January 29, 1869

The SPEAKER, The House ndw resumes the consideration of the motion oMhe gentle-

3x> Si sk— To -JG. man from Massachusetts [Mr. BouTWETi] to reconsider the vote by which the bill (H. R. No. 1G67) to secure equal privileges and immunities to citizens of the United States, and to enforce the provisions of article fourteen of the amendments to the Constitution, and the joint resolution (H. R. No. 402) proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, were recommitted to the Committee on the Judiciary. The gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Paine] is entitled to the floor.

Mr. PAINE. I yield the floor to I, man from Pennsylvania, [Mr. Kell

M r KELLEY. I have undertaken at the end of twenty minutes to the genH han from Ohio, [Mr. ShellabarghB,] and tffen I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Bikgham.]

The SPEAKER. The Chair will, then, arrest the remarks of the gentleman at the end of twenty minutes.

Mr. KELLEY. Mr. Speaker, it is not necessary that I should address the House to inform gentlemen who were members of the ThirtyEighth or Thirty Ninth Congress what my views are on either of the questions now pending. I have advocated such an amendment of the Constitution and such a law from 1865, when I was first convinced that the Constitution vests in Congress the right to regulate the suffrage, and as an amendment to the bill which called forth thecelebrated Wade and Davis manifesto, proposed a clause which would have invested with the right of suffrage those citizens of African descent who had served in the Army or the Navy or who could read the Constitution of the United States. The first provision was accepted by the committee and embodied m the bill, and the House rejected the other. The Republican party was then groping timidly in the dark. Whether it now sees its duty more clearly we are about to lean* by the fate of the pending propositions. On the 27th of February, 18t 6 after several brief incidental discussions of the point, I laid before the House copious authorities in support of my theory, drawn from the debates in the Federal Convention for framing the Constitution and the several State conventions which accepted it, and closed my remarks with a prophecy which, I trust, is about to be fulfilled at this time.

"In conclusion, I repeat that I hold that all the power this amendment will give is already in the Constitution. I admit that it has lain doimant. I admit that there has been raised over itasuperineumbent mass of State and political usage and jud i eial decisions that is mountain high; but when i remember the mass ofjudicial decisions, ol State and political usage, which was swept away by the decision of Judge taney s court that the Missouri compromise was unconstitutional, I am persuaded that it will vet bequickencd and called into action, in the aroused Constitution people will be exercised demand so that that all each the J btatesnau e shall hp guarantied a republican government, and that thooiS Of each State privileges and immunities of citizenship there respective States; but as some gentlemen question the existence of the power, and others the propriety of exercising it at this time, 1 hope we will submit this amendment to the people, that they may laoie ex. illicitly empower Congress to enforce and maintain their rights throughout the limits of our wide syi ea country.”

Sir, I came upon this mass of historic evidence when seeking to relieve my mmd from the doubts in which public opinion had been involved by the persistent assertions and nuespun logic of the advocates of State sovereignty upon the question, is sovereignty m the States or the United States. In reading the Consatution I found that section two of article four provides that—

44 Tho filizens of each State shall be entitled to all immunities of citizens in the several St And yet I saw citizens leave the State of Maine or New Hampshire or Massachusetts, voters, jurors, and possible officeholders, and pass into the State of the gentleman who impressed the House so eloquently last night Kentucky— Mr McKeb.] and be degraded bj her laws to the position he so touchin ly described, in which they might be robbed of propX erty L or life liie itself: itself: and, and, though though twenty twenty persons per_ with a slight infusion ol African blood m then veins beheld the transaction, the court by excluding those witnesses from the witness stand by reason of the taint in their blood would adjudge that 110 crime had been committed. I asked myself can it be possible that the framers of our Constitution had undertaken to secure the privileges and immunities of citizens in 411 the States to all the citizens of each State }Jut had provided no means of securing them. ''I could not believe they had been guilty of so fatal an omission.

Proceeding in the study of the letter of the Constitution I found that article four of the same section says:

The United States shall guaranty to every State in this Union a republican form of Government.

