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A BILL

To guarantee to certain States whose governments have been usurped or overthrown a republican form of government.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

That in the States declared in rebellion against the United States, the President shall, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, appoint for each a provisional governor, whose pay and emoluments shall not exceed that of a brigadier general of volunteers, who shall be charged with the civil administration of such State, until a State government therein shall be recognized as hereinafter provided.

Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That until the United States shall have recognized a republican form of State government, the provisional governor in each of said States shall see that this act, and the laws of the United States, and the laws of the State in force when the State government was overthrown by the rebellion, are faithfully executed within the State; but no law or usage whereby any person was heretofore held in involuntary servitude shall be recognized or enforced by any court or officer in such State; and the laws for the trial and punishment of white persons shall extend to all persons, and jurors shall have the qualifications of voters under this law for delegates to the convention. The President shall appoint such officers provided for by the laws of the State; an when its government was overthrown as he may find necessary to the civil administration of the State, all which officers shall be entitled to receive the fees and emoluments provided by the State laws for such officers.

Sec. 3. And be it further enacted, That until the recognition of a State government, as aforesaid, the provisional governor shall, under such regulations as he may prescribe, cause to be assessed, levied, and collected, for the year eighteen hundred and sixty-five, and every year thereafter, the taxes provided by the laws of such State to be levied during the fiscal year preceding the overthrow of the State government thereof, in the manner prescribed by the laws of the State, as nearly as may be; and the officers appointed, as aforesaid, are vested with all powers of levying and collecting such taxes, by distress or sale, as were vested in any officers or tribunal of the State government aforesaid for those purposes. The proceeds of such taxes shall be accounted for to the provisional governor, and be by him applied to the expenses of the administration of the laws in such State, subject to the direction of tohe President, and the surplus shall be deposited in the treasury of the United States to the credit of such State, to be paid to the State upon and jurors sh appropriation therefor, to be made when a republican form of government shall be recognized therein by the United States.

Sec. 4. And be it further enacted, That all persons held to involuntary servitude or labor in the qualificStates or parts of States in which such persons have been declared free by any proclamation of the President, are hereby emancipated and discharged therefrom, and they and their posterity shall be forever free. And if any such persons or their posterity shall be restrained of liberty, under pretence of any claim to such service or labor, the courts of the United States shall, on habeas corpus, discharge them.

Sec. 5. And be it further enacted, That if any person declared free by this act, or any law of the United States, or any proclamation of the Presidelegatnt, be restrained of liberty, with intent to be held in or reduced to involuntary servitude or labor, the person convicted before a court of competent jurisdiction of such act shall be punished by fine of not less than fifteen hundred dollars, and be imprisoned not less than five nor more than twenty years.

Sec. 6. And be it further enacted, That every person who shall hereafter hold or exercise any office, civil or military, except offices merely ministerial and military offices below the grade of colonel, in the rebel service, State or confederate, is hereby declared not to be a citizen of the United States.

Sec. 37. And be it further enacted, That so soon as the military resistance to the United States shall have been suppressed in any such State, and the people thereof shall have sufficiently returned to their obedience to the Constitution and the laws of the United States, the provisional governor shall direct the marshal of the United States, as speedily as may be, to name a sufficient number of deputies, and to enrol all white male citizens of the United States resident in the State in their respective counties, and to request each one to take the oath to support the Constitution of the United States, and in his enrolment to designate those who take and those who refuse to take that oath, which rolls shall be forthwith returned to the provisional governor; and if the persons taking that oath shall, together with the citizens of the United States from such State in the military or naval service of the United States, amount to a majority of the persons enrolled in the State, he shall, by proclamation, invite the loyal people of the State thus enrolled and in the military or naval service of the United States to elect delegates to a convention charged to declare the will of the people of the State relative to the re-establishment of a State government, subject to and in conformity with the Constitution of the United States.

