THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT 203 



measure could have been carried, the most perplexing features of the 

 race problem would have been avoided and the era of carpet-bag 

 government and the KuKlux Klan would have been impossibilities. 

 The plan, however, met with but little favor, and the reason for this 

 is not hard to see. In the mind of the average Republican, good 

 citizenship and loyalty to the government could be possessed only by 

 those who were identified with the Republican party. This resolu- 

 tion would leave the government of the Southern States in the hands 

 of the Southern Whites who had almost to a man participated in the 

 Rebellion, and who were all Democrats as a matter of course. Under 

 these conditions they felt that the passage of Senator Howard's reso- 

 lution would be an open invitation for the confederate leaders to re- 

 sume their control of the South, and to speedily introduce a social 

 system little if any different from the old slavery. 



The debate was closed on March 9th. No amendment to the 

 original resolution proved satisfactory and the resolution itself failed 

 to receive the requisite two-thirds majority, the vote standing 

 twenty-five yeas to twenty- two nays. The failure of the resolution 

 was a great disappointment to many, but before two months had 

 passed by, the joint committee had framed another joint resolution 

 which it was hoped would meet with greater favor ('^ Mr. Stevens, 

 like Senator Sumner, would have preferred far more radical measures 

 but as he said in his opening speech supporting it, he thought it was 

 all that public opinion would justify. 



The section which corresponded in its general purport to the 

 resolution submitted in January was supposed to be worded rather 

 more conservatively. It read as reported from the committee that 

 " Representatives shall be apportioned among the states according to 

 their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons, ex- 

 cluding Indians not taxed. But whenever in any state the elective 

 franchise shall be denied to any male citizen not less than twenty- 

 one years of age or in any way abridged except for participation in 

 rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation in such states 

 shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of male citizens 



(1) Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 1st Session, p. 2286. 



