History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States

by William Horatio Barnes

Mr. Pike, of Maine, had, on the assembling of Congress after the holidays, offered a resolution, expressing the idea contained in the report of the committee, but on reflection had come to the conclusion that the resolution would not accomplish the purpose desired. He stated his reasons for changing his opinion. He thought that the provisions of the proposed amendment might be evaded. "Suppose," said he, "this constitutional amendment in full force, and a State should provide that the right of suffrage should not be exercised by any person who had been a slave, or who was the descendant of a slave, whatever his race or color. I submit that it is a serious matter of doubt whether or not that simple provision would not be sufficient to defeat this constitutional amendment which we here so laboriously enact and submit to the States."

Mr. Conkling thought that this criticism could have no practical importance, from the fact that the proposed amendment was to operate in this country, where one race, and only one, has been held in servitude.

Mr. Pike replied: "In no State in the South has slavery been confined to any one race. So far as I am acquainted with their statutes, in no State has slavery been confined to the African race. I know of no slave statute, and I have examined the matter with some care, which says that Africans alone shall be slaves. So much for race. As to color, it was a common thing throughout the whole South to advertise runaway slaves as having light hair and blue eyes, and all the indications of the Caucasian race, and 'passing themselves off for white men.' I say further to the honorable gentleman from New York, that well-authenticated instances exist in every slave State where men of Caucasian descent, of Anglo-Saxon blood, have been confined in slavery, and they and their posterity held as slaves; so that not only free blacks were found every-where, but white slaves also abounded."

Mr. Kelley, who next addressed the House, also brought proof to controvert the "hasty assertion" that but one race had been enslaved: "The assertion that white persons have been sold into slavery does not depend on common report, but is proven by the reports of the superior courts of almost every Southern State. One poor German woman, who had arrived in our country at thirteen years of age, was released from slavery by the Supreme Court of Louisiana, but not until she had become the mother of three mulatto children, her owner having mated her with one of his darker slaves. Toward the close of the last century, the Supreme Court of New Jersey decided that American Indians could be reduced to and legally held in slavery. And so long ago as 1741 white slave women were so common in North Carolina, that the Legislature passed a law dooming to slavery the child of every 'white servant woman' born of an Indian father."

Mr. Kelley thought that the enforcement of this long-dormant power of the Constitution would be for the benefit not merely of the poor, the ignorant, and the weak, but also of the wise, "the strong, and the wealthy of our country." "There is now pending," said he, "before the Legislature of regenerated and, as gentlemen would have us believe, reconstructed Virginia, a bill to require five years' residence on the part of citizens of other States who may invest their capital and settle within the sacred limits of the Old Dominion before they can acquire citizenship. If they may pass a limitation of five years, why may they not pass a limitation of fifty? Why will not any limitation that comes within the ordinary duration of human life be admissible?"

Mr. Bromwell, obtaining the floor, inquired whether the question was in such condition that any amendment or substitute could be offered. The Speaker replied: "Six amendments are pending now. The only one that could be offered would be to amend the amendment of the gentleman from Pennsylvania, [Mr. Stevens,] which was, to add the word 'therein' in the fifteenth line. No other amendment would be in order now, the whole legislative power to amend being exhausted."

Mr. Bromwell had desired to offer an amendment which, in his opinion, would obviate many of the objections to pending joint resolution, and the amendments thereto; but the way not being open for this, he addressed the House in a brief speech. He said: "When this amendment was introduced, on last Monday morning, the differences of opinion which have been developed in reference to the principles of the amendment were not anticipated. But to-day we see that it has, so far, not an advocate upon this floor. Such may be the result with every amendment which may be presented. It is difficult to see, among all the amendments which are now pending, any one of them, or any combination of them, that will meet the desire of the majority, not to say two-thirds of this House. I apprehend that the members of this House desire to act so as to secure the support of a proper majority here. I apprehend, also, that they desire to make this amendment such that it will meet with the sanction of a sufficient number of the States of the Union to make it effectual. Now, sir, it is in vain for this Congress to launch an amendment which shall die on the road through the Legislatures."

Notwithstanding the difficulties in the way of all the plans proposed, Mr. Bromwell was heartily in favor of modifying the basis of representation. "I think," said he, "seventy years is long enough for fifteen, twenty, or thirty Representatives to sit here and make laws to apply to Northern people, with no constituencies behind them. I think it has been seen long enough that a large number of persons called property, made property by the laws of the States, shall give to the oligarchs of those particular districts of country the right to outvote the independent men of the North, of the free States, where some approximation has been made to securing God-given rights to all inhabitants. I think that it is wrong that the further a State recedes from common right and common justice the more power the oligarchy which controls it shall grasp in their hands; and I desire that this amendment shall be made so that it shall bear down upon that abuse with the crushing power of three-fourths of the legislatures of the Union."

After the House had heard so many objectors to the basis of representation, as proposed by the committee, Mr. Cook, of Illinois, took the floor in favor of the measure. He said: "We have now, as I believe, the golden opportunity to remedy this evil which will never come again to the men of this generation. The system of slavery has fallen. The States whose representation was increased by it have, with two or three exceptions, destroyed their loyal and legal State governments, and now seek reconstruction. The adoption of this amendment by the States lately in rebellion should be one of the guarantees to be insisted upon as a condition precedent to their taking equal authority and rank in the Union with the loyal States."

To the proposition that the basis of representation should be voters only, Mr. Cook presented the following objections: