Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 3.djvu/29

 the Senate, by a vote of thirty-three yeas to nine nays. All voting yea were Republicans and three Republicans voted nay. In the House the vote stood yeas, one hundred and four, all Republicans; thirty-three voted nay, six of whom were Republicans and twenty-seven Democrats. In February, 1866, Congress passed the Civil Rights Bill which was vetoed by the President. The Senate passed the bill over the veto by a vote of thirty-three yeas, all Republicans, to fifteen nays, five of whom were Republicans and ten Democrats. In the House the bill was passed over the veto by a vote of one hundred and twenty-two yeas, all Republicans, to forty-one nays, seven of whom were Republicans and thirty-four Democrats. By these acts the antagonism between the President and the Republican party was greatly intensified and grew more bitter from month to month. A joint committee of the House and Senate reported a plan of reconstruction for the States lately in rebellion which did not meet the approval of the President, this further alienating the President and Congress until the feeling became intense and bitter. All of the members of Congress from Iowa sustained the measures of that body, while the Democratic party of the State favored the President’s policy. In 1866 Johnson began the removal of Federal officers, in Iowa, who sided with Congress in the controversy, including a great number of postmasters. A large majority of the Republican papers and people of the State warmly supported the policy of Congress on reconstruction, yet it made a division in the party throughout the Union. William H. Seward, one of the founders of the party and now Secretary of State in President Johnson's Cabinet, as well as many other prominent Republicans, with a number of the leading Republican newspapers of the country, warmly supported the President in his controversy with Congress and the entire Democratic party sustained the President in his plan of reconstruction.

In the midst of this division of the people on new issues