“Insert at the end of the second section the following proviso:—
“Provided, That this Act shall not take effect except upon the fundamental condition that within the State there shall be no denial of the electoral franchise, or of any other rights, on account of race or color, but all persons shall be equal before the law. And the people of the Territory shall, by a majority of the voters, at public meetings to be convened by the Governor of the Territory, declare their assent to this fundamental condition; and the Governor shall transmit to the President of the United States an authentic statement of such assent, whenever the same shall be given, upon receipt whereof he shall by proclamation announce the fact; whereupon, without any other proceedings on the part of Congress, this Act shall take effect.”
This amendment was similar to that offered by Mr. Sumner on the Louisiana Bill,[273] and was modelled on what is known as the Missouri precedent, which he proceeded to explain, and then said:—
Possibly a question may arise as to the effect of such a fundamental condition. I do not think there can be any question. I do not doubt that such a fundamental condition, especially if sanctioned by the popular vote according to the terms of the proviso, will be absolutely obligatory on the State. I believe that you may apply to it the language of Mr. Webster’s great speech in reply to Mr. Hayne, where, describing and vindicating the Ordinance for the government of the Northwest Territory, he used this very striking, and, to my mind, exquisitely beautiful language, as simple as it is expressive:—
“It laid the interdict against personal servitude in original compact, not only deeper than all local law, but deeper also than all local constitutions.”[274]
Now, Sir, I call upon the Senate to do for this far Western Territory the same in kind as was done by our fathers for the whole vast Northwest Territory,—to lay an interdict against all inequality of rights in original compact, not only deeper than all local law, but deeper than all local constitutions. Let that be done, and one of the objections to the admission of Colorado will be removed.
Mr. Stewart, of Nevada, followed Mr. Sumner.
March 13th, the debate was resumed, when Mr. Pomeroy, of Kansas, Mr. Lane, of Kansas, Mr. McDougall, of California, Mr. Trumbull, of Illinois, Mr. Cragin, of New Hampshire, Mr. Ramsey, of Minnesota, and Mr. Williams, of Oregon, spoke for the admission; Mr. Saulsbury, of Delaware, Mr. Grimes, of Iowa, Mr. Hendricks, of Indiana, Mr. Wade, of Ohio, Mr. Doolittle, of Wisconsin, and Mr. Conness, of California, spoke against the admission. The chief topics were the Enabling Act and the want of population. In the course of the debate, Mr. Sumner insisted that the population had diminished, and then said:—
But, unhappily, this is not the only way in which this community has fallen,—fallen in population, as my friend says,—fallen, as I shall proceed to show positively, in another respect, far more important than population.
He then showed[275] that the Legislative Assembly of the Territory, at its first session under the organic act, by an act approved November 6, 1861, had provided “that every male person” with qualification of residence should be deemed a qualified voter; but that was amended by another act, approved March 11, 1864, by inserting the words “not being a negro or mulatto,” which reappeared in the limitation of the constitution before the Senate. He then said:—