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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



very lately. It was adopted; but I know- 

 that almost every eminent lawyer, jurist, and 

 legislator, from that period to this, has sup- 

 posed that that limitation was totally void, and 

 void upon this reason, that all the States that- 

 have not committed treason must stand upon 

 the same footing with regard, to their relation 

 to the General Government and their powers 

 as States. 



"Another kindred doctrine has been as uni- 

 versal and as unquestioned ; and that is that 

 the General Government has no power to fix 

 the qualifications of voters in the several States. 

 I mean all the time, those States that have been 

 loyal and have never forfeited their rights. 

 This amendment is not offered to alter the con- 

 dition, as it is said, of a State in this Union, 

 because Nebraska is a Territory seeking to be 

 admitted into the Union as a State. That is 

 very true; but, sir, does not the same doc- 

 trine apply to it that would if it were already 

 a State ? Will you do a vain arid idle thing ? 

 For the moment you have attached that amend- 

 ment and permitted the State to come in on 

 that condition, if I am right in my reasoning, 

 the next day she may alter her constitution and 

 throw your amendment to the winds, and fix 

 the status of her own voters in her own 

 way." 



Mr. Brown: "Will the Senator from Ohio 

 permit me to ask him whether, if that doctrine 

 be true, and he were to impose a restriction of 

 this sort upon the States readmitted, that have 

 heretofore been in rebellion, they could not do 

 the same thing also; and how he distinguishes 

 the power of the State thereafter in one case, 

 and the power of the State thereafter in the 

 other case?" 



Mr. Wade : " That is a very pertinent ques- 

 tion; and I propose to come to that without 

 having my attention particularly drawn to it. I 

 have been speaking of States which have never 

 forfeited any of their rights loyal States. The 

 doctrine that I have asserted applies to them. 

 I do not know that the Senator from Missouri 

 will question these principles as applied to the 

 States that have never been in rebellion or in 

 any way forfeited their rights. I do not sup- 

 pose at this time of day we can do it. I know 

 of no leader of political parties, I know of no 

 jurist, from the Chief Justice of the Supreme 

 Court down to the judges of the county courts 

 in the several States, who has ever asserted 

 any other doctrine than that to which 1 have 

 alluded. 



"The Senator from Missouri, on a former 

 occasion, undertook, as did the Senator from 

 Massachusetts (Mr. Sumner) also, to show that 

 I was inconsistent with myself; that I was 

 asking the Senate to do an act inconsistent 

 with what they had done on a former occasion, 

 when we all voted to fix the elective franchise 

 in this District. Why, sir, there is no analogy 

 between the two cases at all. Our power of 

 legislation over the District of Columbia is 

 plenary and supreme. There is no doubt on 



that question whatever. It is given us by the 

 Constitution of the United States. The dis- 

 tinction that I make between that and this 

 measure is barely this: that with regard to 

 Congress passing a law to fix the qualifications 

 of voters in a State that has not been in rebel- 

 lion, we have no power whatever to do it, 

 whereas our power to fix that status in this 

 District is full, plenary, and supreme ; there is 

 nobody to question it. There is, therefore, no 

 analogy between the two cases, whatever. 



"When we. admitted the State of Tennessee 

 at the last session, no question was raised on 

 this floor that we should refuse to admit her 

 until she agreed to let us fix the status of her 

 voters. Of course we looked to the effect upon 

 her in that respect of the constitutional amend- 

 ment when it should be adopted ; and as it was, 

 as the constitutional amendment had not then 

 become a part and parcel of the Constitution 

 of the United States, we indeed admitted that 

 State without putting any condition at all upon 

 the qualification of electors. Now, I will ask 

 the Senator, is it not well for us to deal as leni- 

 ently with a most patriotic State, who sends 

 Eepresentatives here the best qualified that you 

 can find gentlemen some of whom have parti- 

 cipated in the war, who have run all the hard- 

 ships and the hazard of that great controversy 

 for the maintenance of this Union ought we 

 not to deal as leniently with such a Territory, 

 knocking at our doors to come in as a State, 

 as though she had been in rebellion, and two- 

 thirds of her people had been endeavoring 

 night and day to overturn your Government, 

 and to erect an accursed slave government 

 upon its ruins? I will not submit, if I can 

 help it, to. any such discrimination as that. 



" Now, sir, I want to remind gentlemen how 

 some of us voted on that question, because this 

 amendment offered by the Senator from Mis- 

 souri is not one of first impressions, it is not a 

 new principle upon this floor, it is understood 

 by us all." 



Mr. Brown : "It was adopted in 1820." 



Mr. Wade: "Yes, sir. It was sought to be 

 applied again, not in exactly the words in 

 which the Senator has embodied his amend- 

 ment, but the principle was precisely the same, 

 as an amendment to the joint resolution for the 

 admission of the State of Tennessee. I wish 

 Senators to attend to the action that was had 

 then, because they will not suppose that I am 

 the advocate here now of any new doctrine. 

 I wonder that when this question was so em- 

 phatically settled as it was then it should be 

 made a question here now. When that resolu- 

 tion admitting Tennessee if you please to call 

 it admitting or restoring her relations with 

 this Government, as the resolution asserted, 

 was before the Senate, the Senator from Mas- 

 sachusetts sought to attach this amendment to 

 it: 



Provided, That this shall not take effect except 

 upon the fundamental condition that within the 

 State there shall be no denial of the electoral fran- 



