people," was made by General Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina, and negatived by eight States against three. Two weeks afterwards a resolution that representatives "ought to be appointed in such manner as the legislature of each State shall direct" was rejected by a vote of six States to four in its favor; one being divided.12 An attempt by Gouverneur Morris to confine the franchise to freeholders obtained the support of no State but Delaware.18 In the end unanimity prevailed.14 From the beginning of representation in England, the members of the House of Commons were chosen by a direct popular vote; while in France representatives of the third estate in the States General, and until the middle of the present century, members of the Assembly, were usually chosen by electoral colleges, so that the people voted only for electors. The advantages of this system were supposed to be that the selected wisdom of 11 June 6th, 1787; Connecticut, New Jersey, South Carolina, ay; Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, no (ibid. pp. 160164). "He 12 This resolution was moved by Gen. Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina. Yeas: Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware and South Carolina. Nays: Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia. (Ibid., pp. 223–224.) Maryland was divided (ibid, p. 388). 13 Gouverneur Morris said: had long learned not to be the dupe of words. The sound of aristocracy, therefore, had no effect upon him. It was the thing, not the name, to which he was opposed; and one of his principal objections to the Constitution, as it was now before us, is, that it threatens the country with an aristocracy. The aristocracy will grow out of the House of Representatives. Give the votes to people who have no property, and they will sell them to the rich, who will be able to buy them. We should not confine our attention to the present moment. The time is not far distant when this country will abound with mechanics and manufacturers, who will receive their bread from their employers. Will such men be the secure and faithful guardians of liberty? Will they be the impregnable barrier against aristocracy? He was as little duped by the association of the words 'taxation and representation.' The man who does not give his vote freely is not represented. It is the man who dictates the vote. Children do not vote. Why? Because they have no will of their own. The ignorant and dependent can be as little trusted with the public interest. He did not conceive the difficulty of defining 'freeholders' to be insuperable; still less that the restriction would be unpopular. Ninetenths of the people are at present freeholders, and these will certainly be pleased with it. As to merchants, &c., if they have wealth and value the right, they can acquire it. If not, they don't deserve." (Ibid., pp. 386, 387.) 14 Ibid., p. 389. the college was greater than the aggregate wisdom of the people. In practice it has been found that such a course on the one hand tends to lower the character of the representative, since it facilitates intrigue if not bribery, and on the other lessens his care for his constituents, to whom he is not directly responsible. The experience of France has taught that country as well as others the unwisdom of such a method of election.15 The natural imitation of the practice in the mother country had made the colonial legislatures elected directly by the people, and the same practice had prevailed in the early State constitutions, except in Maryland, where the senate was chosen through an intermediate body of electors. In the debates over this provision, the advocates of a choice of the lower house of Congress by the State legislatures rested upon the argument of Sherman. "The people," he said, "immediately should have as little to do as may be about the government. They want information, and are constantly liable to be misled." 16 Those who prevailed, referred to the practice in England and the States as proving the safety and advantages of a direct popular election, and pointed out the danger of placing the existence of the national government at the mercy of the State legislatures. They applauded the remark of Wilson: "On examination, it would be found that the opposition of the States to federal measures had proceeded much more from the officers of the States than from the people at large." 17 The subject remained within the exclusive jurisdiction of the States until the close of the Civil War. They gradually extended the franchise, except as regards negroes and women, till the right of suffrage in State and Federal elections was possessed by every free white male inhabitant, a citizen of the United States, of sound mind and not a pauper, with no other qualification; except in a few States the payment of a poll-tax or capacity to read and write, and in Rhode Island a discrimination against citizens of foreign birth, upon whom a property qualification was imposed, besides a property qualification for all voters at municipal elections, which authorized the imposition of a tax or the expenditure of money. 15 See Burke's Observations on the French Revolution. 16 Madison Papers, Elliot's Debates, 2d ed., vol. v, p. 136. 