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 32> ) 3 
 
REPRESENTATION IN CONGRESS. 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 y 
 
 1 
 
 OE ILLINOIS, 
 
 J 
 
 *r 
 
 DELIVERED 
 
 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 
 
 JUNE 11, 1868. 
 
 
 ■ 7 -3?Z JS 
 
 
 
 WASHINGTON: 
 F. & J. RIVES & GEO. A. BAILEY, 
 
 REPORTERS AND PRINTKRS OF THE DEBATES OF CONGRESS. 
 
 1868. 
 
<c, 
 
 / 
 
 
REPRESENTATION IN CONGRESS. 
 
 The Senate having under considerationthemotion 
 to reconsider the vote on the passage of the bill (II. It. 
 No. 1058) to admit the States of North Carolina, South 
 Carolina. Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, and Florida, 
 to representation in Congress — 
 
 Mr. FATES said : 
 
 Mr. President : The war through which 
 the country has passed and its incidents have 
 waked up a new spirit of inquiry into the 
 powers of the Constitution, the relative powers 
 of the General Government and of the States, 
 of the President and of Congress. It seems 
 that the doctrine of State rights or State sov- 
 ereignty, which was undoubtedly the father 
 of secession and the cause of the war, and 
 which, upon the construction given to it by 
 the Democratic party, is certainly the gateway 
 to the dissolution of the Union, is now re- 
 vived, and Senators even on this side of the 
 Senate seem to give color to the dangerous 
 pretension that it is settled that the States are 
 sovereign in the power to limit the right of 
 suffrage to as many or as few of the people as 
 in their discretion they may deem proper. 
 
 Mr. President, I declare myself opposed to 
 that sort of logic which opposes every measure 
 of reform upon the ground that " the question 
 is settled." Moreover, I am not in favor 
 of applying the precedents of slavery to the 
 altered state of things brought about in this 
 country by emancipation. In advocating the 
 cause of human rights I do not like to have a 
 merely legal plea interposed, a special demur- 
 rer, a musty precedent brought up to prevent 
 the saving action of Congress for a wholesome 
 and permanent reconstruction of the Union. 
 
 Sir, I do not decry precedents. I belong to 
 the profession of the law, and I am' proud to 
 lieu member of that profession. I know, how- 
 ever, that precedents are as useful sometimes 
 to show the errors of the past, as they are as 
 examples for our imitation. 
 
 Slavery was once the rule and freedom the 
 exception, and whatever else might be dis- 
 turbed, slavery was sacred. All constitutions, 
 laws, and usages were to bow submissively 
 before the Moloch of slavery. Even the good 
 
 Lincoln — who was a radical anti-slavery man, 
 and who said if anything was wrong slavery wag 
 wrong — said it was no part of the war to interfere 
 with slavery, and up to the beginning, and 
 during the war, statesmen denounced it apolo- 
 getically. Even Congress raised a rampart for 
 its protection by an apologetic resolution that 
 it could not be interfered with, and that it was 
 no part or purpose of the war to put it down. 
 Behind the parapets of judicial decisions, and 
 clothed with the imperial panoply of law and 
 precedent, it stood impregnably and defiantly 
 secure. The cry from all the hustings was ; 'the 
 question is settled." 
 
 But, Mr. President, it perished with the 
 rebellion. Brightest among the trophies of the 
 war is slavery destroyed and the supremacy of 
 the slave power annihilated. In America, all, 
 thank God, are free. 
 
 And yet, sir, when the proposition is intro- 
 duced here to append a fundamental condition 
 to the admission of a State, and that funda- 
 mental condition is to be in aid of human rights, 
 we are told that that is an old question, and lias 
 long been settled. 
 
 We now have a new rule. Freedom is now 
 the rule, and slavery the exception. It. is now 
 settled that all constitutions, laws, usages, and 
 precedents, and all constructions against human 
 liberty, are but cobwebs, to be swept away, in 
 the march of events, with the institution of 
 slavery in aid of which they were set up and 
 established. Whatever may be the precedents 
 or the rule of construction heretofore, it is now 
 settled that all future constructions are to be 
 given in favor of liberty and the extension of 
 the rights of all men. 
 
 How long will it take statesmen to learn that 
 nothing is to be considered as settled which is 
 not settled upon the principles of right, truth, 
 justice, and liberty? 
 
 The Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. Biok- 
 ai.ew] says that, as "this question has been 
 settled from the foundation of the Governmenl 
 to the present time, surely no man can be hardy 
 enough to question it." My colleague [Mr. 
 Trumbull] says that all such conditions are 
 inoperative and void. 
 
Mr. President, when the other day I referred 
 to some illustrations showing the applicability 
 of the ordinance of 1787, and of the Missouri 
 compromise of 1820, the Senator from New 
 York [Mr. Conkling] said I was exceedingly 
 unlucky in introducing those precedents. Sir, 
 the bad luck is on his side. The bad luck is 
 on the side of any man who now, in the altered 
 state of things in this day of emancipation, 
 casts his vote against a fundamental condition 
 by which the rights of every American citizen 
 are recognized and secured. Suppose that 
 condition was inoperative, as the Senator from 
 Nevada [Mr. Stewart] very justly asked, 
 '•what harm could there be in it?" Would 
 it weaken the Constitution to require the peo- 
 ple, through their Legislature, to give their 
 assent to such a condition? Such consent 
 would be in the nature of a compact, and the 
 idea of good faith would enter into it, to last 
 during all the generations of the people of the 
 Slate. The word of a great State must be 
 kept. With a bad grace could the State ever 
 attempt to alter this great fundamental corner- 
 stone of the institutions of the State. 
 
 Mr. President, upon the subject-of the power 
 to impose these conditions the argument of the 
 Senator from Vermont [Mr. Edmunds] has not 
 been answered, and cannot be answered. The 
 precedents which he offered are to the point, 
 and they sustain the power of Congress over 
 the subject. 1 shall be able to show, during this 
 argument, that every Senator wdio has voted for 
 imposing this condition upon Nebraska and 
 upon Alabama has positively committed him- 
 self to the power of Congress over the question 
 of suffrage in all the States. Senators may as 
 well consider this. They are committed to the 
 principle ; their mouths are closed ; they can- 
 not explain away this committal; no technical 
 quibbles will avail them. You cannot say by 
 your votes that the State shall never have power 
 to change its constitution in regard to suffrage, 
 and yet say that Congress has not the power 
 over the question of suffrage in the States. 
 Every Senator upon this floor who has com- 
 initted himself by his vote in favor of imposing 
 a condition preventing the States from changing 
 their constitution so as to exclude a large por- 
 tion of the people from suffrage has asserted 
 ili- power of Congress, the unlimited power 
 ol I !ongress, over the subject of suffrage in the 
 Slates. And it will not do at all for Senators, 
 when they, by their votes, have appended to 
 the Nebraska and Colorado bills a fundamental 
 condition prohibiting those States from disfran- 
 chi ing their citizens, to say now that it has been 
 ■ tubal Congress has no power over the ques- 
 Buffrage. 
 
 But, sir, 1 referred to the ordinance of 1767, 
 
 II >l imply because Congress had the power 
 
 to pa i bal ordinance, but to show the salu 
 tarj effects of fundamental conditions, such 
 as the bill before us proposes, on the future 
 << : ' a State. What 1 asserted was, that the 
 of J7N7 did keep slavery out of tin- 
 
 Northwestern Territory. Those five States, 
 which were carved out of the Northwestern 
 Territory, would have been slave States, inevit- 
 ably slave States, but for the effect of the 
 ordinance of 1787. The slave emigration 
 which went to Missouri would, at least one half 
 of it, have gone to Illinois and the other west- 
 ern States ; and instead of this ordinance being 
 inoperative, as contended by the Senator 
 from New York, it was regarded as having 
 almost the sanction of a constitutional provision. 
 All petitions to Congress to suspend the opera- 
 tions of the ordinance, even temporarily, 
 failed. It is a historical fact that slave-owners 
 who emigrated to Illinois in many instances 
 hired out their slaves in Missouri, fearing that 
 if taken to Illinois, they would become free by 
 operation of the ordinance. So troublesome 
 did the slaves hired out in Missouri, by resi- 
 dents of Illinois, become, that the Legislature 
 of Missouri, not being able to reach the owners, 
 passed a law, making the resident agents of the 
 owners responsible for the mischiefs they com- 
 mitted. 
 
 When the people of Illinois came to adopt 
 their constitution, they declared in thepreamble, 
 that it was made consistent with the ordinance 
 of 1787, and provided in the constitution 
 against the future existence of slavery in the 
 State. All efforts to amend the constitution 
 so as to admit slavery, failed. All that has 
 been said to the contrary notwithstanding, I 
 say, that the people held in high estimation 
 this condition prohibiting slavery. As they 
 regarded the title to their homesteads ; as they 
 regarded the Declaration of Independence ; as 
 they regarded their right to worship God ; 
 so they regarded that ordinance, which made 
 their prairies the home of freemen, aud which 
 dedicated the Northwestern Territory to free- 
 dom and free institutions. 
 
 And sir, what has been the effect? Under 
 that ordinance those live Territories became 
 free States, and the power of this continent is 
 there ; they are running their race to glory, and 
 inspired by the energizing power of free labor 
 and free institutions they have taken their posi- 
 tion, and already of themselves, constitute an 
 empire. 
 
