Mr. King was born in 1806 at Ogdensburg, St. Lawrence County, New York, which throughout his life continued to be his home. He became prominent in political affairs, while still a young man, as a zealous supporter of President Jackson in whose interest he edited a paper. He attached himself to that strong school of New-York Democrats of whom Silas Wright was the acknowledged leader. After conspicuous service in the New-York Legislature, he entered Congress in 1845 and remained until 1851. When the South demanded the abrogation of the Missouri Compromise Mr. King followed his personal convictions, broke from his Democratic associations and aided in the organization of the Republican party. He adhered steadily to the fortunes of the new party and brought with him a strong popular support--the large Republican majorities in Northern New York being originally due in no small degree to his personal influence and earnest efforts. CHAPTER IX. The controversies between the President and Congress, thus far narrated, did not involve what have since been specifically known as the Reconstruction measures. Those were yet to come. The establishment of the Freedmen's Bureau was at best designed to be a temporary charity; and the Civil Rights Bill, while growing out of changes effected by the war, was applicable alike to all conditions and to all times. The province of the Special Committee on Reconstruction was to devise and perfect those measures which should secure the fruits of the Union victory, by prescribing the essential grounds upon which the revolted States should be re-admitted to representation in Congress. The principal objects aimed at were at least four in number. That which most largely engaged popular attention at the outset was the increased representation which the South was to secure by the manumission of the negroes. In the original Constitution only three-fifths of the slaves were permitted to be enumerated in the basis of apportionment. Two-fifths were now added and an increase of political power to the South appeared probably as the somewhat startling result of the civil struggle. There was an obvious injustice in giving to the white men of the South the right to elect representatives in Congress apportioned to their section by reason of the four and a half million of negroes, who were enumerated in the census but not allowed to exercise any political power. By permitting this, a Confederate soldier who fought to destroy the Union would be endowed with a larger power of control in the National Government than the loyal soldier who fought to maintain the Union. To allow this to be accomplished would be a mere mockery of justice, the utter subversion of fair play between man and man.