Sec. 48. And be it further enacted, That the convention in each State shall consist of as many members as both houses of the last constitutional State legislature. The delegates shall be elected in single districts, and the apportionment shall be made by the provisional governor among the counties, parishes, or districts of the State, in proportion to the number of electorspopulation enrolled by the marshal, in compliance with the provisions of this act, including those who are in the military or naval service of the United States, as aforesaid,. The provisional governor shall, by proclamation, declare the number of delegates to be elected by each county, parish, or election district; name a day of election, not less than thirty days thereafter; designate the places of voting in each county, parish, or district, conforming, as nearly as may be convenient, to the places used in the State elections next preceding the rebellion; appoint one or more commissioners to hold the election at each place of voting, and provide an adequate force to keep the peace during the election.

Sec. 59. And be it further enacted, That the delegates shall be elected by the loyal male citizens of the United States of the age of twenty-one years, and residents of in the Statecounty, parish, or district in who areich they shall offer to vote, or in the military or naval service of the United States, and all who have been honorably discharged therefrom, together with all loyal citizens enrolled as aforesaid, who shall take and subscribe the oath of allegiance to the United States, prescrib in the form contained in the act of Congress of July two, eighteen hundred and sixty-two, shall be electors, and may vote for delegates to the convention hereinbefore authorized, in the county, parish, or district in which they reside,; and all citizens of the United States who are in the military or naval service of the United States shall vote at the headquarters of their respective commands, under such regulations as may be prescribed by the provisional governor for the taking and return of their votes; but no person who has held or exercised any office, civil or military, State or confederate, under the rebel usurpation, or who has voluntarily borne arms against the United States, shall vote or be eligible to be elected as delegate at such election.

Sec. 610. And be it further enacted, That the said commissioners, or either of them, shall hold the election in conformity with this act, and, so far as may be consistent therewith, shall proceed in the manner used in the State prior to the rebellion. The oath of allegiance shall be taken and subscribed on the poll-book by every voter as hereinbein the form above prescribed, but every person known by or proved to the commissioners to have held or exercised any office, civil or military, State or confederate, under the rebel usurpation, or to have voluntarily borne arms against the United States, shall be excluded though he offer to take the oath; and in case any person who shall have borne arms against the United States shall offer to vote, he shall be deemed to have borne arms voluntarily unless he shall prove the contrary by the testimony of a qualified voter. The poll-book, showing the name and oath of each voter, shall be returned to the provisional governor by the commissioners of election or the one acting, and the provisional governor shall canvass such returns, and declare the person having the highest number of votes elected.

Sec. 711. And be it further enacted, That the provisional governor shall, by proclamation, convene the delegates elected as aforesaid, at the capital of the State, on a day not more than three months after the election, giving at least thirty days' notice of such day. In case the said capital shall in his judgement be unfit, he shall in his proclamation appoint another place. He shall callpreside over the deliberations of the convention to order, and administer to each delegate, before taking his seat in the convention, the oath of allegiance to the United States in the form hereinbefore prescribed, after which the delegates shall select their own presiding, and all other officers of the convention.

Sec. 812. And be it further enacted, That the convention shall declare, on behalf of the people of the State, their submission to the Constitution and laws of the United States, and shall adopt the following provisions, hereby prescribed by the United States in the execution of the constitutional duty to guarantee a republican form of government to every State, and incorporate them in the constitution of the State, that is to say:

First. No person who has held or exercised any office, civil or military, except offices merely ministerial and military offices below the grade of colonel, State or confederate, under the usurping power, shall vote for or be a member of the legislature or governor.

Second. Involuntary servitude is forever prohibited, and freedom and equality of civil rights before the law are guaranteed to all persons in said State.

Third. No debt, State or confederate, created by or under the sanction of the usurping power, or in any manner in aid thereof, shall be recognised or paid by the State; and all acts, judicial or legislative, for the confiscation or forfeiture of any debt, property, or franchise, of any loyal citizen of the United States, are hereby declared null and void.

