The first gun of the political war between the President and Congress, which was to rage four years, was fired by Thaddeus Stevens in the House of Representatives by the introduction, even before the hearing of the President's Message, of the resolution already mentioned, which substantially proclaimed that the reconstruction of the late rebel States was the business, not of the President alone, but of Congress. This theory, which was constitutionally correct, was readily supported by the Republican majority, and thus the war was declared. Of Republican dissenters who openly took the President's part, there were but few--in the Senate, Doolittle of Wisconsin, Dixon of Connecticut, Norton of Minnesota, Cowan of Pennsylvania, and, for a short period, Morgan of New York, as the personal friend of Mr. Seward. In the House of Representatives, Mr. Raymond of New York, the famous founder of the New York _Times_, acted as the principal Republican champion of the "President's policy." [Illustration: PRESIDENT ANDREW JOHNSON WHOSE RECONSTRUCTION POLICY LED TO THE FOUR YEARS' WAR BETWEEN HIMSELF AND CONGRESS] _Stevens the Dominating Figure of the Struggle_ Thaddeus Stevens was the acknowledged leader of the Republicans in the House. Few historic characters have ever been more differently judged from different points of view. A Southern writer of fiction has painted him as the fiend incarnate; others have spoken of him as a great leader of his time, far-sighted, a man of uncompromising convictions, intellectually honest, of unflinching courage and energy. I had come into personal contact with him in the Presidential campaigns of 1860 and 1864, when he seemed to be pleased with my efforts. I had once heard him make a stump speech which was evidently inspired by intense hatred of slavery, and remarkable for argumentative pith and sarcastic wit. But the impression his personality made upon me was not sympathetic: his face, long and pallid, topped with an ample dark-brown wig which was at the first glance recognized as such; beetling brows overhanging keen eyes of uncertain color which sometimes seemed to scintillate with a sudden gleam; the under lip defiantly protruding; the whole expression usually stern. His figure would have looked stalwart but for a deformed foot which made him bend and limp. His conversation, carried on in a hollow voice devoid of music, easily disclosed a well-informed mind, but also a certain absolutism of opinion, with contemptuous scorn for adverse argument. He belonged to the fierce class of anti-slavery men who were inspired by humane sympathy with the slave and righteous abhorrence of slavery, but also by hatred of the slaveholder. What he himself seemed to enjoy most in his talk was his sardonic humor, which he made play upon men and things like lurid freaks of lightning. He shot out such sallies with a fearfully serious mien, or at least he accompanied them with a grim smile which was not at all like Abraham