 When I referred to the Missouri compro- 
 mise, I did it to show that that compromise had 
 the effect to keep slavery out of the territory 
 north of the parallel of J5G° 30' north latitude. 
 Will any Senator deny that, in the absence of 
 that ordinance, slavery would have entered 
 into those Territories, under the State-rights 
 doctrine that slave property could go, under 
 the Constitution and the laws, into any State or 
 Territory of the linked States? That compro- 
 mise you may now call a foolish thing; but 
 the Senator from Maryland [Mr. JOHNSON] 
 will remember that Mr. Clay said of it, the 
 bells rang, the cannons were; fired, and every 
 demonstration of joy was made throughout the 
 Republic, on account of the passage of the 
 Missouri compromise. You remember Mr. 
 
Douglas said, though afterward he attempted 
 to break it down : " That it whs a compromise 
 akin to the Constitution ; that it had its origin in 
 the hearts of patriotic men of all sections of the 
 country, and was canonized in the hearts of 
 the American people as a sacred thing, which 
 no ruthless hand would ever dare to disturb." 
 This was the effect of that compromise. Sla- 
 very could not enter that Territory. This com- 
 promise stood as a wall against slave immigra- 
 tion, and protected those Territories from the 
 blighting curse of human bondage. 
 
 It is said by the gentlemen who contend that 
 these fundamental conditions are null and void, 
 that the condition which was imposed on Mis- 
 souri in 1821 was all right enough. It seems 
 that in the adoption of her constitution, one 
 clause excluded the immigration of free ne- 
 groes into the State. Congress put a condition 
 in the act of admission which provided, that 
 nothing in that clause should be so construed 
 as to interfere with, or deprive citizens of the 
 United States of their rights. This it is admit- 
 ted was a good condition, and why? Because 
 it prevented the State of Missouri ever after- 
 ward from violating the Constitution of the 
 United States, by the exclusion of citizens of 
 the United States from entering that State. 
 Now, sir, our argument is this: that this con- 
 dition, which we offer to impose upon the 
 States which are to be restored to their full 
 relations in this Union, is to prevent the State 
 from violating the Constitution of the United 
 States, in that most important and vital of all 
 points, the depriving a whole race of their 
 right of suffrage, and other rights under the 
 Constitution, 
 
 The doctrine for which I contend is, that 
 Congress has the right and the power to 
 enforce bylaws " necessary and proper," in 
 the language of the Constitution., a republican 
 government in every State of the United States, 
 whether that State is to be received into the 
 Union, or is already in the Union. The power 
 to establish republican governments devolves 
 upon Congress in the last resort. In the first 
 instance, it may be committed to the States; 
 but Congress has the revisory power. Con- 
 gress, under the Constitution, is required to 
 guaranty to every State in the Union a repub- 
 lican form of government. Then the conclud- 
 ing clause of the eighth section of the first 
 article of the Constitution declares, that Con- 
 gress shah have authority to carry into effect 
 all the enumerated powers of the Constitution, 
 by passing laws necessary and proper for that 
 purpose, and also shall have power to pass 
 all laws necessary and proper to carry into 
 effect any power vested in the Government of 
 the United States, or in any department or 
 officer thereof. The power is vested in, and 
 the duty imposed upon, Congress of guaranty- 
 ing to eaeli State, a republican form of govern- 
 ruenl , and ( Jongress is authorized, and, in fact, 
 required, by necessary and proper laws, to 
 carry into execution that guarantee. 
 
 This doctrine is not at all startling when 
 Senators look at the ground whereon tiny 
 stand, and see how they have already commit- 
 ted themselves, and consider what immeas- 
 urable benefits will flow to the people of this 
 country, by settling the question of slavery and 
 all its incidents by taking the question of suf- 
 frage out of the arena of American politics, 
 by settling it upon principles just and fair to 
 every section of the Union, by placing each 
 State upon an equal footing with every other 
 State, and each citizen of the United States 
 upon an equal footing with every other citizen 
 of the United States. Sir, when this doctrine 
 can be sustained upon such clear demonstra- 
 tion, it ought not to startle Senators. 
 
 Mr. President, it has been said sarcastically, 
 that upon this question, the Senator from 
 Massachusetts [Mr. Sumner] is radical. It is 
 said to me, that I follow in the wake of the 
 Senator from Massachusetts.- Sir, I do not 
 follow in any man's wake ; but I do not object 
 to this accusation. I do not deem it a reproach 
 to be a disciple of that distinguished Senator, 
 the worthy representative of that grand old 
 Commonwealth " where American liberty 
 raised its first voice." 
 
 For a quarter of a century that Senator [Mr. 
 Sumner] has been the fearless champion of 
 human rights, lie has occupied the advanced 
 guard, the outpost in the army of progress. 
 Triumphant over calumny and unawed by 
 personal violence, with a keen, prophetic eye 
 upon the great result to be attained, with 
 the scimeter of truth and justice in his hand, 
 and the banner of the Union over his head, 
 he has pressed onward to the goal id' final 
 victory. Although yet in the vigor of his 
 manhood, he has lived to seethe small band of 
 pioneers who stood by him swollen to mighty 
 millions. His views have already been embraced 
 and lauded as the wisest statesmanship. They 
 have been written upon the very frontispiece 
 of the age in which he lives; written in the 
 history of the mighty events which are trans- 
 piring around us ; written in the constitutions 
 and the laws, both national and State, of bis 
 country. Where he stood yesterday other 
 statesmen stand to-day. Where he stands in 
 1808 other statesmen will stand in 1872. Say 
 what we may, there are none in this country who 
 can contest the right of his tall plume to wave 
 at the head of freedom's all-conquering hosts. 
 
 Mr. President, I wish it understood that 1 do 
 not antagonize the Chicago platform. The 
 ground that I take is in entire accord and har- 
 mony with it. That platform says what I do, 
 that the question of suffrage belongs to the 
 States — so 1 say, that the question of suffrage 
 belongs in the first instance, to the States, but 
 if the States shall in prescribing tin' qualifica- 
 tions of voters SO prescribe them as to disfran- 
 chise it portion of citizens arbitrarily, and thus 
 render the government anti-republican, then 
 Congress is required to intervene and make it a 
 republican form of government, 
 

 
 I confess that recent events, and especially 
 the course of President Johnson, have satisfied 
 me that too much reliance is not to be placed 
 upon mere paper edicts which we style plat- 
 forms. Measures, not men, was once the doc- 
 trine, but my doctrine now is: both men and 
 measures. A good platform in the hands of 
 bad men is of not much avail. With men of 
 the unquestioned integrity, wise statesmanship, 
 and lofty patriotism of Grant and Colfax, we 
 can trust the helm of the ship of State, and feel 
 secure that no narrow creeds, but the good of 
 the people and the prosperity of the Uepublic, 
 will be the pillars of fire to lead and guide them 
 in the administration of the Government. 
 
 I consider myself fortunate in being able to 
 sustain the view of the case 1 have taken, by 
 the strong authority of Mr. Madison, as set forth 
 in the Debates of the Virginia Convention, page 
 261: 
 
 " With respect to the other point it was thought 
 that the regulation of time, place, and maimer of 
 electing the Representatives should be uuiform 
 throughout thecontinent. Some States might regu- 
 late the elections on the principles of equality, and 
 Others might regulate them ol herwise. The diversity 
 would be obviously unjust. Elections are regulated 
 unequally now in some of the States, partieulai ly in 
 S luth Carolina,, with respect to Charleston which is 
 represented by thirty members. Should the people 
 of any State by any means be deprived of the right 
 of suffrage it was proper that it should be remedied 
 by the General Government. It was lound impossi- 
 ble to lix the tiiue, place, and manner of the election 
 i.: Representatives!!! theCoustitution. It was lound 
 neeessary to leave the regulation of these in the first 
 place to the State governments, as being best ac- 
 quainted with the situation of the people, subject to 
 llie control of the General Government, in order to 
 enable it to produce uniformity and prevent its own 
 dissolution. And considering the State government 
 and General Government as different bodies, acting 
 in different and independent Capacities, it was 
 thought the particular regulations should be sub- 
 mitted to the former and the general regulations to 
 the latter. Were they exclusively under the control 
 of the State governments, the General Government 
 might easily be dissolved. But if they be regulated 
 properly by the State Legislatures, the congressional 
 control will very probably never bo exercised." 
 
 I add to this the declarations of Alexander 
 Hamilton, set forth in the following extract 
 from the Federalist, paper No. G'J : 
 
 " It will, I presume, be as readily conceded, that 
 there were only three ways in which this power 
 could have been reasonably organized ; that it must 
 cither have been lodged wholly in the national Legis- 
 lature, or wholly in the Si ate Legislatures, or primar- 
 ily in the hitter, and ultimately in the former. The 
 last mode has with reason been preferred bythocon- 
 vention. They have submitted the regulation of 
 elections lor the Federal Governmehl in the first 
 instance, to the local adminiatral ions ; which in ordi- 
 nary eases, and where no improper views prevail, 
 maybe both more convenient and more satisfactory ; 
 but they have reserved to the national authority a 
 right to interfere, whenever extraordinary circum- 
 stances might render that interposition necessary to 
 ii .tely. 
 