How was this power to be exercised? How was the guarantee to be carried into effect I Accepting the political dogmas of the parties of those days—for on this point they did not differ—I could find no provision by which these high duties of the Government could be executed. Finding the political teachers of the day utterly at fault, I went back, as I have said, to consult those who framed the Constitution, and asked, what did they say to each other in the discussion of that august Convention, charged with a duty as grand as ever was confided to any deliberative body? I turned to the recorded views of J roes Madison, tits le dei of that Convention, and who is known to history as its father because of the influence he exercised in its counsels and in molding its conclusions. I found that on the 13th of June, 1788, in the Virginiaconvention, Mr. Madison, in response to Mr. Monroe, who appealed to him as the gentleman wjjo had been in the 1< ederal Convention for an explanation of section four of article one, explained that it provided for the execution of both these guarantees. And in my remarks ot February 27, 1866, when I pressed upon the attention of the House all the authorities from this source which have yet been brought to the attention of the House, I quoted the following from his reply:

Some States might regulate the elections on the principles of eauality. and others might regulate them otherwise. This diversity would be obviously unjust. Elections are regulated now unequally10 some States, particularly South Carolina, with 10- snect to Charleston, which has a representation ot thirty members. Should the people of any State by any means be deprived of the right of suffrage, it was judged proper that it should be remedied V y the General Government."

Are not hundreds of thousands of the people of Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware deprived of the right of suffrage?_ Are not forty thousand people in Pennsylvaniaaepnyed of it? Do not Ohio and Indiana and other States withhold from citizens of African descent that essential right, and is it not the duty of Congress to invest them with it by executing that provision of the Constitution winch James Madison pointed to as the means by which it could be secured to each and all?

Mr. WOODWARD. Will the gentleman allow me to ask him a question?

Mr. KELLEY. Having but twenty minutes in which to discuss so grave a question I must decline to yield to any one at this time.

Thus the question of the power of Congress to enact the pending bill was brought distinctly before the Virginia convention, and this was the answer made by "the father ot the Constitution:",

Should the people of any State by any means bo deprived of the right of suffrage it was judged proper that should be remedied by the General Governmerit."

]f gentlemen ask why, if Congress possesses it, the States have been permitted to exercise this power, as was asked on the first day of the debate by the gentleman from Kentucky, (.air. Kxott,] I reply in the language of that same speech of Mr. Madison, as follows:

"It was found impossible to fix the time. and manner of the election of Representative, in the Constitution herniation of this, It in \?as the found first necc place, arv to foe to 1c «ao <n m menu as being best acquainted Ki h th. w u lion of the people,, f aujec to the« mtiol of t- era! Government, in older to i 141 uniformity «md ,mt 1,~ "wn dilution.

Out Madison was not the n y who so expounded the clause of the Constitution! refer to, nor -was Virginia the only State that accepted the Constitution tinder that interpretation of the clause. In the North Carolina convention Mr. Bloodworlh asked this question:

"Now, sir, does not this clause give an unlimited and unbounded power to Congress over the times, places, and manner of choosing Representatives?"

And answered Ms own question with another of great significance, as follows:

May not their power over the manner of election enable them to exclude from voting every description of men they please?"

North Carolina was thus notified of the construction of the clause, yet, with Virginia, she adopted the Constitution. The same views were presented in New England. I quote from the debates of the Massachusetts convention the remarks of Theophilus Parsons, as follows;

But a State Legislature, under the influence of their Senators, who would have their fullest confidence, or under the influence of ambitious or popular characters, or in time of popular commotion, and when faction and party spirit run high, would introduce such regulations as would render the right of the people insecure aDd of little value. They might make an unequal and partial division of the State into districts for the election of Representatives, or they might even disqualify one third of the electors. Without these powers in Congress, the people can have no remedy; but the fourth section provides a remedy, a controlling power in the Legislature, composed of Senators and Representatives of twelve States, without the influence of our commotions and factions, who will hearimpartially, and preserve and restore to the people their equal and sacred rights of election."

Mr. Speaker, as early as 1807, but seventeen years after the adoption of the Constitution, the Democratic party in. this House, through its leading orator, John Randolph, of Virginia, could find no answer to the proposition other than that it had lapsed by non user They contended that a correlative power, residing, as Madison had said, primarily in the State, but subject to the supervision of Congress, had lapsed, had become a dead letter in seventeen years, before it had been fairly tested whether the States would regulate the suffrage upon principles of justice!