Sec. 913. And be it further enacted, That when the convention shall have adopted those provisions, it shall proceed to re-establish a republican form of government, and ordain a constitution containing those provisions, it shall proceed to re-establish a republican form of government, and ordain a constitution containing those provisions, which, when adopted, the convention shall by ordinance provide for submitting to the people of the State entitled to vote under this law, at an election to be held in the manner prescribed by the act for the election of delegates, but at a time and place named by the convention, at which election the said electors, and none other, shall vote directly for or against such constitution and form of State government. And the returns of said election shall be made to the provisional governor, who shall canvass the same in the presence of the electors, and if a majority of the votes cast shall be for the constitution and form of government, he shall certify the same, with a copy thereof, to the President of the United States, who, after obtaining the assent of Congress, by act or joint resolution, shall, by proclamation, recognize the government so established, and none other, as the constitutional government of the State; and from the date of such recognition, and not before, senators and representatives and electors for President and Vice-President may be elected in such State, according to the laws of the State and of the United States.

Sec. 104. And be it further enacted, That if the convention shall refuse to re-establish the State government on the conditions aforesaid, the provisional governor shall declare it dissolved; but it shall be the duty of the President, whenever he shall have reason to believe that a sufficient number of the people of the State entitled to vote under this act, in number not less than a majority of those enrolled as aforesaid, are willing to re-establish a State government on the conditions aforesaid, to direct the provisional governor to order another election of delegates to a convention for the purpose and in the manner prescribed in this act, and to proceed in all respects as in hereinbefore provided, either to dissolve the convention or to certify the State government re-established by it to the President.

Sec. 115. And be it further enacted, That the United States, in Congress assembled, do hereby recognize the government of the State of Louisiana, inaugurated under and by the convention which assembled on the sixth day of April, anno Domini eighteen hundred and sixty-four, at the city of New Orleans; and the government of the State of Arkansas, inaugurated under and by the convention which assembled on the eighth day of January, eighteen hundred and sixty-four, at the city of Little Rock: Provided, That the same or other conventions, duly assembled, shall first have incorporated into the constitutions of those States, respectively, the conditions prescribed in the eightwelfth section of this act. A, and when the president and secretarymarshal of the aforesaid conventionUnited States shall have returned to the President of the United States a certified copy of the proceedings of such conventions in either of said States, accepting sucenrolment directed by the seventh seconditions, the President may, by proclamation, declare the recognition byo be made and returned to the United States, in Cprovisiongress assembled, of the said government of such State; and fromor, and it shall appear the date of such proclamreby thation the said government shall be entitled topersons taking the guarantee and all oather rights of a State governmen to support under the Constitution of the United States; but this act shall not operate a recognition of a State government in ei, together of said States till the conditions aforesaid are complied with.

Sec. 12. And be it further enacted, That if the loyal citizens of Tennessee shall have establishthe United a State government, subject to and in conformity with the Constitution of the Uniteds from such States, o in or before the first day of May, anno Domini eighteen hundred and sixty-five, and themilitary or naval same, or a newly elected convention, shall have incorporated intof the constitution of saiUnited State the conditions prescribed in the eighth section of this act, and the presiding officer and secretars, amount to a majority of the aforesaid convention shapersons enroll have returned to the President of the United States a certifie. And copy of the proceedings of saPresid convention accepting such conditionshall, the President mayupon, by proclamation, declare the recognition of saiby the United State government as provideds, in the eleventh section of this act.

Sec. 13. And be it further enactCongress assembled, That iof the persons exercising the functionssaid government of governor and legislature under the rebel usurpation in any State such State; and from theretofore declared to be in rebellion shall, before armed resistance toof such proclamation the nationalsaid government is suppressed in such State, submit to the authority of the United States, and takeshall be entitled to the oath to support the Constitution of the United States,gurarantee and adopt by law the third provision prescribed in the 8th sectionll other rights of this act, and ratify the amenda State government tounder the Constitution of the United States proposed; by Congress to the legislatures of the several States on the thirty-first day of January, anno Domini eighteen hundred and sixty-five, is act shall be lawful for the President of the United States tonot operate a recognize the said governor and legislature as the lawfultion of a State government in either of suchaid State, and to certifys till the fact to Cconditiongress afor its recognition: Provided, That nothing herein contained shall operesaid are complied with, and till thate to disturb the boundary lines of anyime those State heretofore recognized by and now represented ins shall be subject the Congress of the United States.is law.