 " Kotning inn be mon evident than that an exclu- 
 
 power nt regulating elections for tin- national 
 
 Government, in tin. hands of tin- State Legislatures, 
 
 ii- mi, I leave tin existena of tin- I nion entxre/y at 
 
 their mercy. They could at any moment annihilate 
 
 ii I . n> iicting to provide for the choi if persons 
 
 to administer its affairs. It is to little purpose to 
 
 say, I ha! am ion of this find would 
 
 constitution ' 
 thin:-', withoul : ii oq.ui\ alent for 
 
 the risk, nan unanswerable objection. Norhas any 
 satisfactory reason been yet assigned for incurring 
 that risk. The extravagant surmises of a distem- 
 pered jealousy can never be dignified with that 
 character. If we are in humor to presume abuses 
 of power, it is as fair to presume them on the part 
 of the State governments as on the part of the Gen- 
 eral Govern: lent. And as it is more consonant to 
 the rules of a just theory to intrust the Union with 
 the care of its own existence, than to transfer that 
 care to tiny other hands; if abuses of power are to be 
 hazarded on the one side or on the other, it is more 
 rational to hazard them where the power would 
 naturally be placed, than where it would unnatur- 
 ally be placed." 
 
 I shall embody in my speech, the positions 
 assumed by Senators on this floor. For instance, 
 I refer to the position which was taken by the 
 Senator from Indiana. [Mr. Morton,] who said 
 a day or two since : 
 
 " I contend that every State has the right to regu- 
 late the question of suffrage and to amend her con- 
 stitution in any particular from time to time, so that 
 it does not cease to be republican in its character. 
 
 " Mr. Edmunds. Who is to judge of that? 
 
 "Mr. Morton. I suppose that is a question to be 
 judged of by Congress." 
 
 Suppose the State fails to establish a govern- 
 ment republican in its character, what then? 
 Who is to judge whether it is republican or anti- 
 republican '! '" 1 suppose," said he, "that is a 
 question to be judged of by Congress." My 
 colleague, [Mr. Trumbull.] while lie asserts 
 the exclusive power in the States over the suf- 
 frage question, still admits enough for the pur- 
 poses of this argument: 
 
 "'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.' When 
 the times comes that any of the States of this Union 
 so change their constitutions as to set up something 
 different from a republican government, the Govern- 
 ment of the United States may interfere." 
 
 He and I may differ as to what may be a 
 republican form of government, but that lie 
 commits himself to the power of Congress to 
 intervene, in case the State government is not 
 republican, is, I think, to be inferred from his 
 speech. 
 
 He says further: 
 
 "I am not prepared to say what steps should be 
 taken in case the State- of Nebraska should hereafter 
 change its constitution, and in that change adopt a 
 different rule in regard to suffrage from thai which 
 was recognizee! at the time the State was admitted. 
 Perhaps we could find some way to compel the Stain 
 of Nebraska to allow the same persons to vote that it 
 agreed it would allow to vote when it was admitted 
 into the Union : but we should have to find that way 
 out then; we cannot provide for it now." 
 
 He acknowledges that perhaps there is power 
 somewhere, in eases of failure on the part of 
 the State to comply with the condition, and I 
 assert, you cannot trace it to any source except 
 Congress. The remarks of other Senators go 
 to show that they admit that this revisory 
 
 power is in Congress. I read from the same 
 debate, the views taken by the Senator from 
 Nevada I Mr. STEWART] and the Senator from 
 New York, [Mr. CoNKXING:] 
 
 ".Mr. STKWABT. We do not pretend to determino 
 at what point Congress should interfere under the 
 
 authority oi the guurantee olause, Thai will be for 
 a I ut ure Congress when the question comes up. That 
 there arc times when ii Bhould interfere the Senator 
 ti on \ .. Yoik now admits. 
 
"Mr. Conkling. Certainly. 
 
 "Mr. Stewart. Every man who reads the Con- 
 stitution must admit that there may he times when 
 the Congress should interfere upon tho question of 
 suffrage." 
 
 Now, sir, here these Senators, who have 
 asserted that the exclusive power over suffrage 
 is iti the States, admit away their whole case. 
 They admit fully the power of Congress to 
 revise the action of the States upon the suf- 
 frage question. The right to exercise the power 
 is clearly admitted. W.hether it shall exercise 
 the power to pass all laws which are necessary 
 and proper to carry into execution this clause 
 of guaranty, depends upon whether the State 
 government is a republican form of govern- 
 ment. That is the question. 
 
 On the 22d day of January, 18GG, I intro- 
 duced a bill into the Senate of the United 
 States, and defended it in a speech of consid- 
 erable length, in which I took the position that 
 Congress had this revisory power, and that 
 wherever a State had an anti-republican gov- 
 ernment, it was the duty of Congress to inter- 
 fere and make it a republican form of govern- 
 ment ; and 1 am glad to be supported in that 
 view now, by such distinguished authorities as 
 the. Senators whose remarks 1 have quoted. If 
 that bill had then become a law, by this time, 
 no vesiige of this question would be left to dis- 
 turb the harmony- of the nation. 
 
 I quote from the speech of the Senator from 
 Massachusetts [Mr. Sumner] March 7, 18G6, 
 which will show that I was in advance even of 
 him for congressional legislation for suffrage 
 in the South as well as the North : ■ 
 
 "Something has been said of the form in which 
 the proposition has been presented. There is the bill 
 of t ii o Senator from Illinois, [Mr. Yates,] which he 
 has maintained in a speech of singular originality and 
 power, that has not been answered, and I do not 
 hesitate to say cannot be answered. By this bill it is 
 provided that all citizens in any State or Territory 
 shull be protected in the full and equal enjoyment 
 and exercise of their civil and political rights, in- 
 cluding the right of suffrage." 
 
 ******* * * * 
 
 " Not doubting the power of Congress to carry out 
 this principle everywhere within the jurisdiction of 
 the United States, I content myself for the present 
 by asserting it only in the lapsed States lately in 
 rebellion, where the twofold duty to guaranty a 
 republican government and to enforce the abolition 
 of slavery is beyond question. To that extent I now 
 urge it." 
 
 Now, I come to consider the clauses of the 
 Constitution affecting the question of the power 
 of Congress, or the States, over the question of 
 suffrage. My friend from Kentucky [Mr. 
 Davis] thinks that the whole gospei of the 
 Constitution is contained in chapter ten of the 
 amendments, which provides that — 
 
 " The powers not delegated to the United States by 
 the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, 
 lire reserved to the States respectively or to the 
 I oplo." 
 
 Unfortunately for his position, this power to 
 guaranty republican governments ?'.s- "dele- 
 gated to the United States," and the Constitu- 
 tion says, that wherever a power is vested by 
 the Constitution, in the Government of the Uni- 
 
 ted States, Congress shall execute that power. 
 I quote the clause : 
 
 " Art. 1. Certain powers having been enumerated, 
 these words follow in section eight: 'To make all 
 laws which shall be necessary and proper for carry- 
 ing into execution the foregoing powers, and all 
 other powers vested by this Constitution in the Gov- 
 ernment of the United States, or in any department 
 or officer thereof.'" 
 
 Thus it is seen, that it is for Congress to carry 
 into effect the various powers vested in the 
 Government of the United States. How is 
 Congress to do this? By all laws necessary 
 and proper to that end. 
 
 The thing is very plain. We see that the 
 same clause which authorizes Congress to pass 
 all laws necessary and proper to carry the enu- 
 merated powers into effect, says, that Congress 
 shall have power to pass all necessary and 
 proper laws to carry into effect "ail other 
 powers" vested by the Constitution in the Gov- 
 ernment of the United States. 
 
 I say, then, that it is the duty of Congress, to 
 do what I propose: by a necessary and proper 
 law, to guaranty to every State in the Union, a 
 republican form of government. Article four, 
 section four, of the Constitution is as follows : 
 
 "The United States shall guaranty to every State 
 in the Union a republican form of government, and 
 shall protect each of them against invasion: and on 
 application of the Legislature or of tho Executive 
 (when the Legislature cannot bo convened) against 
 domestic violence." 
 
 A guarantor is one who undertakes to do a 
 thing, which another has undertaken to do, pro- 
 vided that other fails. Now, suppose South 
 Carolina, or any other State, should in its con- 
 stitution insert the word "black" before the 
 word "inhabitants," so as to provide that "all 
 black inhabitants shall be electors," would 
 Congress intervene? Would Congress, having 
 the power to guaranty republican forms of gov- 
 ernment, sit still, and see white citizens ex- 
 cluded from the suffrage by the constitution of 
 South Carolina? Does any Senator dare to 
 answer categorically " Yes" to that propo- 
 sition? I should like to see the Senator who 
 is bold enough to answer it in that way. Ken- 
 tucky says that her electors shall be all white 
 inhabitants, and she excludes every other than 
 the white race. Maryland does the same thing, 
 and Illinois does the same thing. Will you 
 intervene, willyou exercise the power conferred 
 on you by the Constitution, or will you bow 
 ignobly to the prejudice of caste and race ? 
 Will you decline to intervene where black peo- 
 ple are excluded, and intervene where white 
 people are excluded ? 
 
