which he made in Congress, was the one delivered May 2, 1862, in the support of the bill to confiscate rebel property. This speech, because of its value as an exponent of constitutional law, challenged the attention of the lawyer members. He was ceaseless in administering blows against the institution of slavery. He acted in this regard steadily upon his own declaration: “Whenever we can give slavery a constitutional blow, let us do it.” On February 15, 1863, he introduced a resolution, which was passed, declaring that the constitution should be so amended as to abolish slavery in the United States; and this was the first step ever taken in Congress in favor of the abolition and prevention of slavery in the country. In his speech advocating this resolution, he uttered the following vigorous language and eloquent sentiment: “In view of the long catalogue of wrongs that slavery has inflicted upon the country, I demand to-day in the Congress of the United States the death of slavery. We can have no permanent peace while slavery lives. It now reels and staggers in the last death struggle. Let us strike the monster this last decisive blow. Pass this joint resolution and the Thirty-eighth Congress will live in history as that which consummated the great work of freeing a continent from the curse of human bondage. The great spectacle of this vote which knocks off the fetters of a whole race will make this scene immortal.” Further on he said: “I mean to fight this cause of the war—this cause of the expenditure of all the blood and treasure from which my country is now suffering; this institution which has filled our whole land with sorrow, desolation and anguish—I mean to fight it until neither on the statute-book nor in the constitution shall there be left a single sentence or word which can be construed to sustain the stupendous wrong. Let us now in the name of Liberty, Justice and of God consummate this grand resolution. Let us now make our country the home of the free.”