Anti-Slavery Poems and Songs of Labor and Reform, Complete

TO THE THIRTY-NINTH CONGRESS.

The thirty-ninth congress was that which met in 1865 after the close of the war, when it was charged with the great question of reconstruction; the uppermost subject in men's minds was the standing of those who had recently been in arms against the Union and their relations to the freedmen.

     O PEOPLE-CHOSEN! are ye not
     Likewise the chosen of the Lord,
     To do His will and speak His word?

     From the loud thunder-storm of war
     Not man alone hath called ye forth,
     But He, the God of all the earth!

     The torch of vengeance in your hands
     He quenches; unto Him belongs
     The solemn recompense of wrongs.

     Enough of blood the land has seen,
     And not by cell or gallows-stair
     Shall ye the way of God prepare.

     Say to the pardon-seekers: Keep
     Your manhood, bend no suppliant knees,
     Nor palter with unworthy pleas.

     Above your voices sounds the wail
     Of starving men; we shut in vain *
     Our eyes to Pillow's ghastly stain. **

     What words can drown that bitter cry?
     What tears wash out the stain of death?
     What oaths confirm your broken faith?

     From you alone the guaranty
     Of union, freedom, peace, we claim;
     We urge no conqueror's terms of shame.

     Alas! no victor's pride is ours;
     We bend above our triumphs won
     Like David o'er his rebel son.

     Be men, not beggars. Cancel all
     By one brave, generous action; trust
     Your better instincts, and be just.

     Make all men peers before the law,
     Take hands from off the negro's throat,
     Give black and white an equal vote.

     Keep all your forfeit lives and lands,
     But give the common law's redress
     To labor's utter nakedness.

     Revive the old heroic will;
     Be in the right as brave and strong
     As ye have proved yourselves in wrong.

     Defeat shall then be victory,
     Your loss the wealth of full amends,
     And hate be love, and foes be friends.

     Then buried be the dreadful past,
     Its common slain be mourned, and let
     All memories soften to regret.

     Then shall the Union's mother-heart
     Her lost and wandering ones recall,
     Forgiving and restoring all,—

     And Freedom break her marble trance
     Above the Capitolian dome,
     Stretch hands, and bid ye welcome home
     November, 1865.

     *  Andersonville prison.
     ** The massacre of Negro troops at Fort Pillow.