If gentlemen will refer to the annals of Congress, Tenth Congress, first session, page 887, they will find that in the discussion of the contested election ease of Barney vs. Creery Mr. Pisk, of Vermont, announced the theory I am now advocating. The report reads as follows: I There was one part of the Constitution applicable in the present discussion which had not been noticed. Ho alluded to thefourthseetionnf thefirst article. ‘The times, places, and manner,' Ac. Mr JHHk would only ask the gentleman from Virginia, (Mr Randolph,) who had so ably defended the right ot ruebtates. ii thepoweroJCongresswasnotcoecma,! and coextensive with that of the States. Congress might alter and prescribe the rule of elections so far as respected the time manner and place, li hewoi d manner is italicized in the report.] If tliogcntleraan contended that the States had a right to fix thOS lineright must a S° admit th lt Congress hfl 1 John Randolph, of Roanoke, had no other reply to make to the suggestion than this: gentleman from Vermont has quoted a part of the Constitution which had nothing to do with this fct7wS1 b in fact, in this day is nothing better mont nfolf f K t Would Gentleman from Verma™S nf hnM? ito regulate the tune, place, and manner ot holding elections m the several fnv members to that House? After all that could hi Oon fnfrf 166 ^"-established practice under the l°h n E j dolPh on that day surrounded in the two Houses of Congress by members of til Federal Convention andofthe several Statecor? ventions, and m their presence did not dare to deny that the power asserted by Mr Pist which the friends of the pending bill propose to exercise, had beenembodiedmtheConstitutionbut, evading the issue, he claimed that because in the brief period of seventeen years it had not been exercised by Congress it bad lapsed or become a dead letter I would like some of the lawyers of this House to show mo how the powers expressly conferred on a Government by a written Constitution can lapse because no emergency requiring their exercise has arisen. So preposterous a suggestion required the genius and fame of John Randolph to secure it a respectful hearing.

This power is not, I freely admit, one to be exercised by Congress in the first instance. The regulation of the suffrage is left primarily to the States. If they regulate it according to the principles of justice then their action stands; but if not, Congress is required to exercise its supervisory power. And, gentlemen, has not the time arrived for the exercise of this power%' Do not two hundred and fifty thousand cftizens of the United States in the single State of Kentucky, whose homes and persons anjfavaged with legal impunity, whose property is insecure, who have no voice in the Government, whose appeals for justice may not be heard in the courts of that State, proclaim to you and to the country that the time has come when a Republican Congress should call into operation this latent power, and give them and the people similarly situated in other States the power to protect themselves by the peaceful exercise of the right of suffrage in the choice of legislators and other officers? This duty is before us, and we cannot with honor shrink from or evade it. Sound policy and justice with equal voice demand its performance.

How, sir, by means other than the passage of this bill, can we do justice to the citizens of those States who recognize, as all ought to, the citizenship of every man? How otherwise will you carry out as to them the fourth section of the second article of the Constitution, and secure them "in each State all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States?" By no other means can that clause of your Constitution be executed. By what other means can you guaranty to each State "a republican form of government J Gentlemen may answer that it may be done by a constitutional amendment. To secure the adoption of such an amendment may require several years, and this duty is already laid upon Congress, and ought to be performed by the immediate passage of a law, and we may then endeavor to make it a part of the Constitution also. It should be embodied in distinct language in the fundamental law of the land. -But gentlemen cannot avoid their responsibility ill the premises by shrinking from the performance of plain duty or attempting to cast it upon the Legislatures of the several States. [Here the hammer fell.]

Mr. SHELLABARGBK next addressed the House. [See Appendix.]

Leave was granted to Mr. Bowen and "Mr. LocGHRiDGEtoprintspeeches. rSeeApnendix. 1

Mr BINGHAM. Mr. Speaker, I fullyconcur with my colleague [Mr. Shellabarger] in all that he has said touching the objectionable features of the amendment as presented by the gentleman from Massachusetts, [Mr. Bootwell.] The House, I have 110 doubt, will concur with me in saying that the only limitation that the amendment imposes upon the original powers now in the several States of this Union is the limitation that they shall not restrict the elective franchise in the persons of citizens by reason of race, color, or previous condition of slavery. Those three terms are the only terms of limitation in it, and hence it is manifestly true that this power remaining in the States, in 110 other manner fettered by the proposed amendment, may be exercised to the end that an aristocracy of property may be established, an aristocracy of intellect may be established, an aristocracy ot" sect may be established; in short, what has been done in New Hampshire in regard to official qualifications may be done in every State in this Union in regard both to the qualifications of electors and the qualifications of officers; that is to say, the States may setup a religious test, and pronounce at once that all who are not of the i Protestant faith shall be disqualified either to wtv vc? office' ttnd add thereto a property qualification and an educational qualificaHence, I believe, if we are going to touch this question by amendment we ought so to amend the proposition of the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Boutwell] that the amendment presented to the people for their approval will inform them that upon its adoption these abuses by States will hereafter be impossible. To that end I have offered an amendment which, in substance, is the same as that proposed by my colleagup, [Mr. Shellabarger,] with a single exception. I propose to amend the proposition of the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Boutwell] so that it will read as follows:

Sec 1. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge or deny to any male citizen of the United States of sound mind and twenty one years of ago or upward the equal exercise of the elective franchise, subject to such registration laws as the State may establish, at all elections in the State wherein he shall have actually resided for a period of one year next preceding such election, except such of said citizens as shall hereafter engage in rebellion °r insurrection, or who may have been or shall be duly convicted of treason or other infamous crime.

I desire to give in passing one reason that controls me in presenting this amendment in this form, as to the term of residence required— one year next preceding the election in the State in which he shall offer to vote—that reason is this: each year there are landed upon our shores hundreds of thousands of adult persons who are aliens of—by the modern invention of forged naturalization papers, the Government ot the United States is not protected against the pollution of the ballot box by thousands who are not entitled to vote, and yet control the elections of the people.

I have something further to say of the additional limitations proposed in the short time within which this debate is limited, and then I shall have done. My colleague, [Mr. Shellabarger,] I regret to say, has deemed it his duty, in addition to what I have offered here, to offer a further exception; allowing the several States of this Union to exclude from the ballot, for all time to come, all who may have participated in the late rebellion. The gentleman—in addition to the provision that all who may hereafter participate in any rebellion, which is my own amendment, and is intended to protect the Government m the future—would make this constitutional provision have a retrospective operation, thus presenting, by our consent, to the eyes of the civilized world a constitutional provision fordisenf ranehising in some of the States a majority of its maleadults because they have participated in the rebellion, while you enfranchise byname the whole body of male adult citizensof sound mind, without distinction of race or color, who heretofore have been deprived of suffrage. The proposition of my colleague to except "all who have engaged in rebellion" would include all the victims of a cruel conscription, a conscription which entered the homes of hundreds and thousands of people of the southern States and forced them to bear arms in the rebellion against the Constitution and laws of their country.

Sir, it is the common law of the civilized world that no man is criminal in that which he l fj by coercion; and formyself, while reason holds a place in my brain, I never will support a proposition which holds such persons criminal because, in my judgment, it outrages the enlightened conscience and common sense of mankind. I know the answer is that we do not by this amendment, say the States shall do this. My reply is that if we so amend the proportion the States may do this. I submit, sir, that it is not right to affirm to the States the power to do it. We have no more right to disqualify from the ballot the male citizen of sound mind, who by force of conscription bore arms in support of the rebellion, than we have to disqualify you, Mr. Speaker, or to disqualify my honorable colleague.

I wish to remark further, when we were exercising the transcendent powers of this nation, the power of self defense in presence e l rebellion, when all the limitations 01 the Constitution were silent, we never dared to put upon the statute book any such provision as the amendment of my colleague contemplates; that the great mass of the men who participated iu the rebellion should not vote in the preliminary work of reorganization. On the contrary, by our statutes we did not disqualify one out of twenty of the adult males of the Sou tli who participated in the rebellion. Why? Because the Congress of the United States had no thought of setting up in any of the States an oligarchy by operation of statute law. The Congress while providing by the thirteenth and fourteenth articles of amendment to make all men free avoided any proposition by way of amendment to deny the ballot to any citizen. Let it not be forgotten that when it was proposed to insert in the fourteenth article of amendment the provision that until 1870 those who had participated in rebellion should not vote for members of Congress or for Presidential electors it was struck out by every vote of the Senate save one. Now we are to ask the Senators who thus voted, and whose votes stand thus recorded to so amend the Constitution as to allow the ballot to be denied to all who have participated in rebellion not for a limited period of a year, but for life.

Mr. Speaker, I am opposed for another reason to this proposition of my colleague. The interests of this great country demand that we shall so frame the fundamental law of the country that we will take not vengeance for the past, but security for the future. We should so amend our Constitution as to summon back to the standard of the country and to the support of its Government the whole multitude of men who but yesterday were in arms against us. We should so amend the Constitution as that by this work of generous deliverance, by the will of a brave and victorious people, we shall hasten that, hour for which all good men pray, when we shall again be one people, with one" Constitution and one country. We should frame this amendment so as to carry out the humble petition of the great man whom but yesterday the people lifted by their ballot to the highest office in their gift. "Let us have peace 1 says Grant. -'Let us have peace!" We shall have it when we so amend the Constitution as to clothe the whole body of the people with the elective franchise, and say that 110 State shall deprive them of it, leaving the disabilities as to the holding of office standing as they stand in the text of the Constitution to day Was it not the people s judgment solemnly recorded by the ratification of the fourteenth article of amendment that the only political disability which they would sanction in organized States by reason of and for participation in the late rebellion was that those who violated an official oath to support the Constitution by engaging in the rebellion, or giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the Constitution, should be disqualified for office, civil and military, State and national, until Congress should remove the disability. That was their judgment, and by that judgment we should abide. They intended that there should be neither political nor servile slaves in any State. Let us stand by that judgment and not consent that any of the several States may disfranchise a majority of the male citizens resident therein by reason of the late rebellion.