 Mr. President, if we had expended the time 
 to find out power in the Constitution, for Con- 
 gress to confer upon men their rights, and to 
 establish and preserve a republican form of 
 government, if we had examined the Constitu- 
 tion closely and critically with a view to find 
 out this power, instead of trying to find that 
 Congress has not the power to guaranty a 
 republican form of government, by securing 
 to all men their rights, we should have ; 
 
8 
 
 more successful. For instance, take section 
 two of article one. This is the groundwork of 
 the claim of exclusive State jurisdiction over 
 the question of suffrage. It is as follows : 
 
 "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." 
 
 If the States have exclusive power over this 
 question they get it from that section of the 
 Constitution. How do they get it from this 
 section? According to the construction of the 
 Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Doouttle] they 
 get it by implication, in this way : it provides 
 that, the Legislatures shall be chosen by the 
 people of the State, and these same people 
 who choose members of the Legislature, are 
 made the electors of Representatives in Con- 
 gress. Is there any more implication in favor 
 of the exercise of the power in this clause by 
 the Legislatures of the States, than there is 
 implication in favor of the exercise of the 
 power by Congress itself? It may be said to 
 me, " Surely you would not contend that Con- 
 gress should declare who shall elect members 
 of the State Legislature." I would not; I 
 would not think that very appropriate ; I would 
 not think it was doing the thing in the right 
 way exactly. But is it more appropriate, that 
 the Legislature shall decide who are to vote 
 for members of the Legislature, than that Con- 
 gress should say who are to vote for members 
 of Congress? With much propriety can I 
 say, that Congress shall define the rights and 
 qualifications of the citizens of the United 
 States, for the sake of uniformity in c'tizenship, 
 and as a matter of self-national preservation, 
 and not leave the question, who shall be citi- 
 zens of the United States to thirty six different 
 States, and have as many different standards 
 of citizenship as there are States in the Union. 
 •But, sir, 1 waive this view of the case, because 
 t lie uniform construction has been that the 
 question belonged to the States in the first 
 instance, and I do not propose now, to question 
 that construction. 
 
 lint this section of the Constitution says that, 
 tin- House of Representatives shall be composed 
 of members " chosen every second year." By 
 whom ? " By the people." Suppose that any 
 State constitution says that a part of the people 
 shall not be embraced in choosing llepresenta- 
 ; BUpp08e it excludes any particular class : 
 is not that State in conflict with this provision 
 I institution, because all the people are 
 not represented, ami are not consulted in choos- 
 beir Representatives? There can be no 
 mistake upon this point. Members of the Legis- 
 lature, and members of Congress are to be 
 chosen ''by the people." The "people" in 
 
 eaell case ;ile to lie the eleelnrs j and those 
 
 who vote for members of Congress, are to have 
 
 tii- Bame qualifications as the electors of the 
 
 I Dumerous branch of the State Legisla- 
 
 Most clearly, if the Constitution of a State, 
 or the laws of a Legislature, so fix the qualifi- 
 cations of voters as to exclude any portion of 
 the people on the ground of race or color, it is 
 in conflict with this clause of the Constitution, 
 which provides that the people, not a part of 
 the people, not half of the people, not white 
 people, or black people, but all the people, 
 shall be represented in the choice of their 
 representatives, State and national. 
 
 I think I have shown, that all Senators on 
 this side of the Chamber admit that Congress 
 has a right to pass all laws necessary and proper 
 to guaranty to a State a republican form of 
 government, provided the States adopt consti- 
 tutions which are not republican forms of gov- 
 ernment. 
 
 Then, sir, the issue is clearly narrowed down 
 to the question, What is a republican govern- 
 ment? Whenever it can be shown that States 
 have violated this great fundamental idea, it is 
 clearly the duty of Congress to intervene. 
 
 My colleague [Mr. Trumbull] says, in a let- 
 ter, published in The Advance, a newspaper iu 
 Chicago, that " a republican form of govern- 
 ment does not depend upon the numbers of the 
 people who participate in theprimary elections 
 for members of Congress." It is true,- that it 
 does not exclusively depend on the numbers of 
 people who vote. Minors may be excluded ; 
 other persons may be excluded on account of 
 certain disabilities. But while a republican gov- 
 ernment does not depend on the numbers who 
 constitute the body politic, it does 'depend 
 largely on the question, whether any large por- 
 tion of the people are excluded from the ben- 
 efit of suffrage, on the ground of race, color, 
 or previous condition. Let me put a case to 
 test the question. Suppose that in carrying 
 out the provision of the second section of i lie 
 first article of the Constitution, the constitu- 
 tion of some Stale should say, that Germans 
 should not participate in the choice of mem- 
 bers of the Legislature and Representatives in 
 Congress ; would that be a republican form 
 of government? Suppose that Illinois, where 
 we have a large mass of Germans, a most in- 
 telligent, industrious, and thrifty population, 
 who constitute a large portion of the Republi- 
 can strength in that State, and who are almost, 
 universally the friends of freedom, loyal to the 
 Government, and gallant defenders of the flag : 
 suppose that the constitution of the State of 
 Illinois should be altered so as to say, that the 
 people who are to choose members of Con- 
 gress and members of the State Legislature 
 should not include any person of German 
 birth, would it not be an ti- republican in form '.' 
 
 Does any man dare to say that it would not 
 be the duty of Congress to intervene to re- 
 store to those Germans their rights, to declare 
 the constitution of the State, so far as it 
 excluded this large class of our fellow citizens, 
 to be not republican in its features ? Sup 
 that the people of Utah should exclude from 
 the pol rybody but Mormons, folio'. 
 
9 
 
 of their faith ; suppose that Connecticut should 
 exclude everybody except Congregationalists ; 
 or Maryland everybody except Catholics, would 
 it not be our duty to intervene, and make those 
 governments republican in form ? And yet, 
 when it is proposed to enfranchise the negro, 
 we bow to the prejudice of caste, and say that 
 a State government is republican in form, 
 whether it excludes the colored man or not. 
 
 If I am asked whether there must not be 
 some limitations, I reply, yes ; but not total 
 exclusion ; there may be temporary disabili- 
 ties, of age, residence, and other disabilities; 
 but the difference between making temporary 
 provisions as to a class, and the total exclusion 
 of a whole race of our fellow- citizens, is very 
 apparent. 
 
 Mr. CONKLING. By permission of the 
 Senator 1 beg to ask him a question. He says 
 that fixing qualifications as to residence and 
 age is within the power of the States, as I 
 understand him. 1 beg to inquire whether, if 
 the State of Illinois should say that voting 
 should be confined to persons upward of forty- 
 five years of age, and who had resided in the 
 State of Illinois at least twenty-five years, such 
 a provision as that would be republican, in his 
 judgment ? 
 
 Mr. YATES. Exclusions from suffrage for 
 a time, and which apply to all men alike, are 
 allowable. If all men are excluded, men of all 
 races, until they are of suitable age, from 
 voting, I do not see anything which would con- 
 flict with its being a republican form of govern- 
 ment. Equality is the basis of a republican 
 government. The Senator seems to forget the 
 idea which enters into the definition of a 
 truly republican government. He was very 
 sound yesterday, or some other Senator was 
 very sound in my view, when he said, it did not 
 depend on Congress to say what sort of stat- 
 utes of limitation a State should have as to the 
 payment of debts, applicable to all citizens 
 alike, but Congress shall guaranty to every State 
 a republican form of government ; and the test 
 whether a government is republican, depends 
 upon whether it grants to all citizens alike the 
 same privileges, and imposes upon all citizens 
 the same disabilities and duties. To define the 
 length of residence necessary to enable a man 
 to vote, to say what his age shall be, is one 
 thing; ami to say that he shall not vote at all 
 because he is black or white, is an entirely dif- 
 ferent thing. In the latter case, color is made 
 the disqualification, just as race would be if 
 Germans were excluded from the ballot-box. 
 The Siate may preserve a right; it may fix the 
 qualifications; it may impose certain restric- 
 tions so as to have that right preserved in the 
 best form to the people; but it is not legiti- 
 mately in the power of the State, it is not in 
 tin' power of the Congress of the United 
 States, it is not in any earthly power to de- 
 stroy a man's equal rights to his property, to 
 his franchise, to his suffrage, or to the right to 
 aspire to office — 1 mean according to the true 
 
 theory of a republican government. That is 
 the one thing, that in this country, the Govern- 
 ment cannot do. 
 
 The Senator from New York [Mr. Conkmxg] 
 will remember, that if a State constitution 
 should do so unwise a thing as to debar from 
 the polls all men till forty-five years of age, 
 there is a question behind that. Who made 
 the constitution? Were all men, of all races 
 and colors permitted to vote on the question 
 whether that limitation should be put on all 
 alike? If he means that in the State of New 
 York, where only a portion of the people can 
 vote, that that portion of the people have a 
 right to impose such a limitation on others 
 who have no voice in making the limitation, 
 then most clearly such a provision would be 
 anti-republican. My answer to him is, that 
 such a provision as he mentions, would estab- 
 lish an oligarchy, and therefore be unconstitu- 
 tional, while a reasonable limitation as to age 
 is not only proper, but absolutely necessary, 
 and if made applicable to all men alike would 
 be constitutional. 
 
 The Senator from New York will ask me, per- 
 haps — I address myself to him simply because 
 he sits before me — " Do you not consider Illi- 
 nois a republican government? Do no' you 
 consider New York a republican government?" 
 I answer that question by asking another: 
 Does New York exclude from suffrage, among 
 the people who are to choose members of the 
 Legislature, any large class of its citizens ? and 
 then I leave him to answer whether a govern- 
 ment that does that is republican. 
 
