Citizens Without Naturalization more control over citizenship than over the national prerogative to coin money. It could not impose discriminating disabilities upon naturalized citizens. If a citizen of Mississippi was eligible to all the privileges of citizens of Louisiana, according to the federal Constitution, how could the convention impose disabilities? At the time when Mississippi was admitted to the Union, one of its citizens, who had never gone through the usual process of naturalization, was elected to the Legislature from the district to which he had removed, and the question arose whether he was a citizen of the United States and eligible to the office. The State Senate decided in his favor; the court sustained the Senate, and also decided that all the inhabitants of the Mississippi Territory at the time of its admission into the Union became, ipso facto, citizens of the United States. To discriminate against naturalized persons was contrary to the decision of the federal court.* This and other decisions fixed the principle that a State cannot impose greater restrictions in admitting foreigners to naturalization than are imposed under the act of Congress. A State may require qualifications, and some new States had availed themselves of that construction by admitting foreigners to citizenship upon easier terms. The dogma of Native Americanism was not new. It came from an objectionable source, associated in the opinion of the people of Louisiana *Collett vs. Collett, 8 Dallas, 294. with everything vile and degrading in politics. It had made its first appearance in the days of Federalism, and had produced the infamous Alien and Sedition laws. Conscious of weakness, the old Federal party enacted these laws to save itself from overthrow. They were passed for the purpose of engendering prejudice and creating animosities. They became a leading question before the country, and a distinguished statesman of Democratic principles, of whom Louisiana would ever be proud, was conspicuous in the struggle. Perhaps of all his productions his arguments against these laws were the best. Livingston was at that time a member of Congress from the State of New York. His arguments against these laws were admirable and conclusive, and the State of Louisiana should obtain a copy, have it elegantly bound, and deposited in its archives in honor of its great author. The opposition to these laws was the rallying point of the Democratic party. In the Legislature of Kentucky prompt and decisive action was taken, and in the Legislature of Virginia resolutions now famous were introduced. As soon as the Democratic party came into power the laws were repealed and the persons confined under their authority set at liberty. The principle then repudiated had been revived later, with all its narrow and contracting prejudices, in Native Americanism. No man-certainly no Democrat-could give support to that idea. Again, the principles of the Alien and Sedition laws were proclaimed during the administration of Madi Native-Americanism in the Hartford Convention son. At a critical period a convention was held in a little village in New England, and it has given immortality to the place. Hartford otherwise would have never been heard of. At this meeting of traitors this very question of Native-Americanism was revived and brought conspicuously to light, in vital and abiding antagonism to the South, in the form of a proposition to exclude the representation of slaves, and Massachusetts still held to the idea. The Louisiana convention was in session during the height of the excitement over the "reannexation" of Texas, and this national issue was not overlooked in the debates. Native-Americanism was associated in men's minds with opposition to annexation, and a member read an extract from the Southern Quarterly Review, to which he said the author's name was not given, "but from the great ability with which the article was written. he presumed it was from the pen of a distinguished gentleman, Professor Everett."* The article discussed annexation, and declared that it would produce dissension. In like spirit, the Hartford convention had declared that slave representation would produce dissension. It had proposed amendments to the Constitution-such as restricting Congress from admitting new States without the consent of two-thirds of the existing States; the withdrawal of the representa * Southern Quarterly Review, October, 1844, Art. ix., "The Annexation of Texas," pp. 483-520. There is no evidence in the article that Everett was its author. tion allowed to the slave-holding States based upon the slave population; the exclusion of aliens from office and from the privileges of citizenship, except after a residence of twenty-one years; one term for the President, and that the office should not be filled twice from the same State. These were proposed by the Legislature of Connecticut to the other States of the Union, but met with no favor.* Was not this extract in the spirit of the Alien and Sedition laws? Did it not revive and blend new elements of political strife and endanger the peace and safety of the Union? It had met with no favor in 1814; it would meet with no favor in 1845. In these doctrines there was a design to revolutionize the whole country and light the torch of civil war. It was the Hartford convention, sanctioning the federal doctrines of 1797, and again proclaiming federal principles, which, when originally brought out, proved so disastrous to the party that espoused them. These were the principles which had given rise to the Native American party-the old Federal party under a new guise. Defeated in 1800, and meeting with a succession of disasters, the Federal party then revived the doctrines of 1797, and made war upon our institutions. The doctrines of * See the Proceedings of a Convention of Delegates from the States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island; the Counties of Cheshire and Grafton, in the State of New Hampshire; and the County of Windham, in the State of Vermont; Convened at Hartford, in the State of Connecticut, December 15, 1814. Third Edition. Corrected and Improved. Boston: Printed and Published by Wells & Lilly. 1815. 32 pp. Liberal Principles of Our Early Statesmen the Native American party were older than the federal Constitution. The Madison papers showed that this policy, to exclude persons of foreign birth from participating in the government of the country, was broached and insisted upon in the Philadelphia convention of 1787.* Washington, Madison, Franklin, and Wilson held liberal opinions, and were opposed to restrictions that would exclude their fellow-men from citizenship. The opinions of Franklin, in particular, were practical, "because that distinguished man had spent a considerable time in Europe and had the opportunity of forming a correct judgment." During a period of over sixty years, although several States had formed and modified their system of government, not one had incorporated the principle of placing the naturalized citizen in a position inferior to that of the native-born. With the exception of Georgia and Maine, not a State had adopted this illiberal distinction. The constitution of Georgia of 1798 had special reference to the peculiar geographical position of that State, being then contiguous to the dominions of Spain. But it did not contain a Native American clause. The Maine convention had not discussed the proposition, but required the Governor to be a native-born citizen of the United States. The weight of authority in America was against the incorporation of a Native-American clause in a State constitution. It was the intention of the * Elliot, Vol. v., pp. 120, 143, 378, 398, 411, 560. |