Having done that, sir, onr action will be consistent with our past record. Having done that we shall hasten the time when we shall have peace. Those words, "Let us have peace!" ought to be written in the heart and mind of every one of us when we come to deliberate upon this question." Let us have peace 1' ought to be written on the archways ot your Capitol, and, if it were possible, ought to be written upon the azure arch which bends above us like the arms of beneficence to which weary men look up for hope and consolation. Let us have peace’’ by an act of peace, that we may restore the broken fabric of American empire. Let us have peace”’ by the works ol peace and the arts of peace, that the land which but yesterday was stained with fraternal blood may grow green and beautiful under the hand of honest toil. "Let us have peace" that wo may perfect the holy temple of our liberties until it shall lift its headstone of beauty above the towers of w tch and war, filling the whole earth with its glory, and drawing all nations unto it." Let us have peace," that by our sublime example we may teach the whole world "how good and how pleasant a thing it is for brethren to dwell together in unity."

Mr. BOUTWiiLL obtained the floor, and yielded ten minutes to Mr. Jones, of Kentucky.

Mr. JONES, of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, 1 do not propose to make an argument upon the important questions involved in this bill, not being allowed time for any such purpose, but merely to indicate the reasons which will control my vote upon it. While the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Bootwei l was addressing the House the other day in defense of this bill, I asked him the question if he contended that the power to regulate suffrage within the States was delegated by the Constitution to the United States or prohibited by it to the States; if not, how he construed the tenth article of the amendments to the Constitution, which reads as follows:

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively or to the people?"

The gentleman made no satisfactory reply, but said that the tenth article had nothing to do with the question. Sir, it has everything to do with the question. Such a reply comes with bad grace from any man who assumes to represent the Common wealth of Massachusetts, supposingindeed that Massachusetts bears any resemblance to her former self. Six-, does the gentleman know that it was the people of that State who were the first or among the first to require this very amendment? No State was so tenacious of the rights of the people or so jealous of Federal power at the dawn of our national existence as was Massachusetts. When her delegates assembled in convention to ratify the Constitution of the United States they solemnly declared thus:

And as it is the opinion of this convention that certain amendments and alterations in the said Constitution would remove the fenrsand quiet the nnprehenbions of many of the good people of this Commonwealth, and more effectually guard against an undue administration of the Feder il Government, the convention do therefore recommend that the following alterations and provisions beintroducfd into the said Constitution: first, that it be explicitly declared that all powers not expressly delegated by the aforesaid Constitution are reserved to tlao several States, to be by them exercised

And to show, sir, that when they made this declaration and express reservation they were considering the very question of suffrage and regulating elections, they also declared:

That Congress do not exercise the power vested in them by the fourth section of the first article, but in cases where a State shall neglect or refuse to make the regulations therein mentioned, or shall make regulations subversive of the rights of the people to a free and equal representation in Congress, agreeably to the Constitution."

Now, what says the fourth section of the first article alluded to?

“The times, places, and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives shall bo prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but Congress may at any time bylaw make or altersuch regulations, exceptas to the places of choosing benators."

This section gives to Congress the power simply to make or alter the regulations as to the times and manner of such elections, and for obvious reasons to meet other requirements in the Constitution as to Senators and Representatives, but not affecting in the least the power of the States to make and fix the qualifications of its own electors. But so jealous were the delegates of the Massachusetts convention even of this little power in the Congress that they declared against its exercise except in cases which were never likely to occur. The people of a State would not be apt to subvert their own rights or to deny themselves free and equal representation. Well, sir, after suggesting some other restrictions upon Federal power, to make their opinions more emphatic the delegates in the Massachusetts convention concluded thus:

"And the convention do, in the name and in bohalf of tbe people of this Commonwealth, enjoin it upon the r representatives in Congress at all times, until tho alterations and provisions aforesaid have been considered agroeably to tbq fifth article of tho said Constitution, to exert all their influence and use all reasonable and legal methods to obtain a ratification of thesaid alterations and provisions m such manner as is provided in the said article

