federal Constitution that the States should impose no greater restrictions than were imposed by the laws of Congress. All the eminent men of the formative period of American history were opposed to the spirit of Native - Americanism. Of these the most illustrious were Wilson and Madison. Conceding that "the services of Madison were most eminent, next to him no one had impressed a stronger mark of his mind upon the Constitution than Wilson,"* a foreigner by birth, whose very name was an illustrious refutation of the fallacy of the doctrine. Nor were all the members of the Whig party blind to the folly of the crusade against naturalized citizens.†

Like the constitution of Massachusetts of 1780, that of Louisiana in 1812 required of the Governor a property qualification, in the form of landed estate of the value of five thousand dollars. The unpopularity of this qualification was illustrated in the election of Governor Mouton, in 1844, who

* This is one of the earliest tributes to this eminent jurist. At this point in the discussion a member of the convention read an extract from the Louisville Weekly Journal, whose editor, he said, was a distinguished writer and a personal and political friend of the late Whig candidate for the Presidency, and yet he pronounced himself decidedly against the movement of his party to organize under a new name and upon the principle of hostility to foreigners. The article was written immediately after the defeat of Clay, and might be considered a sort of funeral oration or explanation of the cause which prevented the Whigs from making a better fight. Another extract, from the New York Tribune, to the same effect, was read, and the member concluded his appeal for the equal rights of the native and the naturalized citizens of the country by citing the distinguished services of foreigners in the war for American independence.

Slavery Permeating the Whole Political Body

was inaugurated without inquiry as to his property. Even if he had lacked the qualification, his popularity would have insured his election. In like manner, and agreeable to public opinion, the religious and property qualifications for voters and office-holders disappeared in practice before they vanished from the State constitutions.

It was impossible to discuss any phase of the franchise without involving the institution of slavery, and Judah P. Benjamin, a member from Orleans, afterwards foremost in secession and in the formation of the Southern Confederacy, now warned his colleagues that they ought not to wrangle over distinctions between the rights of naturalized and native-born citizens, for a subject of vital importance, which ought to produce unanimity in their councils, demanded their attention, one that would obliterate all distinctions between Whigs and Democrats, and cause the whole South to form a single political party. The signs of the times plainly indicated that the peculiar institution of the slave-holding States must be guarded from an insidious foe the Abolitionist. The course of events was proving that the Southern States must maintain their rights, rely upon themselves, and not upon the stipulations in the federal compact.

On Friday, the 24th, the right to vote was limited to free white male citizens of the United States. In the slave-holding States the tendency was to require a longer residence than was customary in the free States. The whole attitude of slave-hold

*

ing communities was essentially unfriendly to newcomers. These commonwealths wished to be exclusive, and their exclusiveness bred a political conceit which the course of politics and industry in America did not warrant. In this respect the restrictions on the suffrage, which for a long time were in force in slave-holding communities, continued the prejudices of colonial times. The high wall of political exclusiveness thus erected around the slave-holding commonwealths practically deprived them of the energizing population which was pouring into the free States. In no part of the world was there ever a more ardent defence of the doctrine of political equality among men than that heard from time to time in constitutional conventions of the slave-holding States. But in none did equality include any but the white, the dominant race. In Northern conventions there was less said of the necessity for long residence in order to enable the new-comer to become familiar with the essential interests of the State. The homogeneous population of the North practically permitted a shorter residence for the voter, while the heterogeneous population of the South, as its needs were interpreted by Southern statesmen,

* See the speeches on citizenship and immigration in The History and Debates of the Convention of the People of Alabama, Begun and Held in the City of Montgomery on the Seventh Day of January, 1861; in which is preserved the Speeches of the Secret Sessions, and many valuable Papers. By William Smith, one of the Delegates from Tuscaloosa. Montgomery: White, Pfister & Co. Tuscaloosa: D. Woodruff. Atlanta: Wood, Honleiter, Rice & Co. 1861.

Cosmopolitan Characteristics of Louisiana

made a longer period necessary. Thus, directly and indirectly, slavery excluded immigration, and had the domestic effect of emphasizing in an undue degree the importance of the peculiar institution.*

In Louisiana political exclusiveness was less intense than in any other slave - holding commonwealth, because it was in part obliterated by the cosmopolitan character of the State. Its population sprang from different races-the African, the Spanish, the French, the English, the American. New Orleans was the commercial capital of the South. Therefore, in determining the time required for gaining a residence in the State, this cosmopolitan character of its population was a determining factor. The discussion of this qualification was not widely different from that in the Northwestern States in a similar economic situation. The State stood in need of population; it had immense resources, which could be fully developed only by a great number of people. Therefore, it ought to encourage immigration. Discouraged immigrants would elsewhere-to Arkansas or Texas. If a liberal policy was pursued those possessing ability and industry would come to the State, and it would then grow greater every day in wealth and imporIts commercial domain would then extend from the Alleghany Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico, from the Gulf to the remote parts of the earth. If freely encouraged to locate in Louisiana, immi

go

tance.

* See Calhoun's letter to King, August 12, 1844.

grants would there become rich and prosperous, and in times of danger strengthen the State.*

These liberal notions, however, were highly objectionable to many who wished the control of the State to be wholly in the hands of its native-born population and its oldest and richest families. As the debate proceeded, the constitutions of other States were freely quoted, particularly those of Iowa,† Alabama,‡ Michigan,§ Illinois, and Arkansas, whose provisions defining the elective franchise were regarded as expressing the liberal spirit of the American people. One member, in referring to these, said that he did not attach much authority to the eighteenth-century constitutions of the confederacy. They had been framed at a period when man's capacity for self-government was an unsolved problem, when our ablest statesmen were doubtful of the result of our great political experiment. Among those, however, there was one illustrious exception, "a man whose intellect towered above the age in which he lived, and mingled with the events of the coming generation." Jefferson, earlier than any of his contemporaries, had seen the successful issue of our republican institutions, and in his philosophical writings on government had left a priceless heritage to the younger statesmen of America. The doctrines of an exclusive suffrage had long been exploded. They

These ideas are almost identical with those expressed in Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, and Wisconsin in 1845-50. See the constitutional conventions of these States during these years.

† 1846.

$ 1819.

§ 1837.

1818.

1836.