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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



and that state of facts Congress had put forth 

 a bill declaring the amendment adopted, would 

 that be a final decision conclusive on all de- 

 partments ? Does the Senator undertake to say 

 that no judicial question can ever be raised as 

 to what the Constitution of the United States 

 is, whether it remains with or without amend- 

 ment, which can be acted on by a court on the 

 face of the record ? " 



Mr. Williams : " Mr. President, assuming 

 that each member of Congress is sworn to 

 support the Constitution of the United States 

 as well as the judges of the Supreme Court, I 

 affirm that if a majority of both Houses of Con- 

 gress, upon their solemn oaths, affirm that a 

 constitutional amendment had been ratified by 

 three-fourths of the States, it would not be 

 within the power of the judiciary to disaffirm 

 that decision and declare it invalid, because 

 the question is one belonging wholly to the 

 political department of the Government. It 

 is as easy to assume that Congress would abuse 

 any other power belonging exclusively to the 

 political department of the Government as to 

 assume that it would abuse this power. Does 

 the honorable Senator mean to say because 

 it can be assumed that members of Congress 

 will violate their oaths, that the Supreme Court 

 of the United States may revise every action of 

 Congress actions confessedly within the po- 

 litical department of the Government ? I say 

 that the question as to what is the Constitution 

 belongs to the political department of the Gov- 

 ernment, but the question as to what it means 

 belongs to the judiciary. When the Consti- 

 tution was framed it was altogether a matter 

 of political action, and the amendments to it 

 have been made by the political department of 

 the Government ; and the power of the judi- 

 ciary extends only to questions arising ' under 

 the Constitution ' and not to questions as to 

 whether or not there is a Constitution," 



Mr. Howard, of Michigan, said : " Mr. Presi- 

 dent, I do not view that amendment as subject- 

 ing the people of Georgia or the State of 

 Georgia to any coercion. If it shall be adopted 

 and become a part of the law, it will simply sub- 

 mit to the people pf Georgia the alternative 

 of remaining in their present condition until 

 it shall be changed by Congress, or of adopt- 

 ing the fifteenth amendment of the Constitu- 

 tion. It .simply submits to them the question 

 whether they prefer the one condition or the 

 other ; that is all not a very uncommon state 

 of things in our political history. If the people 

 of Georgia see fit to remain in their present 

 condition, subject to the reconstruction acts 

 of Congress and to the military authority pro- 

 vided for in those acts, they have a right to 

 do so ; let them do so. But if they shall find 

 it so uncomfortable and so objectionable as 

 seems to be represented by some of their 

 friends here, all they have to do is to adopt the 

 fifteenth amendment and they can escape from 

 their difficulty at once. There is no coercion 

 about it ; it all depends on the free will of 



Georgia. ' Coercion ' is not a term to apply 

 to such a thing. It is left to their own free 

 will. If that be coercion, then I have mis- 

 taken the meaning of language. 



"An objection has been raised to the pas- 

 sage of this amendment, upon the allegation 

 that it imposes a new and further condition 

 upon the people of Georgia not embraced in the 

 previous reconstruction laws. Well, sir, I am 

 not sure but that that is true in point of fact, 

 but the amendment is not worse on that account 

 either for the people of Georgia or the rest of 

 the people of the United States. I know very 

 well that under the reconstruction acts even 

 the State of Georgia acquired no positive right 

 to be represented in the two Houses of Con- 

 gress until the two Houses of Congress said so ; 

 until we should give our consent under all the 

 circumstances of the case. That right and that 

 duty were reserved in the reconstruction act in 

 plain terms, and it was, in my judgment, a very 

 prudent provision. We see its necessity at this 

 present juncture plainly and distinctly. 



"But, sir, if an excuse were wanting for the 

 imposition of this further condition in the ad- 

 mission of Georgia, I feel for one that it is 

 found in the conduct of the dominant party in 

 Georgia. They have not kept their faith with 

 the reconstruction acts. The reconstruction 

 acts authorize every male person twenty-one 

 years of age, without distinction of color, to 

 vote at the polls and to vote for members of 

 the Legislature, and to be voted for as mem- 

 bers of the Legislature. The right to be elected 

 to the Legislature was as plainly provided for 

 in the reconstruction acts as was the right to 

 vote. It was plainly written on the face of the 

 statute, so plainly that he who runs might read, 

 and that even he who stumbles might not mis- 

 take it. But notwithstanding the clearness of 

 that provision in those acts, when the Legis- 

 lature of Georgia assembled, there being a 

 majority of what are called white Conservatives 

 who believed not in the policy of the reconstruc- 

 tion laws, but in what is called the policy of 

 'the white man's government,' they took it 

 into their heads to ostracize and to expel from 

 the legislative bodies of that State, elected under 

 the reconstruction acts, a large portion of the 

 members elected ; not because they were not 

 twenty-one years old, not because they were 

 not citizens of the United States, not because 

 they had been guilty of any crime or offence 

 justly disqualifying them for the elective fran- 

 chise and for holding the office of represent- 

 atives and senators, but because they were col- 

 ored, because they had descended from Africa ; 

 and that was the sole reason. 



" Sir, there was no excuse or apology for this 

 high-handed, revolutionary, and oppressive 

 measure. It was setting at direct defiance the 

 commands of the reconstruction laws of Con- 

 gress. It was not keeping faith with the United 

 States. It was directly breaking faith with us. 

 It was an unblushing and unhesitating violation 

 of the plain language of the reconstruction acts." 



