CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



257 



tors of a State, then it might be proper that the 

 Federal supervisors should be present to inter- 



5 ret and execute the laws; but under what 

 octrine of constitutional law, on what prin- 

 ciple of government will you say that super- 

 visors appointed by the Federal Government, 

 strangers to the laws of Ohio, shall stand at 

 the polls and interpret our laws and execute 

 them? 



" The third objection is that these supervis- 

 ing officers are armed with authority unknown 

 in the history of the common law or State laws. 

 They have authority at the polls on the day of 

 election to arrest, without warrant, any man 

 whom they may suspect of being about to en- 

 gage in a violation of the laws. There is no 

 principle of common law or State law which 

 can authorize the arrest of citizens on suspicion 

 of an intention to commit an offense. Here 

 are men who honestly believe that they have 

 the right to vote, and who on going to the 

 polls to deposit their ballots are confronted 

 with this extraordinary invasion of the rights 

 of civil liberty and arrested, and, as in the city 

 of New York, incarcerated in many instances 

 for days. What an extraordinary scene was 

 presented for a republican government in the 

 city of New York at the last election ! Thou- 

 sands of men who had failed to get out their 

 naturalization papers in a way that suited the 

 judgment of the supervisor of elections were 

 arrested upon sight. At one time over six 

 hundred men were under arrest who had gone 

 to the polls honestly believing that they had 

 the right to vote. They had committed no 

 breach of the peace ; they had committed no 

 felony. They had attempted to exercise what 

 they believed to be their right and their duty. 

 Yet they were incarcerated and prevented from 

 voting. Since that time a judicial tribunal to 

 which the case was referred has determined 

 that these men were not guilty; that they 

 were innocent ; that they were entitled to vote 

 at the election. A power so outrageous as 

 that upon the right of suffrage and the exer- 

 cise of the duties of a freeman, I venture to 

 say, has not within this century been exer- 

 cised before under any government, monarchi- 

 cal or despotic. 



" Another point which I urge against them 

 as a reason for their repeal, and one which 

 so overshadowingly is greater than the others 

 that I have been loath and hesitated to discuss 

 it. It is that these measures in their very 

 nature and essence are dangerous and destruc- 

 tive to civil liberty. All history is full of warn- 

 ings upon this subject. No republic which has 

 ever perished from the face of the earth has 

 gone to its grave save through military in- 

 fluence. The familiarization of the people 

 through the army with the forms of despot- 

 ism, the gradual abrogation of the forms of the 

 republic, and the ultimate subversion of all 

 civil government have marked the career of 

 every republic from its birth to its grave, and 

 hall we escape the force and application of 

 VOL. six. 17 A 



the universal rule? IB power less sweet, are 

 rights more sacred, are liberties more secure 

 in this country, so that we can dare without 

 harm to trifle with a danger that has wrought 

 ruin everywhere before ? From lands where 

 republics have died and where monarchies have 

 been erected on their ruins ; from lands where 

 the contest for liberty is now going on ; from 

 lands where the shadow of despotism darkens 

 every household and compels every citizen to 

 seek shelter upon some foreign shore, helpless 

 to free himself at home, there come the sol- 

 emn notes of warning against military inter- 

 ference. 



" From the presence of troops at the polls 

 to the control of elections by troops is but a 

 single step. In that step free elections are 

 gone ; and free elections are the source of free 

 government and the author and originator of 

 its power. Troops at the polls mean intimi- 

 dation of voters ; troops at the polls mean as 

 its result the registration of the will of the 

 commander ; troops at the polls mean the sub- 

 stitution of the bayonet for the ballot, the en- 

 thronement of the Commander-in-Chief, and 

 the deposition of the President. I have been 

 astounded, as this debate has continued, to 

 hear from gentlemen upon the other side ar- 

 guments in favor of the use of troops at the 

 polls, the last place in the world where such 

 arguments should be heard ; but my regret is 

 lost in joy when I recollect that the party of 

 the army is not in power in this Congress. 



" I do not know, Mr. Chairman, even what 

 will be the action of this House upon this bill. 

 I certainly do not know what will be the action , 

 of the President of the United States when the 

 bill is submitted to him, if it shall pass ; much 

 less can I know what will be the action of the 

 House when the bill may be returned to us 

 with his objections. But this much I do know, 

 that if the power of withholding supplies shall 

 be exercised, then never in all the contests for 

 liberty in English history, never in all the vic- 

 tories which have made that little stormy 

 island the center of civilization of the world, 

 never in all the struggles for the rights of 

 man, was the power of holding supplies exer- 

 cised more wisely than it will be when we ex- 

 ercise it to preserve the freedom of elections, 

 to subordinate in times of peace the military 

 power to the civil authority, and to preserve 

 pure and uncontaminated the sources of free 

 government." 



Mr. Robeson of New Jersey : " It seems to 

 have been assumed on the other side of this 

 Chamber that this is nothing but the repeal of 

 a section of a law enacted in 1865 ; that it is a 

 negative and not an affirmative provision. 

 Let us see exactly what it is : 



"That section 2002 of tho Be vised Statutes bo 

 amended so as to read as follows : 



'"No military or naval officer, or other person en- 

 gaged in the civil, military, or naval service of the 

 United States, shall order, oring, keep, or have under 

 his authority or control any troops or armed men at 

 the place where any general or special election is held 