Thus spoke John Hancock, Samuel Adams, James Bowdoin, Francis Dana, and others of her first born sons, and thus spoke Massachusetts herself, lately emerged from the baptismal fires of the Revolution, wuh her robes of sovereignty fresh and bright upon her, a bride at the alter celebrating the nuptials of the Union. Alas! alas! Mr. Speaker, her injunctions are buried with her great men, and her degenerate sons would barter away her sovereignty to pamper this Federal power which she so much dreaded, this political mastodon which is gormandizing on the vitals of constitutional liberty.

And now, sir, what does this bill and this constitutional amendment propose to do? I cannot go into a discussion of the provisions of either, as there is no time for it, and as they have been amply discussed by others in this debate. The proposition is simply to divest the States or the people of the right to regulate suffrage and elections within their own borders and vest it in the Congress of the United States.

I might, if time were allowed, go into an examination of tlie opinions of the framersof the Constitution, and quote, as is too often done without effect in this House, the authority of Madison and Hamilton, of Franklin, Rutledge, and Pinckney, and cite from the decisions of Marshall and Story and Kent and Taney, or refer to the lucid expositions of Webster and Calhoun, to show that the regulation of suffrage was intended to be confined to the States, to be exercised exclusively by them, and to be maintained as the chief element in their liberties. It was not only a reserved right, but vested in the States by the Constitution itself; and it is only necessary to glance at its provisions on that subject to settle the question in the mind of any sensible man, however captious he may be." He who runs may read" and understand if he will.

The second section of article one provides: “The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several States, and the electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State Legislature. The same section then goes on to prescribe certain qualifications for members of Congress, but never in the remotest degree assuming the right to fix the qualification of electors. That right was inherent in the people, as expressed in the Declaration of 1 ndependence, "That governments are instituted among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." Section three of the same article carries out the same principle:

"The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State chosen by the Legislature thereof, for six years, and each Senator shall have one vote."

This is the power of the people one degree removed. They elect the Legislature; the Legislature elects the Senators; the source of power being with the people, to be regulated and administered by its own chosen agents. Had not this been intended and understood the Government would have been anti-republican at its inception and a monarchy or oligarchy established as the result of our revolutionary struggle, or, indeed, Mr. Speaker, our fathers would have instituted a delusive phantom to deceive and cheat mankind.

Another provision of the Constitution distinctly fixes the right of choosing electors for President: even with the States.

"Each State shall appoint in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Kepresent ativcs to which the State may be entitled in Ooq~ gress," &o

Can any honest man doubt for a moment the meaning and intent of these provisions? And strange to say, sir, these startling changes are tQ he made in our system of government under the specious plea of section four of article four of the Constitution, namely:

The United States shall guaranty to every State in this Union a republican form of government," See. Shame, sir, that these revolutionists should seize that as their shibboleth in this contest. It, sir, is the most potent argument and shield —j them. Timt clause was inserted in the instrument as a protection of the States, and against the very power and despotism they would nowimpose upon them. Erase that from the Constitution and you strike down one of the firmest bastions in our republican form of government; indeed, you destroy the Government itself. Let us beware, fellow Representatives, of these monstrous innovations, and while we, in fidelity to our oaths, cherish the Union and maintain the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, let us also, I pray you, guard with unceasing vigilance as the vestal flame of our liberties the reserved rights of the States and of the people.

Mr. BOUTWELL. I yield ten minutes to th© gentleman from New York, [Mr. Waud.]

Mr. WARD. Mr. Speaker, the course of thegentleman from Massachusetts, [Mr. Boutwell,] who has the charge of this subject, in asking that there be no action at present upon the bill which has been reported by him from th® Committee on the Judiciary, with reference to this all important question of suffrage renders it unnecessary for me to say at this time what I desired to say upon that bill. In the short time allotted to me I will endeavor to speak briefly upon the various projects now before the House for the amendment of the Constitution.