 Mr. President, I say to Senators that we 
 must look at things as they are. The disabili- 
 ties which heretofore existed against the black 
 man have been removed. Even admitting the 
 soundness of the hard ruling of the Dred Scott 
 decision, what was it? That the black man 
 was not a citizen because he belonged to a 
 subject race, because a slave has no will, and 
 therefore cannot vote, and hence is excluded 
 from the body-politic. But now, that disabil- 
 ity is removed ; slavery is dead and will have 
 no resurrection ; the genius of civilization 
 touched it, and it fell ; the light of the nine- 
 teenth century blazed upon it, and it. faded 
 away. By the thirteenth amendment of the 
 Constitution, slavery was abolished throughout 
 the laud, and Congress was required " by appro- 
 priate legislation" to enforce emancipation. 
 By this emancipation, the disabilities which 
 attached to the colored race are removed, and 
 the colored man stands before the countrv 
 the world a freeman and a citizen; emanci- 
 pated into the sovereignty, one of the people, 
 one of the body-politic, and is entitled to the 
 same rights and privileges that any other citi- 
 zen, of whatever color, may enjoy. 
 
 1 admit, sir, in the language of the CI 
 platform, if you choose, that in the first in- 
 stance, the right of suffrage nelongs properly 
 to the States to regulate for themselves; but 
 it is subject to the Constitution of the United 
 
10 
 
 States, to the Constitution as it is amended; 
 and especially to that particular clause in the 
 Constitution which says, that Congress shall 
 guaranty to every State in this Union, a repub- 
 lican form of government. 
 
 Now, let me repea* the question : What is a 
 republican form of government? Mr. Madi- 
 son, in the forty-second number of the Fed- 
 eralist, says: " The definition of the right of 
 suffrage is very justly regarded as a funda- 
 mental article of republican government," and 
 he speaks at length on that subject. I only 
 read enough to show that the question, who 
 shall vole, is of the essence of a republican 
 government, and enters into the definition of 
 what is to be considered a republican form of 
 government. 
 
 Mr. Madison further says in the Federalist, 
 No. 57: 
 
 " Let me now esk, what circumstance there is in 
 the constitution ot the House ot Representatives 
 that violates the principles of republican govern- 
 ment, or favors ihe elevation of the low on the ruins 
 ot the many? Let. me ask, whether every circum- 
 stance is not. on the contrary, strictly conformable 
 to these principles; and scrupulously impartial to 
 the rights and pretentions of every class and descrip- 
 tion ol citizens? Who are to be the electors of ttie 
 Dedcral Representatives? Not the rich, more than 
 the poor; not the learned, more thaa the ignorant; 
 not the haughty heirs of distinguished names, more 
 than the humkMesons ot obscurity .aid unpropitious 
 lortuue. ihe electors are to be the great body of 
 the people ot the LTiiited States. They are to be the 
 same who exercise the right in every State of elect- 
 ing the correspondent branch of the Legislature of 
 the State. 
 
 Now, what I say emphatically, and what the 
 people of this country will indorse, is, thai in 
 the light of the Declaration of American Inde- 
 pendence, in the light of the Constitution of 
 the United Stales as amended, any State gov- 
 uent which excludes one large class of citi- 
 zens from suffrage is not a republican govern- 
 ment. It must em -race the representation of 
 the great body of the people without distinc- 
 tion of race or color. 1 maintain that propo- 
 sition, and 1 Bay that no Senator can maintain 
 the reverse. 1 say emphatically, that the 
 equal right of every man to vote and to aspire 
 t" office is essential to republican government, 
 and if he is deprived of that right, the govern- 
 ment which deprives him ofitisnot republican. 
 
 Sir. in its spirit and in its letter, and in sub- 
 stance, the adverse plea is bad. The very 
 essence, marrow, and life of a republican gov- 
 ernmeift, the very basis of republican govern- 
 ment, is equality of all its citizens. Theques- 
 tion whether any class of ciii/.ens can be ex- 
 cluded from the right of suffrage, is a vital and 
 a fundamental question. It is the only ques- 
 tion to be decided in this argument. ltissub- 
 
 terranean.it runs under ihe very foundation 
 corners of republican government, and if you 
 acknowledge the right to thus exclude any class 
 of citizens, you loosen ihe earth around and 
 beneath the corner-stones and ihe structure 
 will lall. Whenever a Government attempts to 
 
 ide any large class of itscitizens from the 
 rights which it gives toother citizens, it ceases 
 
 to be republican. Such exclusion stamps it 
 with the brand of an oligarchy as indelibly as 
 did the spot of blood on the" hand of Lady 
 Macbeth stamp her as a murderess. 
 
 And the argument that Illinois or New 
 lork or Ohio is a republican form of govern- 
 ment, if it excludes any large class of citizens 
 on account of race, color, or previous condi- 
 tion, if we are to judge it according to the 
 foundation theories of our governmental sys- 
 tem, is not worthy of a child ten years old. 
 
 Ihe Republican massesof the country under- 
 stand it, and last year the Republicans of Ohio 
 tried to make their government republican, to 
 make it conform to the Constitution of the 
 United Stales, by conferring the elective fran- 
 chise upon all her people without regard to 
 race, color, or previous condition. 
 
 i am not asking what is an approximation 
 to a republican form of government ; 1 am not 
 inquiring whether Illinois is not more repub- 
 lican than some Government in Europe or 
 than some other Slate. 1 am not trying to 
 decide that question ; but 1 am trying to decide 
 the only issue that is before the American peo- 
 ple, and that is presented by the Constitution 
 of the United btates, namely, whether any 
 Government which excludes a citizen from his 
 rights, except, for mere temporary disability, 
 such as age, or residence, or crime, is a repub- 
 lican form of government. Why, sir, a mams 
 right to vote is_ as sacred as any other right 
 that he has. To rob a man of that right is as 
 wicked as the law of slavery, which robs him 
 of his wife, or child, or of himse.f. 
 
 What is the theory upon which the Govern- 
 ment of the United States was built? What 
 was the cause of the Revolution? For what 
 did our fathers fight, but the principle that 
 taxation and representation must go together, 
 and that all just government must be founded 
 upon the consent of the governed, not a part 
 of the governed, not half of the governed, 
 not an oligarchy, but upon Lie consent of all 
 the people? A majority of all the people of 
 the United States are to decide those ques- 
 tions by which the rights of all are protected, 
 the will of all is represented, and the Gov- 
 ernment itself is maintained and preserved. 
 Go back to revolutionary days ; go back to 
 the door-steps of those little meetings of our 
 fathers, as they stood up with wounds yet bleed- 
 ing, fresh from the Revolution, and with the 
 blood and sweat of battle running down their 
 furrowed cheeks ; listen to their discussions, 
 and what do you hear? Their only remon- 
 strance against the mother country was her 
 asserted right to tax ihe Colonies without their 
 consent. This was the initial cause of the 
 Revolution, it was for this that the blood of 
 our fathers consecrated ihe battle-fields of the 
 Revolution ; it was for this thai John Han- 
 cock and .lames Otis spoke ; it was for this 
 that Wan-en fell— a denial of the right, of Gov- 
 ernment to tax ihe people without their con- 
 sent. 
 
11 
 
 This power in Congress to guaranty a 
 republican form of government to the States 
 is a mighty and a vital power. It is the wisest 
 power in the Constitution. It is the only 
 power by which the national Government can 
 preserve its nationality, by which it can se- 
 cure equal representation, by which it can 
 put the States upon an equality. It is the doc- 
 trine that was designed to protect the States in 
 their rights in the true sense of " Mate rights, 
 so that all the States should be upon an equal 
 footing, and the citizens of each State should 
 enioy all their rights in every State ot the 
 Union. As the Senator from Massachusetts 
 well said in one of his speeches, " this guar- 
 antee clause has been a sleeping giant but 
 recently awakened during the war, and now 
 comes forth with a giant's pmver. 
 
 Sir what is the dut.v of the Republican party i 
 What position should the Republican party 
 take? Will they stand back appal ed by the 
 statement that the question is settled? Will 
 they join the State-rights party upon the other 
 side of the House, and in the South, and say 
 that Congress has not the means tor its own 
 preservation in its hands, and assert the doc- 
 trine of State rights, by which the leaders ot 
 the rebellion are to control *ue legislation and 
 the destinies of this country? 
 
 Mr President, I wish to say to Senators and 
 Representatives, and to all of the Republican 
 party, that we have to meet this question ot 
 suffrage. It matt be met. It confronts us in 
 the next elections. It confronts us in the new 
 relations of rive million people set free. It 
 confronts us in the imperious demand made by 
 the emancipated race for enfranchisement. We 
 cannot ignore the question. Burying your head 
 in the sand wiil not obscure you from the keen 
 gaze of the pursuer. Your opponents will meet 
 you upon every stump, and ask .you whether you 
 are for universal manhood suffrage. It cannot 
 be dodged. No question of finance, or banks, 
 or currency, or tariffs, can obscure this mighty 
 moral question of the age. No glare of mili- 
 tary glory,' not even the mighty name ot Gen- 
 eral Grant, can stifle the determination ot the 
 people to finally consummate the great end 
 and aim for which the Republican party was 
 brought into being. We are to be for or against 
 suffrage. If we are for it, how many States 
 shall we lose? I mean as a State question. 
 How many will there be like Ohio, bowing to 
 the prejudice of color and caste and afraid to 
 proclaim their honest sentiments ? How many 
 Slates shall we lose if we are for it? If we 
 ignore it, if we give the lie to the whole record 
 of our lives and evade it, try to dodge it, then, 
 I think I can speak for Illinois alone, we shall 
 be beaten by fifty thousand majority upon a 
 vote taken in that State. 
 
