SUFFRAGE BETWEEN 1865 AND 1870
In 1865, the only States that permitted Negroes to vote on the same footing as white persons were Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin. New York and Tennessee permitted a restricted Negro suffrage.
The changes in the suffrage laws between 1865 and 1870 indicate what might have taken place had not the United States interfered with the Fifteenth Amendment. The Reconstruction Constitutions[[675]] of the Southern States in 1868 and 1869 extended the suffrage to Negroes. These Constitutions, however, did not express the will of the Southern white people at the time in regard to suffrage. The Constitution of Maryland,[[676]] of 1867, permitted only white persons to vote; and that of Nebraska,[[677]] of 1866–67, under which it sought admission to the Union, did not give the suffrage to Negroes.
Negro suffrage was voted down in New York[[678]] in 1868, as it had been in 1846 and 1860, by a vote of 282,403 to 249,802. By the act of territorial government of Colorado, of 1861, suffrage was restricted to white persons. But an act of the legislature[[679]] of that Territory, enacted in November, 1861, seemed to extend the right to vote to Negroes. This was amended,[[680]] however, in 1864, by expressly excluding Negroes and mulattoes from the suffrage. The legislature of Connecticut[[681]] of 1865 proposed an amendment to the Constitution whereby Negroes would be given the right to vote, the same to be submitted to the people for their ratification. Minnesota[[682]] and Wisconsin,[[683]] in 1865, submitted constitutional amendments providing for Negro suffrage. According to Representative Hardwick,[[684]] of Georgia, “Negro suffrage was rejected by decisive majorities.” It was after the 1865 Amendment had been defeated at the polls in Wisconsin that the Supreme Court of that State, as has been seen, held that Negroes had been given the right to vote by a law of 1849.
The word “white” was stricken from the Constitution of Iowa[[685]] by the legislature of 1867–68, and this action was ratified by a vote of 105,384 to 81,384. Minnesota[[686]] amended its Constitution in 1868 so as to extend suffrage to Negroes. On December 30, 1867, the word “white” was stricken from the election laws of Dakota Territory.[[687]]
On June 8, 1867, Congress passed, over the President’s veto, a bill first introduced in 1865 establishing Negro suffrage in the District of Columbia. Before its passage, provision had been made by Congress to submit the question to a vote of the people. The extension of suffrage to Negroes was rejected by a vote of 6,521 to 35 in Washington City and 812 to 1 in Georgetown. In spite of this vote the Thirty-ninth Congress ordained Negro suffrage for the District. After four years, the government of the District was so changed that suffrage was taken from all the residents. In 1866, Congress established Negro suffrage in all the Territories of the United States.[[688]]
The second section of the Fourteenth Amendment, proposed June 16, 1866, and declared in force June 28, 1868, reads: “Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.” The Amendment did not prohibit the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on account of race or color, but provided that, if such right was denied or abridged, the State must suffer the consequence of having its representation in Congress reduced. One feels safe in saying that the purpose of the National Government in adopting this section of the Fourteenth Amendment was to induce the States, particularly the Southern States, to extend suffrage to the Negro. With the possible exception of Minnesota, no State appears to have heeded the warning between 1868 and 1870.
One cannot say what would have been the result had the National Government rested there—whether or not of their own accord the various States would have extended the suffrage to Negroes—because, within less than two years, the Fifteenth Amendment had deprived the States of any choice in the matter by providing that they must not deny or abridge the right to vote on account of race or color.