“That the Constitution, when formed, shall be republican, and not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States and the principles of the Declaration of Independence.”[272]
Look now at this Constitution. Article III., entitled “Suffrage and Elections,” begins as follows:—
“Section 1. Every white male citizen of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, who is by birth, or has become by naturalization or by treaty, or shall have declared his intention to become, a citizen of the United States according to the laws thereof, and who shall have resided in the State of Colorado for six months preceding any election, and shall have been a resident for ten days of the precinct or election district where he offers to vote, shall be deemed a qualified elector, and entitled to vote at the same.”
Note well the text, “every white male citizen”: in other words, nobody who is not “white,” under this constitution, is recognized as entitled to the elective franchise. Now, Sir, I insist—and I here challenge reply from any Senator on this floor—that such a constitution does not comply with the requirement of the Enabling Act, that it is not republican, and that it is repugnant to the principles of the Declaration of Independence. I say that it is not republican; for the first principle of republican government is equality. Let that be denied, and you fail in republican government.
Mr. McDougall [of California]. In what age of the world was there a republic where there was equality? Please answer me that.… I would like to have the single instance where it existed in ancient times, in the middle ages, or in the modern ages.
Mr. Sumner. Speaking on that subject lately, I took occasion to show that there was no such case. The Senator is nearly right. There had been no such case. It was for our fathers, it was left to them, when they undertook to constitute a new government, to declare equality the essential and cardinal principle of a republic. My answer is precise: there had been no such case. But the true idea of a republican government began with our fathers, and its definition is found in their Declaration of Independence. Were they not sufficiently explicit? Is their language vague? Call it “a glittering generality,”—but there it is, in immortal text, whose truth will be recognized more and more as time advances. You may not recognize it now, but others after you will do it reverence.
I say, therefore, that this constitution is repugnant to the principles of the Declaration of Independence. I say that the government which it constitutes is not a republican government. And now the question is, how that difficulty shall be met. I know well that Senators may say, But there are States in the Union with the same discrimination. Connecticut has it; New York also. But permit me to say, these instances do not at all touch the argument. We are not called now to review the constitution of Connecticut or New York, but we are called at this moment, in the discharge of a solemn duty, to review the constitution of this proposed State. If called in this Chamber, under the responsibilities of official position, to review the constitution of Connecticut or New York, my course would be clear to say that it was not republican in form; but there is no such occasion, and therefore we have no such responsibility. There are other States with regard to which we have at this moment that responsibility, and I allude to them for illustration: I mean the States lately in rebellion. Their constitutions have been overthrown or subverted; new constitutions have been set up, which it becomes the solemn duty of Congress to examine, to see whether they are republican in form, and not repugnant to the principles of the Declaration of Independence. We have, in relation to those States, the very responsibility now pressing upon us with regard to this new candidate, distant Colorado. We must examine the constitutions, and see whether or not they are in conformity with those sublime principles which enter into the true idea of a republican government.
Again, Sir, I would urge, that, at this moment, when the whole country is agitated by the great question, What shall be done for the protection of the colored race?—to what extent we shall exercise the high powers of Congress to carry that protection into the Rebel States,—it will be hardly decent for us, in reviewing the constitution of a new State, not to apply the highest possible test. It will not do for us now to recognize this constitution of Colorado as republican in form. We owe it to ourselves to set an example, and to require that in a State organized under our influence a good example shall prevail. How many of us heard with regret the result last autumn in Connecticut, and again in Wisconsin, by which suffrage to the colored race was denied! We felt that by those two votes Liberty had suffered, that an enfranchised race was placed in jeopardy, that its rights were dishonored by those who ought to have upheld them; and now, Sir, you have cast upon you in this Chamber that same identical responsibility. You are, with reference to the constitution of Colorado, in the precise position of the people of Connecticut with regard to their own constitution, and the people of Wisconsin with regard to theirs. Some of us have regretted poignantly the policy of those two States: I hope there will be no occasion to regret any similar policy in this Chamber. And now, Sir, in order to bring the Senate to a vote on that question, I send to the Chair an amendment to the bill.
The Secretary read the amendment, namely:—