers are found? Of course, in the two Constitutional Amendments already proclaimed,--being ample sources, if none others existed. Out of these Congress is authorized to do all that is needed to enforce Emancipation and to protect the rights of the citizen. This is plain, very plain.