128 



CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



lature thereof. The times, places, and man- 

 ner ; * but the Congress m&j at any time make 

 or alter such regulations.' "What regulations 

 may Congress make or alter? Clearly, the 

 times, places, and manner, and nothing else : 

 the times when and the places where the elec- 

 tions shall take place. This is clear and un- 

 mistakable. And is there any more room for 

 doubt as to the import of the term * manner ? ' 

 It seems to me not. It cannot relate to the 

 qualification of the electors. This is left where 

 it was at the adoption of the Constitution 

 with the States themselves. Manner must re- 

 late to the manner of conducting the election, 

 whether by ballot or viva wee, to the mode or 

 manner in which the elector shall signify his 

 choice, shall express his will. This was the 

 opinion of Mr. Justice Story, in his able and 

 most exhaustive commentary on the Constitu- 

 tion, where we should almost suppose he had 

 these bills under consideration. He says : 



What would be said of a clause introduced into the 

 national Constitution to regulate the State elections 

 of the members of the State Legislatures I It would 

 be deemed a most unwarrantable transfer of power, 

 indicating a premeditated design to destroy the State 

 governments. It would be deemed so flagrant a vio- 

 lation of principle as to require no comment. Story 

 on the Constitution, sec. 819. 



"This bill proposes to regulate the State 

 elections of members of the State Legislature ; 

 precisely what Story says would indicate an 

 unmistakable design to destroy the State gov- 

 ernments. Again Justice Story says : 



Nor can it be said with correctness that Congress 

 can in anv way alter the rights or qualifications of 

 voters. 7^2., sec. 820. 



" Mr. Story seems to have adopted very near- 

 ly the language of Hamilton on the same sub- 

 ject in No. 59 of the Federalist, where he most 

 emphatically condemns the idea even of intro- 

 ducing such an article into the Constitution. 

 He says : 



Suppose an article had been introduced into the 

 Constitution empowering the United States to regu- 

 late the elections for the particular States, would any 

 man have hesitated to condemn it, both as an unwar- 

 rantable transposition of power and as a premedi- 

 tated engine for the destruction of the State govern- 

 ments? 



" In those days no man would have hesitated 

 to condemn it. The Constitution could never 

 have been adopted if it had contained the grant 

 of power to Congress to determine the qualifi- 

 cation of voters for officers of the States. Such 

 a work is left for these days of revolution and 

 usurpation to the mad fanatics who for parti- 

 pan ends would destroy our republic of States. 

 These authorities not only show that the power 

 to regulate the qualification of electors is not 

 granted to the Federal Government, but that 

 it ought not to be possessed by it. Mr. Story 

 says: 



It would be a most unwarrantable transfer of power 

 indicating a premeditated design to destroy the State 

 governments. 



" Mr. Hamilton calls it 



An unwarrantable transposition of power, * * * a 

 premeditated engine for the destruction of the State 

 governments. 



" Sir, for myself I most heartily indorse and 

 believe this. This measure originated in hos- 

 tility to the States, and most certainly menaces 

 their existence. Every step in the direction 

 of this bill and joint resolution is a step toward 

 centralization and consolidation. It evinces a 

 premeditated design upon the life of the States 

 a design to concentrate all the powers of 

 government in the Federal head. And with 

 this scheme consummated, and the others con- 

 templated by the party in power, there will be 

 very little left of the States ; the rights, pow- 

 ers, and all the vast interests confided to them 

 by the people, will be crushed and destroyed 

 under the advancing foot of empire. The 

 States cannot long stand against the grasping 

 and growing power of the Federal Govern- 

 ment. 



" Mr. Speaker, after the most careful exam- 

 ination 1 and inquiry, I venture the assertion 

 that no friend or advocate of the Constitution 

 at the time of its adoption by the Convention, 

 and ratification by the States, can be found to 

 have claimed even that the power to prescribe 

 the qualification of voters in. the States was 

 conferred upon the Federal Government. It 

 is true that the opponents of the Constitution 

 argued against it on the ground that it might 

 be so construed ; that Congress some future 

 "Congress might undertake to exercise the 

 power of determining what persons should ex- 

 ercise the right of suffrage. The gentleman 

 from Massachusetts (Mr. Boutwell) admits, as 

 I understood him, that this was the charge 

 made against the Constitution by its opponents. 

 Patrick Henry was one of them. He made 

 every argument which his great genius could 

 suggest to stir up hostility to it. But who but 

 the gentleman from Massachusetts would argue 

 a constitutional grant of power, against the 

 plain letter of the instrument, on the sugges- 

 tions of those opposed to it and seeking to de- 

 feat its adoption, merely because those sugges- 

 tions were undenied by its friends ? The 

 gentleman, however, is mistaken when he says 

 that the friends of the Constitution did not 

 deny that this power was conferred upon the 

 United States Government, or that the friends 

 did not deny this construction of those who 

 were opposed to it. It was not only denied in 

 the discussions in the Convention, but it was 

 deliberately denied by Hamilton and Madison 

 in the passage already quoted from the Feder- 

 alist. In my judgment, the evidence that the 

 power to regulate the qualification 'of voters 

 was left with the States, and that the Conven- 

 tion so intended from its language^ from the 

 declaration of the members, from the concur- 

 rent history, from all respectable commenta- 

 tors, is conclusive and overwhelming. Any 

 other conclusion will do violence to the plain 

 letter of the Constitution, and be a falsification 

 of the history and debates upon.it. 



