law to abolish a co-ordinate department of the Government--in such a case the President must take the high responsibilities of his office and save the life of the nation at all hazards. The so-called Reconstruction Acts, though as plainly unconstitutional as any that can be imagined, were not believed to be within the class last mentioned. {160} The people were not wholly disarmed of the power of self-defence. In all the Northern 'States' they still held in their hands the sacred right of the ballot, and it was safe to believe that in due time they would come to the rescue of their own institutions. It gives me pleasure to add that the appeal to our common constituents was not taken in vain, and that my confidence in their wisdom and virtue seems not to have been misplaced." These last words referred undoubtedly to the recent rejection, by popular vote, in a number of the most important Northern "States," of proposed amendments to "State" constitutions conferring suffrage upon negroes. [Sidenote: The interpretation placed by the Republicans on the President's Message.] Most of the Republicans in Congress interpreted this whole paragraph in the Message as a threat to violate the Reconstruction Acts, although this was disavowed, rather indistinctly it is true, and to violate also the Tenure-of-Office Act. It is very difficult to say what the President was aiming at in giving such a warning to a body already excited against him to a high degree. It was certainly a _faux pas_ of the worst kind, to say the least about it. [Sidenote: The President's special Message concerning the suspension of Stanton.] Just nine days later the President sent his special Message to the Senate in regard to his suspension of Mr. Stanton. The gist of it was that mutual confidence between himself and Mr. Stanton no longer existed, and that when he asked Mr. Stanton to resign Mr. Stanton had declined to do so and had strongly intimated that his reason for declining was his own lack of confidence in the President's patriotism and integrity. The President claimed that such an attitude, on the part of a subordinate toward his superior, was unendurable, was in fact official misconduct of a grave order, and he also referred to Stanton's withholding Baird's telegram from {161} him just before the New Orleans riot. The President furthermore discussed Mr. Stanton's letter in reply to his order to him suspending him from office and commanding him to turn over the records and property of the office to General Grant. This letter contained a declaration by Mr. Stanton denying the right of the President, under the Constitution and laws, to suspend him from office, without the advice and consent of the Senate, and without legal cause, and affirming that he yielded, under protest, to the superior force wielded by the General of the Army who had been designated to succeed him.