 How, then, do 1 propose to settle this whole 
 question? The States have-in tin- first instance 
 acted upon it; they have established govern- 
 ments which are not republican in so far as 
 tiny exclude portions of the people from the 
 
 ballot-box, and I would by a bill not ten lines 
 in length declare that no State shall in its con- 
 stitution or laws, make any distinction in the 
 qualifications of electors, on the ground ot 
 color, caste, or race, and that all the provis- 
 ions of any constitution, or law ot any State, 
 which exclude persons from the elective fran- 
 chise on the ground aforesaid, shall be null and 
 void. , , . . 
 
 Such a law would be constitutional and just 
 to eV'Bry section, just to all the people-, and 
 the people instead of opposing it. would hail it 
 with joy and gladness. They would pronounce 
 it the wisest act that the Congress ot the 1 ni- 
 ted States had ever performed, because n would 
 remove this bone of contention from the areua 
 of State politics; it would forever settle tins 
 disturbing question ; it would make citizenship 
 uniform in every State of the Union. And 
 it' we would exercise our power "by laws 
 necessary and proper" to pass such a hill as 
 this, the effect would be salutary, and would 
 result in the final and certain triumph ol the 
 Republican party. I know, sir, what timidity 
 suggests to the minds of Senators, but a bold, 
 honest, straightforward course would set this 
 country right upon this question, and we should 
 gloriously triumph in every election. 
 
 Shall the party which has come up through 
 great tribulation, has faced all these questions, 
 the abolition of the slave traffic in the District 
 of Columbia, the abolition of slavery i" the 
 District, the fugitive slave law, the emancipa- 
 tion of the slaves, the employment of colored 
 troops, the establishment of negro suffrage in 
 the District of Columbia andin the rebel States, 
 shall the party now hesitate before it takes the 
 last final step of a full, complete, and glorious 
 triumph? 
 
 Sir, the people do not understand that argu- 
 ment which says that Congress may confer upon 
 a man his civil rights and not his political I ights. 
 It is the pleading of a lawyer ; it is too narrow 
 for statesmanship. They do not understand 
 why a man should have the right to hold prop- 
 erty, to bring suits, to testify in courts of justice, 
 and not have the right to a voice in the selec- 
 tion of the rulers by whom he is to be governed, 
 and in making the laws by which he is to be 
 bound. Shall he have civil rights without 
 the power of protecting himself in the enjoy- 
 ment of them? What is liberty, what is eman- 
 cipation without enfranchisement? What is 
 the abolition of slavery, unless you employ the 
 power conferred upon you by the Constitution, 
 as amended, " to enforce by appropriate legisla- 
 tion" the rights of the emancipated slave? Shall 
 this party which has been the champion ol the 
 equality of all men, which has proclaimed it 
 upon the housetops everywhere throughout the 
 land, now shrink from asserting practically the 
 equal rights of all men of this race? Shall we 
 draw .Mason and Dixon's line bet ween i he right 
 to vote in the North and in the South ? Shall 
 we impose on the South, the votes of four or 
 five million ignorant people just released from 
 
12 
 
 slavery, and refuse it to the more enlightened 
 and intelligent colored men of the North, who 
 are much fewer in number? is that the posi- 
 tion of the great Republican party? Will it 
 hesitate to exercise a power clearly vested in 
 Congress by the Constitution of the United 
 States, and to confer the same rights upon all 
 the people, in every section, North as well as 
 South, East as well as West? Will you by 
 doing injustice — yes, sir, absolute injustice — 
 to the free colored men of the North, lose their 
 votes in the coming presidential election, and 
 in the States where the balance of power would 
 be in their hands? 
 
 You know well that the argument was used 
 with wonderful effect in Ohio, that argument 
 which lost us our valued Senator, [Mr. Wade;] 
 that while we, the great Republican party, 
 could impose equal suffrage on the southern 
 people, we were not willing to impose it upon 
 ourselves; that while we could do justice to 
 the loyal miftions of ignorant black men in the 
 South we could not do justice to the loyal 
 thousands of intelligent black men in the 
 North. 1 refer to this because to this issue we 
 are forced, and we might as well face it at 
 once. The power is with us. We have exer- 
 cised the power in the southern States. We 
 have the same power in the northern States, 
 and every consideration of justice, expediency, 
 and success demands the prompt exercise of 
 the power. 
 
 I knowitis asked, Why not have the Consti- 
 tution amended? 1 ask, why have it amended? 
 When the Constitution says, that we shall by 
 necessary and proper laws, carry into effect this 
 provision of the Constitution, when we have 
 the power by law to do it already, why have 
 a constitutional amendment? We have not 
 time — we cannot wait lor an amendment to 
 the Constitution. How long would it be before 
 Kentucky would consent, by agreeing to ratify 
 Buch a constitutional amendment, to give 
 enfranchisement to her colored population? 
 At least fifty years ; and so of Maryland, and 
 of many northern Stales. A constitutional 
 amendment will not accomplish the object. 
 By wailing for that we shall commit the same 
 
 mistake that we committed when we did not, 
 
 at the end of the war, declare all the slave 
 Slates, except Missouri, disloyal, and act for 
 them all as disloyal States. Such a constitu- 
 tional amendment would, perhaps, never be 
 adopted. I say there is no necessity tor amend 
 ing your Constitution in this way. Vxu the 
 power; you have it. Read your Constitution ; 
 understand ii ; you need not amend it; but 
 exercise the power il clearly Confers. 
 
 I I is said that such a law would be subject 
 to repeal if Congress were to pass it. Thai is 
 
 ■ inn then I have the authority of my col- 
 leu tie, and I have the authority of the Senator 
 iVo; M Ohio, | Mr. Sherman, | for saying thai such 
 would not be repealed. The Senator 
 IVo. ii Ohio [Mr. Sherman] said the other day, 
 
 . ii -n these righi i are ouce conferred) they 
 
 will never be given back. My colleague said, 
 and truly said, that when these men once get 
 these rights, they will never give them up, and 
 as theSenatorfrom Ohio wellsaid, the tendency 
 of all legislation of this day, is in favor of the 
 extension of the right of suffrage. 
 
 Mr. President, it is "the era of good feel- 
 ing" we want, such as existed in Monroe's 
 administration, when all questions were settled, 
 when all the States were in harmony each with 
 the other. This question settled we will have 
 an "era of good feeling," States all the same 
 in their rights, individuals having the same 
 rights, no sectional jealousies, this disturbance 
 removed from politics entirely. There is no 
 way under the sun by which it can be done, 
 but for Congress to exercise its just and con- 
 stitutional powers by a law for that 'purpose, 
 and not throw the question into the caldron of 
 State politics, a bone of contention, there to 
 divide the people, it may be for fifty years to 
 come. Rather let us, by one sublime act of 
 nationality, broad as the clause of the constitu- 
 tion abolishing slavery, confer these rights 
 upon every citizen in every State of the Union. 
 
 The Republican party cannot stand still. 
 If it stands still, or recedes, it dies. It must 
 move forward. When we set five million peo- 
 ple free they had to be taken care of. They 
 lnul to be made citizens. But are they taken 
 care of, when we deprive them of the rights 
 which belong to other citizens? Will the Re- 
 publican party fail to take tlfts last final step 
 in this mighty onward movement of human 
 progress? Sir, suppose the almighty Archi- 
 tect of the Universe, after he had created the 
 heavens and the earth, the sun and the moon 
 and the stars, on the sixth day, had ceased his 
 work, and not created man and breathed into 
 him the breath of an immortal soul. So 
 would it now be, if the Republican party, 
 after vindicating the beautiful and beneficent 
 system of government designed by the genius 
 of our revolutionary sires, should fail to con- 
 summate the last great act, and admit to equal 
 enjoyment with themselves, the immortal mil- 
 lions, wdio for two hundred years have sighed 
 and suffered under our rule. 
 
 I Know, sir, that the other party say that the 
 Republican party are attempting to establish 
 the supremacy of negro rule. 1 wish to say 
 in j-egard to that, simply that with no decent 
 regard to truth can any man say that the 
 Republican party propose to establish the 
 supremacy of negro rule. You cannot point 
 me to the declaration of a Senator, or of a 
 politician, or of a newspaper of the Republican 
 parly, that says the Republican party is pro- 
 posing to establish the dominion of negroes 
 over the country. No, sir; that is not the 
 doctrine of the Republican pariy. The doc- 
 trine of the Republican party is the equality 
 of all men, and the supremacy and rule of all 
 
 men. 1 might, with much more propriety, say 
 
 licit the Senator from Wisconsin | Mi-. DOO- 
 i 1 1 i l.i: J is trying to establish rebel rule in this 
 
13 
 
 country than he can say the Republican party 
 is trying to establish negro rule, because, he is 
 willing to enfranchise the leaders of the rebel- 
 lion, the men who organized civil war, the men 
 whose hands are red with the blood of our 
 country's defenders, and whose lips are fresh 
 with perjury ; when he is willing to take them 
 into the high places of the Government, to 
 allow them to resume their former positions of 
 power and sway, 1 may truly say that he is in 
 favor of rebel rule, but I deny that it can be 
 said that any Republican Senator has ever 
 declared anywhere, that he was in favor of 
 negro rule. 
 
