I  deem  it  a  subject  of  profound  regret  that  Congress  has  thus  far  failed
to  admit  to  seats  loyal  Senators  and  Representatives  from  the  other
States  whose  inhabitants,  with  those  of  Tennessee,  had  engaged  in  the
rebellion.  Ten  States — more  than  one-fourth  of  the  whole  number —
remain  without  representation;  the  seats  of  fifty  members  in  the  House
of  Representatives  and  of  twenty  members  in  the  Senate  are  yet  vacant,
not  by  their  own  consent,  not  by  a  failure  of  election,  but  by  the  refusal
of  Congress  to  accept  their  credentials.  Their  admission,  it  is  believed,
would  have  accomplished  much  toward  the  renewal  and  strengthening
of  our  relations  as  one  people  and  removed  serious  cause  for  discontent
on  the  part  of  the  inhabitants  of  those  States.  It  would  have  accorded
with  the  great  principle  enunciated  in  the  Declaration  of  American  In-
dependence that  no  people  ought  to  bear  the  burden  of  taxation  and  yet
be  denied  the  right  of  representation.  It  would  have  been  in  consonance
with  the  express  provisions  of  the  Constitution  that  "each  State  shall
have  at  least  one  Representative ' '  and  "  that  no  State,  without  its  con-
sent, shall  be  deprived  of  its  equal  suffrage  in  the  Senate.' '  These  pro-
visions were  intended  to  secure  to  every  State  and  to  the  people  of  every


Andrew  Johnson  447

State  the  right  of  representation  in  each  House  of  Congress;  and  so
important  was  it  deemed  by  the  framers  of  the  Constitution  that  the
equality  of  the  States  in  the  Senate  should  be  preserved  that  not  even
by  an  amendment  of  the  Constitution  can  any  State,  without  its  consent,
be  denied  a  voice  in  that  branch  of  the  National  Legislature.
