274

THE TRUE BASIS OF REPRESENTATION.

zens, and he must be treated as a citizen henceforth for all time. The States, said Howard, would, under the proposed amendment, retain the power which they had always possessed, of regulating the right of suffrage; Congress was not endeavoring to take it from them. The theory of the whole amendment was "to leave the power of regulating the suffrage with the people or legislatures of the States, and not to assume to regulate it by any clause of the Constitution." His objection, and it was the principal one to the changes suggested by Senator Williams, was, that they went too far. A State might choose to classify its electors by allowing one set, duly qualified, to vote for governor; another, for members of assembly; a third for judicial officers; a fourth, for local officers, and yet a fifth, for electors of President and Vice-President.

To avoid confusion, was it not best to make the basis of representation the simple test of the qualifications of voters for the most numerous branch of the State Legislatures? Otherwise, the basis of exclusion might prove so various, in the several States, as to make the administration of the amendment practically impossible. But, the Senate was convinced of the superiority of the William's amendments and adopted them.1 Senator Howard's amendment, on the validity of the public debt, was concurred in, and the joint resolution as thus amended, having received the vote of two-thirds of the Senate, was passed.2

Among the thirty-three, by whose vote it passed, were Charles Sumner, Lyman Trumbull and Benjamin F. Wade, who, though not participating in the debate on the resolution, had prepared the way for its adoption by their devotion to the civil rights bill and their advocacy of the

1 Yeas 31, nays 11, June 8, 1866, Globe. p. 3041.

2 Yeas 33, nays 11, absent 5. June 8, 1866. Globe, p. 3042.

STEVENS' ULTIMATUM.

275

amendments which, discussed at length in the Senate, but laid aside for the House resolution, were intended to effect the purposes sought by the resolution just adopted. The vote of Henry Wilson, soon to become Vice-President of the United States, may be said to have offset that of the chief of the opposition, Thomas A. Hendricks, who also was destined to the same high office. Reverdy Johnson, pronounced by many of his colleagues to be the greatest of living lawyers, voted against the resolution. Among its supporters were Williams, Creswell, Kirkwood, Fessenden and Sherman, all of whom later became Cabinet Ministers.

On the thirteenth, Thaddeus Stevens presented the amended resolution to the House, at the same time saying that the Union members of the Joint Committee were unanimously of the opinion that the Senate amendments ought to be adopted, and were willing to take the vote upon it at once. There was no disposition to re-open the discussion. The House and the country, said Stevens, were to be congratulated that the time was at hand "for the admission of a hitherto outlawed community into the privileges and advantages of a civilized and free government. It had been the dream of his life that the day should come when no distinctions would be tolerated, in this purified republic, save those that arise from merit and conduct." Though Stevens pronounced the amended resolution sent up from the Senate imperfect, he declared he was willing to accept it because he lived "among men and not among angels." The co-operation of the President was not to be expected. "He preferred restoration to reconstruction." He would have the slave States remain as nearly as possible in their ancient condition.

The Southern States, said Stevens, were conquered provinces, but the President maintained that they had

legitimate governments, and insolently demanded that they should be represented in Congress on equal terms with loyal and regular States. There was great danger that the supporters of this doctrine might soon overwhelm the loyal men in Congress; therefore, it should make no delay in adopting the new amendment. He then briefly summarized the changes which the Senate had made in the joint resolution. The first, defining who were citizens of the United States was "an excellent amendment, long needed to settle conflicting decisions between the several States and the United States." It declared this great privilege to belong to every person born or naturalized in the country. The second section of the original resolution had been but slightly changed, less, indeed, than he desired; it should have been more efficacious for the enfranchisement of the negro. The third change, substituting ineligibility for disfranchisement, was not an improvement. It opened the elective franchise to such as the State chose to admit. It endangered the government, both State and national, and might "give the next Congress and President to the reconstructed rebels." With the enlarged basis of representation in the South, and the exclusion of loyal men of color from the ballot box, there was no hope of safety unless in the prescription of proper enabling acts, which should do justice to the freedmen and make their enfranchisement the condition of the re-admission of these States into the Union. The amended resolution was then read by the secretary; the Speaker put the question of concurrence; the roll was called, and the joint resolution, proposing the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, was passed.1

1120 yeas, 32 nays, 32 not voting. June 13, 1866. Globe, pp. 3148-3149. This was identical with the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution.

THE AMENDMENT GOES TO THE PEOPLE. 277

On the sixteenth, the enrolled resolution was formally presented to the Secretary of State, and two days later was officially, and for the first time, published in the Washington Republican.1 By a concurrent resolution, the two Houses instructed the secretary to transmit certified copies to the governors of the States, to be laid by them before the legislatures for ratification.

The amendment, unlike the Thirteenth, and that proposed in 1861 was not submitted to the President for his approval. The omission provoked a special message from him. Even in ordinary times, he said, any question of amending the Constitution must be justly regarded as of paramount importance. This was "enhanced at the present time by the fact, that the joint resolution was not submitted by the two Houses for the approval of the President,” and also because, of the thirty-six States constituting the Union, eleven were excluded from representation in either House of Congress, although with the single exception of Texas, they had been entirely restored to their functions as States, had conformed to the organic law of the land, and had appeared at the national capitol by their Senators and Representatives. Nor was this all. The sovereign people of the Nation had not been given an opportunity to express their views on the important questions which the amendment involved. Grave doubts, therefore, might naturally and justly arise as to whether the action of Congress was in harmony with the sentiments of the people, and whether State legislatures, "elected without reference to such an issue, should be called upon by Congress to decide respecting the ratification of the proposed amendment."

The action of Secretary Seward, in transmitting the amendment to the State executives, was "to be considered 1 Globe, p. 3241.

278

JOHNSON'S MESSAGE ON THE AMENDMENT.

as purely ministerial and in no sense whatever as committing the President to an approval, or recommendation, of the amendment to the State legislatures, or to the people." On the contrary, "a proper appreciation of the letter and spirit of the Constitution as well as the interest of national order, harmony and union and due deference for an enlightened public judgment," might "at this time, well suggest a doubt whether any amendment to the Constitution ought to be passed by Congress, and pressed upon the legislatures of the States for final decision, until after the admission of such loyal Senators and Representatives of the unrepresented States" as had been, or might be, chosen in conformity with the Constitution and laws of the United States.1

The optimistic view which Johnson and the minority in Congress took of the condition of the Southern States, and the little that was said on the subject during the discussion of the Fourteenth Amendment, might seem to be a true picture of their political and social affairs at this time, were it not corrected by the mass of testimony which had been accumulating since the close of the war and was to continue accumulating for ten years after. Congressional discussion of the amendment had been necessarily confined chiefly to an examination of legal principles and their application to the new order of things. If the question be asked, why, in both House and Senate, all pending Constitutional amendments were set aside for that proposed by the Committee on Reconstruction, it may be answered, that this committee had the confidence and support of the party in power, and possessed evidence of the condition of the South which compelled Congress to set aside all minor matters and concentrate its attention upon the policy

1 June 22, 1866. Globe, pp. 3356-3357; and Richardson's Messages and Papers of the Presidents, VI, 391-392.