 Now, Mr. President, the cry of negro equality 
 is equally senseless and groundless. States- 
 manship, nor constitutions, nor laws, noth- 
 ing can make ail men equal in fact. From 
 what a lofty, shining light would Frederick 
 Douglass have to fall, to reach the low level 
 of Andrew Johnson ? Far as the angels fell. 
 "Hurled headlong flaming from the ethereal sky," 
 
 "Nine times the space that measures day and night 
 To mortal men." 
 
 Statesmanship, however, can confer upon men 
 the same chances in life, the same protection, 
 the same laws, the same privileges, the same 
 rights of every kind. 
 
 The fact that one race is superior to another 
 is no warrant for its having superior advan- 
 tages ; on the other hand, if there is any 
 advantage, it should rather be in favor of pro- 
 tection to the meek, the humble, and the lowly. 
 I believe, myself, that the pure American 
 Anglo-Saxon man is the highest style in all 
 God's created humanity, and therefore I believe 
 he can fight his way through, without having 
 an advantage by law over his poor colored 
 neighbor and fellow-citizen, and that he is not 
 in danger of being subjected to that negro rule 
 and supremacy, of which so much is said. 
 
 It is contended by the Senator from New 
 Hampshire [Mr. Patterson] that there should 
 be a qualification, that only those who can 
 read and write should vote. I reply to this, 
 that we ourselves, by our own action, have 
 conferred suffrage upon those who cannot 
 read and write. Providence overruled us in 
 this regard. In order to have loyal States in 
 the South, we were compelled to confer suffrage 
 upon those who could not read and write. On 
 the other hand, there are thousands of white 
 men in the State of Kentucky, and in the State 
 •of Illinois, and in every other State, who cannot 
 read and write, and yet who make good citi- 
 zens. We cannot, by any principle of equality, 
 confer suffrage upon any favorite class, either 
 of intelligence, wealth, birth, or fortune. 
 There is this advantage in universal suffrage: 
 that the masses, though ignorant, are honest, 
 and they are a check upon the intelligent oli- 
 garchy, to whom, I am sorry to say, have been 
 traced mistakes and corruption upon many and 
 many a bloody page of history in all times past. 
 
 The true theory is to trust the Government 
 
 of the American people as our fathers made 
 it, to the consent of the governed, founded 
 upon the rights of all the people, to the strong 
 common sense of all the people. There is 
 more virtue and more intelligence in all the 
 people, than there is in a part of the people. 
 All the people, all the virtuous people, all I he 
 wise people, all the ignorant people, must be 
 consulted. We must trust that one force will 
 counterpoise the other in the future, as it has 
 done in the past. 
 
 The Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. Sum- 
 ner] is a very learned man ; but I would not 
 be willing to trust the legislation of this 
 country in the hands of a hundred men like 
 him. Professor Agassiz is a very classic man. 
 We live with Longfellow in his poetry. Henry 
 Ward Beecher and Theodore Tilton are men 
 of rare genius, sparkling wit, and surpassing 
 eloquence; and yet I would not trust the gov- 
 ernment of this people in the hands of such 
 men alone. I take it that the banker knows 
 more about finances than the Senator from Mich- 
 igan [Mr. Howard] does, because his pursuits 
 are different; the merchant knows more about 
 barter and trade* and the poor man knows the 
 wants of poverty, and the wants of the people, 
 better than the rich or the intelligent. Jeff. 
 Davis is an educated man — educated at the 
 expense of that Government at whose throat 
 he made an infernal leap. Robert Toombs is 
 an educated man. I would rather trust the 
 government of the people of the United States 
 to the hands of all the people, t,o the hands of 
 the humblest laborer who was loyal, and who 
 had an honest heart, who was devoted to his 
 country, than to any oligarchy or favored few. 
 
 Sir, it is the ballot which is to be the great 
 educator. The fact that men have an interest 
 in the Government, that they have the right to 
 vote and hold office, is an incentive to them to 
 inform themselves. This is the reason why 
 education is more universally diffused in the 
 United States than in any other country. This 
 is the reason why we have schools and col- 
 leges everywhere in our midst. They are the 
 offspring of the molding influences of our free 
 institutions. They are born of the ballot. 
 
 Much has been said about the results of the 
 recent elections. Mr. President, if the Re- 
 publican party will stand to its guns, will stand 
 upon the platform which in its past record it 
 has made for itself, will stand by thesequences 
 of its own teachings, I have no fears for the 
 result. As for myself, sir, as I did three years 
 ago, so now I " accept the situation." 1 nail 
 the colors of universal suffrage to the mast- 
 bead ; and I am for it by act of Congress, 
 guarantying a republican government to every 
 State in the Union, Eastas well as West, North 
 as well as well as South. 
 
 I do not propose to arraign the Democratic 
 party. I will only say this : they have been the 
 consistent opponents of the war from the start. 
 The rebellion could not have stood on its legs 
 a single year without its aid and cooperation. 
 
14 
 
 The Democratic party, as an organization, has 
 been part and parcel, yea, the very heart and 
 life of the rebellion itself. It has furnished it 
 its lenders, its aid and sympathies. In their 
 conventions, in their platforms, in their presses, 
 in Congress, in their Legislatures, they opposed 
 every measure for a vigorous prosecution of 
 the war. Sir, I well remember when in the 
 western States, in 1862 and 1863, the Demo- 
 cratic Legislatures were nothing more nor less 
 than rebel camps in the capitals of those States 
 in which they met. They passed resolutions 
 denouncing the war, and threw every obstacle 
 in our way, as ever since, they have persist- 
 ently resisted every measure by Congress, for 
 the speedy and proper reconstruction of the 
 Union. 
 
 What patriot can ever forget the Democratic 
 National Convention at Chicago of July 20, 
 1864, presided over by Horatio Seymour and 
 engineered by Vallandigham, when the whole 
 weight and power of the Democratic party were 
 thrown in favor of the enemies of the country ? 
 It was at that fearful crisis in the history of 
 the country, when the scales hung even, when 
 Sherman and our brave boys in blue were mov- 
 ing on through Dalton, over Lookout mountain, 
 and Mission Ridge, and from Atlanta to the 
 sea, amid shot and shell, and the war and thun- 
 der of battle ; when Sheridan was sweeping 
 along the valley of the Shenandoah, and when 
 Grant was struggling in that hand-to-hand fight 
 through the Wilderness ; when our losses were 
 counted by thousands; when the question of 
 English intervention hung doubtful in the 
 scales ; when the good Lincoln, through the 
 weary watches of the night, with long strides 
 nervously paced his executive chamber await- 
 ing, tremblingly, dispatches from the Army. It 
 was while events like these were transpiring 
 that the Democratic National Convention in 
 Chicago, representing the party in every State 
 of the Union, passed, amid heaven-rending 
 huzzas, with all the forms of parliamentary 
 solemnity, that resolution, forever black with 
 the imperishable stain of treason, that the war, 
 after four years of fighting, was a failure, and 
 that the public welfare demanded an immediate 
 cessation of hostilities. 
 
 That party even now charge it as the great 
 crime of the Republican party, that it disfran- 
 chises the leading rebels. They proclaim that 
 those States which made war upon the Gov- 
 ernment, and set up governments in direct 
 antagonism to our own, are lawful States in the 
 Union, having the right all the time during the 
 war, and now, to send their Senators and Rep- 
 resentatives unquestioned, to take their seats in 
 the Congress of the United States. 
 
 And, sir, to the great shame of the Demo- 
 cratic parly, while they would receive with 
 open arms into Congress, the leaders of that. 
 
 party which organized the rebellion, broughl 
 on the war, filled the land with mourning and 
 desolation, and by plunder and piracy, by 
 arson and murder, by perjury and by poison. 
 
 by the slow tortures of starvation, and by 
 every savage and infernal cruelty shocking in 
 the sight of God and man ; while they would 
 bring them back, and introduce them to the 
 high places of power, to resume their former 
 influence in the Government, they descend to 
 the unworthy work of belittling the loyal 
 blacks, and unblushingly advocate the dis- 
 franchisement of those men of another race 
 who guided and cheered our boys in blue, and 
 won their title to the natioirs gratitude by 
 deeds of imperishable valor. 
 
 If I had time 1 could turn to the brighter 
 record of the Republican party, show its record 
 bright with the country saved from the hands 
 of the spoiler, and the banner of the Union 
 planted upon every battlement where traitor 
 hands had put it down. But I refer to it only 
 in one aspect, as it may bear upon the enfran- 
 chisement of the race it set free. 
 