17 Ibid., pp. 136, 137. § 52. The Fifteenth Amendment. The condition of the emancipated blacks in the insurrectionary States at the close of the Civil War, seemed to demand some interposition for their relief; but even then the serious consequences of a sudden push into the franchise of a horde of men unaccustomed to control their own persons and property, much less fitted to aid in the government of States, in three of which they were in a majority, made both the Presidents and Congress pause. Lincoln in his attempts at reconstruction went no further than a tentative suggestion that one State should grant the right of suffrage to colored men who had fought in the Union army.1 Johnson tried by his influence to induce the Southern States to grant the ballot to those who could read and write or who paid taxes on real estate assessed at two hundred and fifty dollars.2 But neither recommendation was adopted; and the invariable result of an oligarchy followed, namely, legislation oppressive to the disfranchised class.3 Congress at first had proposed no further remedy than that contained in the Fourteenth Amendment, which reduced the representation of any State that denied the right of suffrage to any part of its male adult population. When that clause of the amendment was first before the Senate, on March 9th, 1866, Henderson of Missouri moved as a substitute: "No State, prescribing the qualifications requisite for electors therein, shall discriminate against any person on account of color or race;" and said of his proposition: "I am aware that the Senate will vote it down now. Let them vote it down. It will not be five years from to-day before this body will vote for it. You cannot get along without it."4 Only nine other Senators voted for his motion. It was not until after the former slave States had rejected the Fourteenth Amendment, that Congress interposed to establish negro suffrage. By the Reconstruction acts, of which the first was passed over Johnson's veto, March 2d, 1867,5 the States formerly the seat of the insurrection were compelled by military force to adopt constitutions extending the right of suffrage to all § 52. 1 Supra, § 38, note 40. 2 Supra, § 38, over note 65. 3 Supra, § 38, over note 66. 4 Blaine, Twenty Years in Congress, vol. ii, p. 203. Supra, § 38, over note 103. adult colored men within their jurisdiction. At the same time no step was taken toward compelling similar action in the loyal States, although a number of them voluntarily adopted it. The platform of the Republican party, upon which Grant was elected in 1868, contained the plank: "The guaranty by Congress of equal suffrage to all loyal men at the South was demanded by every consideration of public safety, of gratitude, and of justice, and must be maintained; while the question of suffrage in all the loyal States properly belongs to the people of those States."7 "There was something so obviously unfair and unmanly in the proposition to impose negro suffrage on the Southern States by national power, and at the same time to leave the Northern States free to decide the question for themselves, that the Republicans became heartily ashamed of it long before the political canvass had closed." 8 At the opening of the third session of the Fortieth Congress, in December of that year, various propositions were offered in both houses for an amendment to the Constitution which would extend negro suffrage throughout the country.9 On January 30th, 1869, the House of Representatives, by a vote of one hundred and fifty to forty-two, thirty-one not voting, passed the Fifteenth Amendment in the following form, which differed in only a few immaterial words from that finally adopted: "SEC. 1. The right of any citizen of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State by reason of race, color, or previous condition of slavery of any citizen or class of citizens of the United States. "SEC. 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce by appropriate legislation the provisions of this article." 10 The Senate desired a more radical remedy, which would prevent discrimination by the States through religious, educational, or property qualifications, as well as those forbidden by the amend • Supra, § 38. 7 McPherson, History of the Re construction, p. 364. 8 Blaine, Twenty Years in Congress, vol. iii, p. 412. 9 Ibid., p. 413. 10 McPherson, History of the Reconstruction, p. 399. The italics denote words not used in the final form. ment which the House proposed; and which would extend the protection to the right to hold office as well as the right to vote." Upon the motion of Henry Wilson of Massachusetts, that body adopted an amendment which would have altered the constitutions of more than half the States in the Union: 12 "No discrimination shall be made in any State among the citizens of the United States in the exercise of the elective franchise, or in the right to hold office in any State, on account of race, color, nativity, property, education or creed." 18 A further amendment was added to alter the second article of the Constitution so as to prevent the appointment of presidential electors by a State legislature; and the measure returned to the House, which refused to concur in either. The Senate refused a conference which the House requested; and passed a new amendment in the form finally adopted, except that the words "to hold office" were added after "the right to vote." In their debates the Democrats made a strong point that the question should not be submitted to the legislatures then in session, who had not been chosen with a view to such action, which the national platform of the Republican party had expressly disclaimed.14 Propositions to submit it to the legislatures next chosen and to State conventions were, however, voted down.15 The House refused to accept the senatorial proposition, and passed an amendment substantially like that first adopted by the Senate, prohibiting disqualification from office as well as suffrage "on account of race, color, nativity, property, creed, or previous condition of servitude." The Senate refused to accept this then. A conference was held, which resulted in a recommendation of the form which had originally passed the House, with a few verbal changes. On February 25th, 1869, the Amendment finally passed the House, and on the 26th the Senate, by a majority of more than two-thirds in each; and was sent to the State legislatures in its final form: 11 Ibid., 12 Blaine, Twenty Years in Congress, vol. ii, p. 416. 13 Ibid., pp. 416, 417; McPherson, History of the Reconstruction, pp. 400-404. 14 Blaine, who voted for the Amendment, afterwards admitted that the point was well taken (Twenty Years in Congress, vol. ii, pp. 413, 414). 15 Ibid., p. 413. McPherson, History of the Reconstruction, p. 405. |