It will be observed that the Committee on the Judiciary have reported an amendment which, in substance, prohibits the States from discriminating in regard to the elective franchise against any man of the age oftwenty one years oh account of color or race. An amendment has been proposed by the distinguished gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Bixgham.] and while it does not come from a committee it comes almost with as much authority as if it emanated from a committee. That amendment proposes to secure this franchise of suffrage to every man in the Republic, no matter whether he has been loyal and faithful to it or not. There is a further amendment proposed by the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. SiiellaBarger,] and this comes nearer to my judgment of what the House should pass. It in substance secures suffrage to every male citizen of the age of twenty one years, unconvicted of crime and of sound mind and memory, provided he has not been o r may not be disfranchised for participation in rebellion. The amendment which I have had the honor to submit is similar in substance to that to which I have just referred, and further provides that no man shall vote unless he has been a citizen for three months, and that nothing in this amendment shall be eonstrued to prevent the States from passing such naturalization and registration laws as the interests of the country or the proper protection of the elective franchise may demand.

Kovr, I have no question about our power to pass any amendment which comes within the range of a republican Government orfree institutiong. The fatliers of the Republic left a great power in the hands of Congress and three fourths of the States when they said," You can amend the federal Constitution in any respect whenever Congress by a two thirds vote an d three fourths of the States insist onsuch atnetidm ent." Has the time come when further amendment fco the Constitution is demanded? Sir, we have foar million people who have become free by the &efc of war, who are now citizens of the Republic, who now pay taxes, and from whom we demand military service. In several of the States those citizens are guarantied the right of suffrage, and the representative portion of these people, under the reconstruction acts, in muav of the States exercise the right of suffrage". But to day in the border States, in Maryland. Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, Delaware, and in many of the northern States, there are two hundred and fifty thousand loyal male citizens, unconvicted of crime, untainted with treason, who are paying taxes, and who are subject to military duty, who are deprived now of any voice in the Government which they seek to uphold, deprived of all right of suffrage. There are in other States of the Union six hundred thousand male citizens whose right to that depends upon the volition of the States; and whenever rebel legislators, and whenever rebel instrumentalities, get the control of those State organizations, you will find that those men will be deprived of that right of suffrage. So that the question involved in this constitutional amendment is this: will you secure in your fundamental law the right to one million men nearly in this country to vote in future, men who are loyal citizens, and who are willing to discharge their duties to the Government?

Mr. Speaker, I think that nothing is more apparent than that this Congress should hand over to the people this proposition to amend the Constitution. It will be the capstone in the great temple of American freedom. It will be the consummation of our great work. It will secure to us the fruits of the war. It will settle the controversies between the races. It wilfstop the contests between white men and black men. It will stop the controversies of the North -and the South on that subject. It will bring the country back to peace, which all the interests of the country demand. I hope, therefore, the House will not hesitate about passing this amendment.

But the gentleman from Ohio tells us that we should extend universal amnesty. He tells us, in substance, that we shall hand suffrage over to every rebel and every traitor disqualified by the laws of those States from the right of suffrage. I am opposed to that. I am willing to be merciful; I am willing to be just; I am willing to give these men in the South their lives, liberty, and property; but I am not willing to banish from the statute book the last punishment for treason; for the moment you admit them to suffrage you must admit them to office, and when you admit them to office Mr. Breckinridge comes in triumph from Kentucky and takes his seat in the Senate, Mr. Toombs comes in triumph from Georgia and takes the seat in the Senate which he dishonored, Jefferson Davis returns from his triumphal tour in Europe and takes his seal, and we shall have those spirits back here who defiled these Halls with treason, who went into rebellion and brought all the blood and sacrifice of the rebellion upon the country. It has occurred to me that the quality of mercy might be strained; that we might be too magnanimous. We have been too magnanimous already. There is now a member of this House who was a brigadier general of the confederate army, who was educated at West Point, and who has come here booted and spurred, from the rebel service to make laws for the widows and orphans he has helped to make. He was not admitted, however, with my consent.

Let us see how much the recent conduct of the rebels entitles them to ‘‘universalamnesty.”’ Look at the violent overthrow of the loyal Legislature of Georgia under the leadership of Robert Toombs. It was but the other day that we performed our last sad duty to a member of this House from Arkansas who was murdered in cold blood by rebels of that State, with twenty other prominent Union men.

I hold in my hand what is called the "final summary" of the report of the committee of the Legislature of Louisiana on the conduct of the late elections in that State. The "summary" shows that the following number of Union men in that State were killed, wounded, and maltreated: eighteen hundred and eightysevtn, of which more than a thousand were killed outright. This is the fruit of the "loyalty" of these former rebels in a single Stale. Clemency to such men is crime; it is unjust to the dead who fell in our cause, and to the living who survive the contest, Searing its marks upon them, and it will be dangerous as a precedent in the future. I hope we shall not insult the loyal sense of this nation by restoring all these murderous villains to political power. I am weary of this sickly sentiment al lsm which strikes hands with traitors and criminals at the expense of justice and the public safety.

