CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



277 



tod important legislative functions. They dis- 

 charge United States duties ; they are amenable 

 t<> tlio rules and government of this House, 

 call them what you will. 



" I have said that this clause which I have 

 read, though it confers no right of suffrage, yet 

 adopts to its suffrage that class of voters which 

 are here described. The doctrine of conveying 

 rights by description is not unknown to any of 

 my friends. I may convey to my friend a lot 

 in this city ; if I choose I may describe it by 

 proper metes and bounds, or I may say ' lot 

 numbered 1 in subdivision of square numbered 

 1, as surveyed and recorded in the clerk's office 

 by the surveyor of the city,' and when my 

 friend takes the title for that lot does he take 

 it from me or does he take it from the surveyor 

 who describes it ? 



44 The fourteenth amendment of the Consti- 

 tution of the United States declares that all 

 persons born or naturalized in the United States 

 are citizens of the United States and citizens 

 of the State in which they reside. Do they take 

 their title of citizenship from the mothers who 

 bore them or the court which naturalized them, 

 or from the Constitution of the United States 

 which describes and adopts them ? The Speak- 

 er of this House, under certain contingencies, 

 may become the President of the United States, 

 because he had been elected by the citizens of 

 Philadelphia, and afterward selected by our 

 votes to be Speaker. Does he derive that title 

 from the Constitution of the United States or 

 from the votes of the Fourth Ward of the city 

 of Philadelphia ? It seems to me to be too clear 

 for argument. There are some propositions 

 which in their statement are so conclusive that 

 you confuse them by illustration or argument. 



44 Now, then, if this be a United States elec- 

 tion for members of the United States Govern- 

 ment, who are to have United States qualifica- 

 tions and to execute United States laws, is it 

 not a right guaranteed to every citizen that 

 that election shall be fair? Gentlemen will 

 say there are no citizens or would have said 

 in the old time there are no citizens except 

 the citizens of a State, and therefore it is they 

 who must protect the rights which are guaran- 

 teed to citizens. Since the adoption of the 

 fourteenth amendment, as I have said, there 

 are citizens of the United States independent 

 of and above the States; and by that Consti- 

 tution they are as citizens entitled to every 

 right which is there guaranteed and secured. 

 More than that, this House, this national Le- 

 gislature, is the judge of the election, qualifica- 

 tion, and returns of its own members. Is that 

 a State function or a United States function ? 

 And may it not be reasonably said, may it not 

 be irresistibly argued, that the Congress of the 

 United States has the right, if it chooses to 

 exercise it, to make all laws and all rules which 

 are necessary to give them all the information 

 which it is proper and necessary they should 

 have in order to decide upon these questions? 



44 But it is not necessary to argue from gen- 



eral propositions upon this subject. By the 

 eighth section of the first article of the Consti- 

 tution it is provided that Congress shall have 

 power 4 to make all laws which shall be neces- 

 sary and proper for carrying into execution the 

 foregoing powers, and all other powers vested 

 by this Constitution in the Government of the 

 United States or in any department or officer 

 thereof.' In the very section of the Constitu- 

 tion which gives this right and declares this 

 qualification and establishes this election, and 

 which also gives the right to Congress, when 

 they choose, to make all needed regulations 

 with regard to the time, place, and manner of 

 holding it in the very concluding section of 

 that article the power to make these laws is 

 expressly and explicitly given. Now, then, 

 Mr. Chairman, what does that mean ? If there 

 is any remark to be made about this Constitu- 

 tion, it is that it was the work of master hands, 

 and that, dealing in general statements and gen- 

 eral terms, there is nothing within it which is 

 unnecessary to its operation. Let us see wheth- 

 er it covers the whole of this case. The dis- 

 tinguished gentleman from Alabama [Mr. Lew- 

 is], who opened this debate in a speech which 

 seemed to me to be as fair, as compendious, 

 and as logical as any that I have heard, put 

 this proposition on what seemed to me to be 

 its strongest ground, if strong ground it has. 

 He said that this was an alternate power of the 

 United States Government, which resided origi- 

 nally in the States, and could not be exercised 

 by the United States unless the State refused 

 or neglected properly to exercise it. If I have 

 misstated the proposition, I see the gentleman 

 in his seat, and I hope he will correct me. He 

 founded that assertion on the language of some 

 of the writers of that time, and also on the de- 

 bates on the Constitution in various of the 

 States, and on the protests which some of the 

 States made against its adoption. But it seems 

 to me that the very argument on which he 

 founded it avails for its overthrow. It was an 

 objection made by the States. Why ? Because 

 it was not an ultimate power, but because it 

 was an original power. It was an objectiona- 

 ble clause to which they proposed amendments, 

 but those amendments, after consideration, 

 were not adopted, and the original Constitu- 

 tion remained as it was." 



Mr. Chalmers of Mississippi: " There are 

 two laws standing upon the statute-book in 

 regard to supervisors of elections, one made 

 for the country, the other made for the city, 

 confessedly made for the city of New York ; 

 and John Davenport boasts that they were 

 made at his dictation. The city of New York 

 is Democratic; the country districts are Re- 

 publican: Hence we find that, through the in- 

 genuity of this matchless trickster in politics, 

 we have one law for the Democrat and another 

 for the Republican, The supervisors who are 

 to watch over the Democratic polls are en- 

 trusted with extraordinary power, to supervise 

 registration, in effect to determine the qualifi- 



