CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



127 



This long-conceded right of the States to de- 

 termine for themselves who of their citizens 

 shall exercise the right of suffrage within their 

 respective jurisdictions is now for the first time 

 to be taken away by act of Congress from all 

 the States of this Union. It would seem that 

 the exercise of this power by the States, al- 

 most unquestioned ever since and before the 

 adoption of the Constitution, for more than 

 eighty years, would cause gentlemen to hesi- 

 tate before taking such a step. Is not the ar- 

 gument, that the Federal Government, the 

 people, and all the States, have acquiesced so 

 long in the exercise of this power by the sev- 

 eral States, almost conclusive ? No two of the 

 States have adopted provisions by which the 

 same and all the same Class or classes of their 

 citizens vote. Some even have not confined 

 the right to citizens at all. Aliens having de- 

 clared their intentions only are in several of 

 the States permitted to exercise the right of 

 suffrage. There can scarcely be said to be any 

 uniformity. The laws on the subject are as 

 variant and diversified as the climate and the 

 productions of the States themselves. And 

 yet the right and power of the several States 

 to determine this question of the qualification 

 of voters can hardly be said to have been 

 doubted. I do not ignore the fact that some 

 one or more honorable gentlemen on this floor 

 and in the other branch of Congress, together 

 with some pseudo-commentators upon the 

 Constitution, blinded, as I think, by the heat- 

 ed passions of fanaticism and war, have pro- 

 fessed to believe and have declared that Con- 

 gress has the constitutional power necessary 

 to pass this bill. But the conclusions of these 

 gentlemen are, I apprehend, more from the 

 desire that a Congress composed of their 

 friends should intervene and control the suf- 

 frage of the States in the interest of the party 

 to which they are attached than from any 

 settled conviction of constitutional warrant. 

 Their views and opinions are confused, and 

 they seem uncertain upon what provision of 

 the Constitution to rest them. They base 

 them more upon what they consider the ne- 

 cessity of the times, the wants of the nation, 

 and the will of the people, as expressed through 

 the party to which they adhere, than upon any 

 express or implied grant of power to the Fed- 

 eral Government in and by. the Constitution 

 itself. The Constitution declares that : 



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. 

 Constitution, art. 1, sec. 2, clause 1. 



" This, as I believe, is the only provision of 

 the Constitution in any manner dictating or 

 prescribing the qualifications of electors. ' And 

 the electors of each State shall have the quali- 

 fications requisite for electors of the most nu- 

 merous branch of the State Legislature.' Can 

 any candid, fair-minded man pretend that this 



provision is a grant of power to Congress to 

 intervene and prescribe the qualification of 

 electors of the most numerous branch of the 

 State Legislature ? Is it not all that Congress 

 can do, to insist or require that the same body, 

 or class, or classes of persons who are allowed 

 to vote or qualified as electors of the most nu- 

 merous branch of the State Legislature shall 

 be the electors of members of the House of 

 Representatives ? And are they not to be the 

 same persons who are by the State laws de- 

 clared qualified electors of the most numerous 

 branch of the Legislature of the State? It 

 seems to me nothing can be clearer. No lan- 

 guage can make it more explicit. All is left 

 to the State, except only that the persons the 

 State designates as its electors of the most nu- 

 merous branch of its Legislature shall be the 

 constitutional electors of the House of Repre- 

 sentatives. The Constitution provides that the 

 State may determine the persons who shall be 

 electors of members of the House of Repre- 

 sentatives by its act of determining who shall 

 Jbe the electors of its most numerous legislative 

 "branch. This right of the State to determine 

 the qualification of the electors of the members 

 of its Legislature is older than the Constitution. 

 The State derived the power from the people 

 of the State before the Constitution was adopt- 

 ed. The power, therefore, remains in the State 

 until it is taken away. There is nothing in the 

 Constitution, nothing in the provision quoted, 

 certainly, granting the power to the Federal 

 Government, or prohibiting it to the State. 



" In this view all the commentators, that I 

 have been able to consult, agree. It was a ref- 

 erence of the whole question to the domestic 

 law to the law of the State. The House of 

 Representatives was to be composed of mem- 

 bers chosen every two years by the people of 

 the several States, the requisite qualifications 

 of the electors of whom were expressly referred 

 to the law established by the State itself. And 

 this provision was sustained by a large major- 

 ity of the Convention. The advocates of this 

 bill must therefore look to some other provi- 

 sion of the Constitution for the power to pass 

 it. There is no grant here to the Federal Gov- 

 vernment. It only authorizes the same elec- 

 tors to elect members of the House of Repre- 

 sentatives who by the laws of the State are 

 qualified electors of the most numerous branch 

 of the State Legislature. This is what was in- 

 tended, and all that can be claimed for it. 



"Can authority for this bill be found under 

 article one, section four, clause one, 6f the Con- 

 stitution ? 



The times, places, and manner of holding elec- 

 tions for Senators and Representatives shall be pre- 

 scribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but 

 the Congress may at any time by law make or alter 

 such regulations, except as to the places of choosing 

 Senators. 



" The times, places, and manner of holding 

 the elections for Senators and Representatives 

 shall be prescribed in each State by the Legis- 



