164 



CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



as then, and insist on their practical applica- 

 tion everywhere within the power of Congress, 

 and thus set up a wall of defence for the down- 

 trodden ! 



"Thus the question stands under the enabling 

 act. This act has not been complied with in 

 any respect, whether of form or substance. In 

 form it has been openly disregarded ; in sub- 

 stance it has been insulted. The failure in 

 form may be pardoned ; the failure in substance 

 must be fatal, unless in some way corrected by 

 Congress. 



" Nobody doubts that Congress, in providing 

 for the formation of a State constitution, may 

 affix conditions. This has been done from the 

 beginning of our history. Jhere is no instance 

 where it has been omitted. Search the ena- 

 bling acts of all the new States, and you 'will 

 find these conditions. There they are in your 

 statute-book, constant witnesses to the power 

 of Congress, unquestioned and unquestionable. 



"Thus, for instance, the enabling act for Ne- 

 braska reqxiires three things of the new State 

 as conditions precedent : 



"1. That slavery shall be forever prohibited. 



" 2. That no person shall be molested in 

 person or property on account of religious wor- 

 ship. 



"3. That the unappropriated public lands 

 shall remain at the sole disposition of the Uni- 

 ted States, without being subject to local taxa- 

 tion. 



"Read the enabling act, and you will find 

 these conditions. Does any Senator doubt their 

 validity ? Impossible. 



"But this is not all. In addition to these 

 three conditions are three others, which in 

 order, if not in importance, stand even before 

 these. They are contained in words which I 

 have already quoted, but which have been 

 strangely forgotten in this debate. Here they 

 are : 



That the constitution when formed shall be repub- 

 lican, and not repugnant to the Constitution of the 

 United States and the principles of the Declaration 

 of Independence. 



" Consider this clause ; you will find it con- 

 tains three conditions, each of vital force. 



"1. The constitution must be 'republican.' 

 It does not say 'in form ' merely, but 'republi- 

 can ; ' of course ' republican ' in substance and 

 reality. 



"2. The constitution must be 'not repug-. 

 nant to the Constitution of the United States.' 

 But surely any constitution which contains a 

 discrimination of rights on account of color 

 must be ' repugnant ' to the Constitution of the 

 United States, which contains iio'such discrim- 

 ination. The text of the national Constitu- 

 tion is blameless ; but the text of this new con- 

 stitution is not blameless ; hence its repug- 

 nancy. 



il 3. The constitution must be ' not repug- 

 nant to the principles of the Declaration of 

 Independence.' These plain words allow no 

 equivocation. Solemnly you have required this 



just and noble conformity. But is it not an 

 insult to the understanding when you offer a 

 constitution which contains a discrimination of 

 rights on account of color ? 



" Now, in all these three requirements, so au- 

 thoritatively made as the conditions of the new 

 constitution, Nebraska fails wretchedly fails. 

 It is vain to say that the people there were not 

 warned. They were warned. These require- 

 ments were in the very title-deed under which 

 they now claim. 



" Mr. President, pardon me, I entreat you, if 

 I am tenacious in my position. At this mo- 

 ment there is one great question in our country 

 on which all other questions pivot. It is jus- 

 tice to the colored race. Without this I see 

 small chance of security, tranquillity, or even 

 of peace. The war will still continue. There- 

 fore, as a servant of truth and a lover of my 

 country, I cannot allow this cause to be sacri- 

 ficed or discredited by my vote. Others will 

 do as they please ; but if I stand alone I will 

 hold this bridge." 



Mr. Cowan, of Pennsylvania, 'said : " Mr. 

 President, I trust that my brethren will take 

 advantage of the peculiar contingency which 

 the Senator from Massachusetts says Providence 

 now furnishes, and that they will respond to it 

 in the proper spirit. If I caught the drift of 

 his remarks at that particular point, it was this : 

 that for a long period of years Providence, for 

 some reason or other, had not given to us an 

 opportunity to be just to black people ; had not 

 given an opportunity to recognize the equality 

 of black people ; not given an opportunity to 

 admit black people to cooperate with our own 

 race in the government of sublunary things 

 here, but that contingency has at last happened. 

 If that be so, Mr. President, I must confess that 

 I have had very confused views of Providence 

 heretofore. 1 supposed that the world was 

 governed by Providence, and I supposed that 

 the word came from the fact that He did pro- 

 vide for the government of the affairs of men. 

 I was perfectly willing to admit that His ways 

 were mysterious, very mysterious indeed. I 

 could not understand why He allowed certain 

 things to prevail in the world which to my 

 mind were wrong and improper. But from the 

 best lights that I could get, and from the closest 

 observation I could make of things, in the end 

 they generally came out right. 



" Now, if, as the Senator says and I use his 

 own words, in quoting the Declaration of In- 

 dependence 'all men are equal,' it does seem 

 to me that Providence could have fixed that 

 fact, if He had desired it, with such certainty 

 as to prevent any very great mistake about it. 

 My honorable friend, the Senator from Massa- 

 chusetts, is six feet three inches in height, and 

 weighs two hundred and twenty pounds. I am 

 six feet three inches in height and weigh one 

 hundred and ninety pounds, if you please. That 

 is not equality. My honorable friend from 

 Maine here is five feet nine inches and he weighs 

 one hundred and forty pounds, if you please 



