“I see that the House of Representatives approves, and by a very strong vote, the proposed Apportionment Amendment of the Constitution. I see, too, that nearly all the members who are the most radical friends of Freedom are included in this vote, and that there is, therefore, no room in the case for questioning motives. Freedom may, however, be wounded unwittingly. Nay, she may be wounded even in the house of her friends. Such is her fate in the present instance. And no less deep and dangerous is the wound, but, on the contrary, all the deeper and more dangerous, because inflicted by hands which aimed not to harm, but to help her. Moreover, though it is always consoling to be able to trace an error to the understanding, the error may, nevertheless, be quite as pernicious as if the heart were involved in it.
…
“A disgraceful, if not indeed fatal, blot upon the Constitution and country will be this one. Disgraceful is it to a government to license the gambling-house, even though it be on the condition of being paid for the license. Disgraceful to it to license the brothel or the dram-shop, even though on such condition. But how emphatically disgraceful for a government to license Slavery, that crime of crimes, even though the consideration in return for the license be very great, and the pay very tempting! This, however, is the deep disgrace with which the Apportionment Amendment threatens the Constitution and the country.… It is true that Slavery is not literally in the Amendment. It is true, too, that proscription from the ballot-box does not always mean Slavery. But it is also true, that, where such proscription is of one race by another, there is an instance where the proscribed are enslaved. The power, therefore, which this Amendment will give the Southern whites to withhold the ballot from the Southern blacks will be the power to enslave them. If they shall withhold from them the ballot, they will also withhold from them freedom.
…
“I notice that a common excuse among the friends of Freedom for favoring this Apportionment Amendment is, that we can get nothing better. I know not how that may be; but I do know that we can get nothing much worse, and that it would be far better to get nothing than to get this.”
I have also presented the petition of George T. Downing, Frederick Douglass, and others, representing the colored race in Washington, in which they give their opinions. Protesting against this proposition, as authorizing disfranchisement on account of race or color, they pray Congress
“To favor no Amendment of the Constitution of the United States which will grant or allow any one or all of the States of this Union to disfranchise any class of citizens on the ground of race or color.”
They then proceed:—
“In the Constitution, as it now stands, there is not a sentence nor syllable conveying any shadow of right or authority by which any State may make color or race a disqualification for the exercise of the right of suffrage, and the undersigned will regard as a real calamity the introduction of any words expressly or by implication giving any State or States such power; and we respectfully submit, that, if the Amendment now pending shall be adopted, it will enable any State to deprive any class of citizens of the elective franchise.”