I have no fears, Mr. Speaker, of giving suffrage to the black man. The nation in its march of greatness and to the accomplishment of its high destiny will confer it upon him. Let us have no timidity, no faltering. Let us shake not at the counsels of the weak, but go on and do justice, and from that will come safety, security, and peace.

Mr. BOUTWELL. I now yield for five minutes to my colleague.

Mr. BUTLER, of Massachusetts. I suppose, sir, I need not say that I am in favor of the principle of the amendment as reported by the committee of equal rights to all men. I wish, however, to call the attention of the House for a few moments to the two amendments which have been proposed by the gentlemen from Ohio, [Mr. Bixgham and Mr. Shei,- labargee,] and to see whether they do not accomplish more than and different from what it is desired they should do. The proposition of the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Bingham] means apparently to supplement the proposed constitutional amendment of the committee by allowing any who have been heretofore engaged in the rebellion to have the right of suffrage unrestrained by any State law. His colleague [Mr. Sheiaabaiiger] to this adds an amendment which provides that no man who has heretofore engaged in rebellion shall have the right of suffrage. The amendment of the former [Mr. Bixgham] proposes to prevent any State from denying the right of suffrage to any man for past rebellion, while his colleague [Mr. Shellabarger] proposes that the right of suffrage shall be denied to those who have heretofore engaged in the rebellion.

Mr. SHELLABARGER. My proposition is not that that amendment shall deprive any person engaged in the past rebellion from being disfranchised, but in favor of refusing to wrest from a State the power of disfranchisement, thus leaving that matter where it is now, in the hands of the States.

Mr. BUTLER, of Massachusetts.. I so understand it, and I think I have so stated. Notwithstanding that, I propose to call attention to the fact that both these amendments go further than that. Both amendments provide that no State shall make or enforce any law which shall deny or abridge to any male citizen of the United States of the age of twentyone years or over, and who is of sound mind, an equal vote at all elections in the State in which he shall have such actual residence as shall be prescribed by law. Now I wish to call the attention of both of these gentlemen, and the attention of the House, to the fact that these amendments propose to take away—- at least that the effect will be, in my judgment, to take away from the State any power whatever to make any educational or other test. In addition, the proposition, whether intended or not, is to take away the power in a State of making any registration law.

Mr. BINGHAM. No, sir. I hope the gentleman will allow me to explain.

Mr. BUTLER, of Massachusetts. I have only five minutes.

Mr. BINGHAM. The words "the equal exercise of the elective franchise at all elections in the State" is perfectly consistent with the registration law.

Mr. BUTLER, of Massachusetts. That is exactly what I am coming to. You must take it one way or the other. If you provide that you shall not abridge or deny to any male citizen of the United States the equal exercise of the elective franchise, you cannot put on any educational test, for that would be abridging the equal exercise of the elective franchise, and so the State cannot adopt any registration laws, because that would abridge the right of suffrage to whoever was deprived of his vote by non registration

The SPEAKER. The gentleman s five minutes have expired.

Mr. BOUTWELL, I yield three minutes more to my colleague.

Mr. BUTLER, of Massachusetts. That is what I desire to call to the attention of the House. If the meaning of the amendment is to confer the equal exercise of the right of suffrage to all men beyond the power of the States to make equal prohibition upon that right, that is, one applying to all men, then they may not put on a registry qualification applicable to all men, but denying the right to the men registered or any educational tests. If the amendment does mean that there shall be an equal prohibition under any form, then they cannot adopt any registry law. There is the difficulty. Suppose, for instance, a State should say that no man who does not reside in the town six months shall vote, or in the country for one year, or in the ward five months, or anything that would operate to restrain some man from voting, that would be to put on an equal restriction. So when it is provided that no man shall vote who is not registered, is not that prohibiting men from voting who are free and twenty one years of age, and would not a registry law under this amendment be unconstitutional?

Now, Mr. Speaker, I think we had better stand by the proposition of the committee, and apply the amendment precisely where the great trouble and the great disgrace of the country is at present; and that is, that we shall remove the disfranchisement of every man who is deprived of his right because he has not a skin of the color of our own. Let us take away that power of disfranchisement by the States by constitutional amendment; and when every man, white or black, all the country shall have and exercise the full privilege of expressing any sentiment he pleases, and acting as he pleases, when within the bounds of propriety: when we shall have that peace, security, and safety, I shall be ready to relbve everybody from all disabilities because of rebellion, but not until then.