 Deplorable as war was, it has had its com- 
 pensations. Slavery is dead, and will know no 
 resurrection; that most accursed chatteling of 
 human beings, the auction-block, the tearing 
 asunder of mother and child, the day of stripes 
 and the lash, the revolver and the bowie-knife, 
 are past. Dens and caverns, the pursuing blood- 
 hounds, mountains climbed and rivers crossed 
 and no escape from the Constitution and the 
 laws — these have past. What a sublime result, 
 that not a single slave clanks his chains upon 
 one inch of American soil, and that the na- 
 tions hail with shouts of joy the banner of uni- 
 versal emancipation ! Thanks to God; thanks 
 to the Anti-Slavery Society ; thanks to Parker, 
 Garrison, Henry Ward Beecher, Wendell 
 Phillips, and all the pioneers in the anti- 
 slavery cause; thanks to the Republican party 
 and the Thirty-Ninth Congress ; thanks to 
 Grant and Sheridan and Sherman and our 
 brave boys in blue everywhere; thanks to 
 Abraham Lincoln for the proclamation of 
 emancipation ; thanks to all who labored, suf- 
 fered, and achieved, who fought and who fell 
 for this lifting up to light and liberty and citi- 
 zenship five millions of God's long-oppressed 
 and downtrodden poor; but thanks also to the 
 poor freed man himself, for he, too, has borne 
 himself most nobly. Of them it may be said, 
 " Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit 
 the earth." How humbly have they walked, 
 poor slaves and outcasts! no law for them, no 
 home, no property, no name, no wife nor child 
 he could call his own, no heritage but hopeless 
 bondage — borne down for centuries by the iron 
 heelol foul oppression, they neveraspired to rule 
 over US | they only asked to be hewers of wood 
 and drawers of water, and for a place to lie 
 down and die. Instead of insurrections and 
 massacres of women and children, as we 
 feared, no instance is on record of a single 
 act of savage cruelty on their part during the 
 war. It was said they were too cowardly to 
 fight, and yet they fought more daringly than 
 Napoleon's veterans, and threw themselves 
 
 headlong on the battlements of the enemy and 
 
15 
 
 into the mine of Petersburg, and into the 
 breach at Port Hudson, and into the jaws of 
 death everywhere, with an irrepressible ardor 
 and lofty daring, equaled only by that of our 
 own unmatched and dauntless boys in blue, 
 fighting for a flag, which for two hundred years 
 has been the ensign of liberty for all but them. 
 
 In all the long and fearful struggle of the war, 
 not one of these sable millions ever proved faith- 
 less to the flag. Did one solitary one of them 
 ever refuse to share his scanty loaf with the sick 
 and wounded soldier? Who, when night spread 
 its dark robes over the earth, led our worn and 
 wearied soldier through bayous, swamps, and 
 by paths, and bid him God speed to his home, 
 and the headquarters of our Army? 
 
 And now, after having secured our own 
 safety and the life of the nation aided by his acts 
 of valor, in common with those of our brave 
 soldiers; if, after they have been called to be 
 soldiers of the Army of the Union ; if, after 
 we have clothed them in the uniform of the 
 United States Army; if, after they have 
 flashed two hundred thousand bayonets in 
 the face of Jeff. Uavis and his traitor hordes; 
 if now, we open the portals of the American 
 ballot-box to bloody-handed traitors, and leave 
 them to the tender mercies, and hostile legisla- 
 tion of their former owners, we shall commit the 
 crime of history, and write upon the nation's 
 name, in lines dark as night, and deep as hell, a 
 stigma which all the ages cannot wash away. 
 
 Let no friend of the Republican party be dis- 
 couraged through any temporary defeat. Let 
 him remember, that despite occasional defeats, 
 the true center of gravity in a republican Gov- 
 ernment like ours, is in that power which repre- 
 sents the theory of liberty on which the Gov- 
 ernment is based. Remember that the march 
 of our republican army, has been through storms 
 of persecution, iron walls of prejudice, and 
 through defeat after defeat to final triumph. 
 There are men here who remember the time, 
 when to speak against slavery, was denounced 
 as a crime against society. It was death for 
 Lovejoy, imprisonment for Parker, and mob- 
 law and lynch-law for the early pioneers in the 
 cause of freedom. Any other sin might be atoned 
 for, but, clad in iron mail, slavery was secure 
 behind its impregnable bulwarks. Only in 
 1837, the blood of Elijah Lovejoy sprinkled the 
 Boil of my own State, while bravely defending 
 his press against an infuriated mob. But from 
 that blood men sprang, as Minerva from the head 
 of Jupiter, full armed with buckler, lance, spear, 
 and helmet of living truth, to fire the world 
 againstthe accursed system of human bondage. 
 Only in 1849, as a member of the Legislature 
 of my own State, I introduced a resolution to 
 abolish the slave traffic in the District of Col- 
 umbia, and it was voted down by an over- 
 whelming majority. I remember well the time 
 when it was just as unpopular to advocate the 
 abolition of the slave traffic in this District, 
 where men were sold upon the auction block, 
 and shook their chains in the face of the Capi- 
 
 tol, as it is now to advocate the passage of an 
 act by Congress, where the States have failed to 
 secure suffrage in every State in the Union. 
 Twice has it been my pleasure to witness these 
 colored men, in all the dignity of enfranchised 
 manhood, march to the polls and rescue this 
 capital from the long dominion of copperheads 
 and a slave oligarchy. How long since statutes 
 of the States were black with cruel legislation, 
 expelling these colored men from the States, 
 and subjecting them, for small or no offenses, to 
 the penitentiary, jail, and the whipping-post? 
 In my message of 18G5 to the Legislature of 
 Illinois, I called upon it to sweep them from 
 the statute-book, with a swift, resistless hand, 
 and they did it, leaving not a section to mar and 
 darken the face of the revised statutes of that 
 great State. You remember, that when in 1862, 
 Mr. Lincoln issued that conditional proclama- 
 tion of emancipation, the Democratic party 
 rallied and carried almost every State. But we 
 did not give up ; defeat did not hurt. Like 
 the bombardment of Fort Sumter, it roused the 
 nation, and we gloriously triumphed in the re- 
 election of Mr. Lincoln. And now, through 
 all these defeats and triumphs we reach the 
 final great consummation, the complexion to 
 which it must come at last, the summing up of 
 the whole matter, the simple freedom and 
 equality of all men, the enfranchisement of all 
 men made in the image of God, to a perfect 
 and universal equality of rights. 
 
 And, sir, do you suppose we will falter 
 before taking this last step. The true hearted 
 Republican is never deterred by election re- 
 turns. He expects some defeats. He expects 
 to triumph amid the storms of defeat, as well 
 as in the sunshine of victory. I hail it, not as 
 a defeat, but as a glorious harbinger of victory, 
 that, notwithstanding the timidity of politicians 
 in Ohio, two hundred and sixteen thousand 
 freemen dashed away their prejudices, and 
 voted for suffrage ; not as a defeat, but a'j the 
 herald, the John the Baptist, the " prepare-ye- 
 the-way" of speedy, glorious, and final victory. 
 
 The shortest way to reconstruction is the 
 simplest, the plainest, the easiest; and the only 
 way is the straightforward road to the impartial 
 and equal rights of all men. 
 
 I believe in a special providence in the affairs 
 of men as well as of nations. I believe, coloni- 
 zation, emigration, and the march of empire 
 having completed the circle of the globe, that 
 upon this North American continent, between 
 the Atlantic and the Pacific, is to be ''Time's 
 noblest empire — the last." I believe that this 
 is the chosen nation of Heaven, where the 
 experiment of the self-government of man is 
 to be made. I believe that light from Heaven 
 blazed along the pathway of the Mayflower, and 
 guided our fathers through the stormsof revo- 
 lutionary preparation to the Declaration of 
 Independence. I believe that God meant that 
 we should highly appreciate our privileges by 
 making them cost dearly ; I believe that He 
 gave us slavery, with all of its accursed ugliness 
 
16 
 
 and deformity, as the appalling contrast to the 
 beauties and blessings of liberty. I believe 
 that He thrust across our path the Ethiopian, 
 that we might learn that all men, without 
 regard to color or the accident of birth, are 
 brothers, and that of one blood are all the peo- 
 ple that dwell upon the face of the earth. I 
 believe He gave us Lincoln as He had given us 
 Washington — Lincoln so good, so grand, and 
 so great — as an example for statesmanship, 
 and thai from his martyrdom should spring the 
 seed of the church, the gospel of liberty, and 
 human rights. 
 
 And, in a word, that in all these providences, 
 sad experiences, fearful wars, prejudices of 
 caste, virtues, and wickedness of rulers, " God 
 moves in a mysterious way His wonders to per- 
 orm," and is leading us through the red sea of 
 trouble and the wilderness, to a bright Canaan 
 
 of national deliverance. Having solved the 
 problem of the ages, the equality and brother- 
 hood of the race of man, and vindicated his 
 eternal justice, this nation will move forward 
 in the van of material progress and Christian 
 civilization, and scale height after height of 
 power, glory, and grandeur, such as no people 
 in the world has ever yet achieved. 
 
 Mr. President, I have not gone one solitary 
 step further than I thought it was necessary for 
 me to go for the best interests of my country. 
 I do not antagonize the Republican platform. 
 I leave the question of suffrage where the Con- 
 stitution leaves it, with the States in the first 
 instance, but I reserve the power to the Con- 
 gress of the United States, contained in the 
 Constitution of the United States, by laws 
 necessary and proper, to see that every State 
 has a republican form of government. 
 
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