Selected Resolutions, Pennsylvania Republican Party Convention, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, March 7, 1866

2. That the most imperative duty of the present is to gather the legitimate fruits of the war, in order that our Constitution may come out of the rebellion purified, our institutions strengthened, and our national life prolonged.

3. That failure in these grave duties would be scarcely less criminal than would have been an acquiescence in secession and in the treasonable machinations of the conspirators, and would be an insult to every soldier who took up arms to save the country.

4. That filled with admiration at the patriotic devotion and fearless courage with which Andrew Johnson resisted and denounced the efforts of the rebels to overthrow the National Government, Pennsylvania rejoiced to express her entire confidence in his character and principles, and appreciation of his noble conduct, by bestowing her suffrage upon him for the second position in honor and dignity in the country. His bold and outspoken denunciation of the crime of treason, his firm demands for the punishment of the guilty offenders, and his expressions of thorough sympathy with the friends of the Union, secured for him the warmest attachment of her people, who, remembering his great services and sacrifices, while traitors and their sympathizers alike denounced his patriotic action, appeal to him to stand firmly by the side, and to repose upon the support, of the loyal masses, whose votes formed the foundation of his promotion, and who pledge to him their unswerving support in all measures by which treason shall be stigmatized, loyalty recognized, and the freedom, stability, and unity of the National Union restored.

5. That the work of restoring the late insurrectionary States to their proper relati0ns to the Union necessarily devolves upon the law-making power, and that until such action shall be taken no State lately in insurrection is entitled to representation in either branch of Congress; that, as preliminary to such action, it is the right of Congress to investigate for itself the condition of the legislation of those States, to inquire respecting their loyalty, and to prescribe the terms of restoration, and that to deny this necessary constitutional power is to deny and imperil one of the dearest rights belonging to our representative form of government, and that we cordially approve of the action of the Union representatives in Congress from Pennsylvania on this subject.

6. That no man who has voluntarily engaged in the late rebellion, or has held office under the rebel organization, should be allowed to sit in the Congress of the Union, and that the law known as the test oath should not be repealed, but should be enforced against all claimants for seats in Congress.

7. That the national faith is sacredly pledged to the payment of the national debt incurred in the war to save the country and to suppress rebellion, and that the people will not suffer this faith to be violated or impaired; but all debts incurred to support the rebellion were unlawful, void, and of no obligation, and shall never be assumed by the United States, nor shall any State be permitted to pay any evidences of so vile and wicked engagements.

15. That in this crisis of public affairs, full of grateful recollections of his marvellous and memorable services on the field of battle, we turn to the example of unfaltering and uncompromising loyalty of Lieutenant General Grant with a confidence not less significant and unshaken, because at no period of our great struggle has his proud name been associated with a doubtful patriotism, or used for sinister purposes by the enemies of our common country.

17. That the Hon. Edgar Cowan, Senator from Pennsylvania, by his course in the Senate of the United States, has disappointed the hopes and forfeited the confidence of those to whom he owes his place, and that he is hereby most earnestly requested to resign.