CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



201 



said State," and inserting " voters of said State 

 registered at the date of said submission." 



Mr. Stockton, of New Jersey, said : " Under 

 what principle, I ask, can you deprive a sov- 

 ereign State of representation when you admit 

 that it is sovereign ? You have defended your- 

 selves heretofore by saying that these States 

 were not in the Union, that they needed re- 

 construction ; but now, remember, you recon- 

 struct them first, and then you do not say that 

 they are not reconstructed; you do not say 

 that they are not legal States ; you do not say 

 in your amendment that they are not a part of 

 the Union, that their State governments cannot 

 work regularly, but simply that they shall not 

 be entitled to representation. How are they 

 to be entitled to representation ? Has General 

 Lpngstreet entitled himself to office and to have 

 his disabilities removed ? Are they to bathe 

 in Jordan? Is that the only way? Abana 

 and Pharpar are rivers of Damascus ; but they 

 are not the river Jordan. They must bathe in 

 the pool of your party politics before they can 

 be cleansed. They are to join with you in as- 

 sisting to strike out the word ' white ' from the 

 constitutions of the Northern States. They are 

 to be forced to do this under the amending 

 clause of the Constitution which requires a 

 ratification by sovereign States. Do you sup- 

 pose that your fifteenth amendment will ever 

 become a part of the Constitution of this coun- 

 try under this bill ? Never. The ratification 

 thus forced is unconstitutional. The means 

 of altering the compact made by sovereign 

 States is provided in the instrument itself, and 

 that is a ratification ; and that ratification re- 

 quires that every State shall have a free choice 

 and a free vote ; and when you say to your 

 slaves, when you say to the Southern States, 

 ' We have conquered you ; you are conquered 

 provinces ; we have entered upon and possessed 

 your land ; you are slaves of our sword and 

 our spear ; you can only be admitted to the 

 position of freemen again by ratifying this con- 

 stitutional amendment,' do you allow them a 

 free vote? No, sir; they are powerless. They 

 cannot ratify it. Can they assist you in strik- 

 ing the word ' white ' out of the constitution 

 of my State without a free choice at all, with- 

 out being States themselves even on your own 

 theory ? No, Mr. President." 



Mr. Bayard, of Delaware, said : " The fif- 

 teenth amendment to the Constitution is plain- 

 ly, to my mind, the most dangerous claim of 

 power, the most destructive to the system of 

 our Government, that ever was or could be de- 

 vised. If I know aught of the Government 

 under which we live, it is the elective franchise, 

 it is the process of carrying on Government by 

 the elective system that marks it from its first 

 organization to its last act. It is a power that 

 must be, in the very nature of things, the con- 

 trolling power, because the election is your 

 test of power, of law in every shape, and at 

 every stage of your country's Government. 

 That power you propose to take from the States 



and deposit with the Federal Government, to 

 consolidate the power of all powers, that which 

 underlies and creates all other powers; and 

 that you propose to place in the hands of Con- 

 gress! There never was a graver question, 

 there never was an act which will affect the 

 whole structure and genius of our Government 

 to the extent that this must, should it succeed 

 in obtaining the consent of the people of this 

 country. 



" It has been demonstrated before this Senate, 

 in a manner that could not be and has not been 

 replied to, by my honorable friend, the Senator 

 from Ohio (Mr. Thurman), that by the amend- 

 ment of the honorable Senator from Indiana 

 (Mr. Morton) you do coerce the choice not 

 only of the Southern States, which is a bare- 

 faced act of simple power, but you coerce the 

 sentiment of every Northern State under your 

 pretended power of governing the Southern 

 States. Talk of the free choice of Indiana or 

 Ohio or New York ! What is it when Con- 

 gress can by law insist that the votes of certain. 

 States shall be cast in opposition to it ? All 

 freedom is gone. Sir, when Congress adopts 

 such a measure as this, it is doing nothing less 

 than playing with cogged dice. It is the inten- 

 tion, therefore, by a measure like this to de- 

 stroy, first, all shadow of freedom in the exer- 

 cise of their opinions by the people of these 

 three States, and next, having destroyed that, 

 to make their votes the instrument whereby 

 you crush out the sentiment of the Northern 

 States. Per fas aut nefas seems to me to be 

 the rule by which this amendment is to be 

 forced upon the American people; and the 

 question will yet come up it cannot be long 

 kept down how any law, how any amend- 

 ment obtained by means like this, can be held 

 binding upon the conscience of a people who 

 have neither the sense nor the manhood to re- 

 main free." 



The bill, as amended, was passed by the 

 following vote : 



YEAS Messrs. Abbott, Boreman, Brownlow, Buck- 

 ingham, Carpenter, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conk- 

 ling, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Fenton, Ferry, Fessen- 

 den, Hamlin, Harris, Howard, Howe, McDonald, 

 Morrill, Morton, Nye, Patterson, Pomeroy, Pratt, 

 Eamsey, Eice, Eobertson, Boss, Sawyer, Schurz, 

 Scott, Sherman, Spencer, Stewart, Sumner, Thayer, 

 Tipton, Trumbull, Warner, Willey, Williams, and 

 Wilson 44. 



NATS Messrs. Bayard, Casserly, Davis, Fowler, 

 McCreery, Norton, Sprague, Stockton, and Thurman 

 9. 



ABSENT Messrs. Anthony, Cameron, Edmunds, 

 Gilbert, Grimes, Hamilton, Harlan, Kellogg, Osborn, 

 Pool, Saulsbury, Vickers, and Yates 13. 



The House concurred in the amendments of 

 the Senate. 



In the House, on April 9th, Mr. Banks, of 

 Massachusetts, offered the following resolu- 

 tion: 



Resolved ~by the House of Eepresentatives^ That the 

 people of the United States sympathize with the peo- . 

 pie of Cuba in their patriotic efforts to secure their 

 independence and establish a republican form of gov- 



