ticipate in the right of suffrage. Every year States have formed different qualifications adds some three hundred thousand foreigners themselves for enjoying different rights of to our population, and they are not required to citizenship." wait the period of time specified by the act of Congress, prescribing the rule of naturalization, but they are precipitated in hot haste upon the ballot-box, and introduced into the political struggles of the day. Is that right? I beg, in this connection, to call the attention of the House. to what passed in the Federal convention. I know it is thought that there was a policy in that day which required us to encourage emigration. Yes, sir, there was a policy which required it to a limited extent. But how? To that matter I now call your attention. Colonel Mason, of Virginia, then one of the leading members of Congress, who was for opening a wide door for emigrants, but did not choose to let foreigners make laws for us, said: "Were it not that many, not natives of this country, had acquired great credit during the Revolution, he should be for restraining the eligibility into the Senate to natives." I read these remarks for the purpose of letting the House see and understand what was the temper and tone and sentiment of those who framed our organic law. I want the House to understand that even at that day, when we were in a state of almost political dissolution-a weak and feeble people, threatened with the anger of the British lion-even then the rights of American citizens were highly appreciated, and the privilege of foreigners sharing in them was guarded with jealousy and care. Nor is that all. I pro pose to read, for the information of the House, the debate on the first bill passed on the subject of naturalization, in which the healthy tone of public sentiment, on the part of our fathers, cannot fail to be highly refreshing to us, their sons. On the first bill establishing a uniform rule of naturalization, a protracted debate sprang up, in which the following sentiments were expressed, in which it was assumed that natu Mr. Butler, a very distinguished man of that ralization was necessary to give the right of day, said that he,— suffrage. The debate commenced February 3, 1790, Mr. Hartley said: "The policy of the old nations of Europe has drawn a line between citizens and aliens; that policy has existed, to our knowledge, ever since the foundation of the Roman Empire. Experience has proved its propriety, or we should have found some nation deviating from a regulation inimical to its welfare. From this it may be inferred that we ought not to grant this privilege on terms so easy as is moved by the gentleman from South Carolina. If he had gone no further in his motion than to give aliens a right to purchase and hold lands, the objection would not have been so great; but if the words are stricken out that he has moved for, an alien will be entitled to join in the election of your officers at the first moment he puts his foot on shore in America, when it is impossible, from the nature of things, that he can be qualified to exercise such a talent." Mr. Madison said: "I should be exceedingly sorry, sir, that our rule of naturalization excluded a single person of good fame that really meant to incorporate himself into our society; on the other hand, I do not wish that any man should acquire the privilege, but such as would be a real adition to the wealth or strength of the United States." Here is the doctrine, as laid down by Mr. Madison, that I maintain. This is the position I occupy. This is the ground upon which I can stand before the country. But to proceed: Mr. SMITH, of South Carolina, thought some restraint proper, and that they would tend to raise the Government in the opinion of good men, who are desirous of emigrating; as for the privilege of electing or being elected, he conceived a man ought to be some time in the country before he could pretend to exercise it. "He said the intention of the present motion is, to enable foreigners to come here, purchase and hold lands; but this will go beyond what the mover has required; and therefore, it will be better to draft a separate clause, admitting them to purchase and hold lands upon a qualified tenure and pre-emption right, than thus admit them at once to interfere in our politics. The quality of being a frecholder is requisite, in some States, to give a man a title to vote for corporation and parish officers. Now, if every emigrant who purchases a small lot, but perhaps for which he has not paid, becomes in a moment qualified to mingle in their parish or corporation politics, it is possible it may create great uneasiness in neighborhoods which have been long accustomed to live in peace and unity. “Mr. HARTLEY said, an alien has no right to hold lands in any country; and if they are admitted to do it in this, we are authorized to annex to it such conditions as we think proper. “He also said, with respect to the policy of striking out the words altogether from the clause, and requiring no residency before a man is admitted to the rights of election, the objections are obvious. If, at any time, a number of people emigrate into a seaport town-for example, from a neighboring colony into the State of New York-will they not, by taking the oath of allegiance, be able to decide an election contrary to the wishes and inclinations of the real citizens?" "Mr. MADISON said, whether residence is, or is not, a proper quality to be attached to the citizen, is the question. In his own mind, he had no doubt but residence was a proper prerequisite, and he was prepared to decide in favor of it." Mr. SEDGWICK said, some kind of probation, as it has been termed, is absolutely requisite, to enable them to feel and be sensible of the blessing. Without that probation, he should be sorry to see them exercise a right which we have gloriously struggled to attain." Mr. SMITH, of South Carolina, said, for his part, he was of opinion, that a uniform rule of naturalization would tend to make a uniform rule of citizenship pervade the whole continent, and decide the right of a foreigner to be admitted to elect, or be elected, in any of the States." Mr. BISHOP. Do I understand the gentleman to take the ground that no person is entitled to vote in any state except he be a citizen of the United States? Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. Yes, sir, in all Federal elections. Mr. BISHOP. And that a person born out of the country must be in the United States a certain number of years before he is a citizen, according to the laws of the country? Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. Yes, sir, he must be naturalized. Mr. BISHOP. I would now like to inquire how, on that ground, when Texas was admitted into the Union, the persons living in Texas could be entitled to vote in that state until Texas had been in the Union for a period of five years? Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. That was under a separate clause, and a power altogether differ ent in its character, providing for such a case. Mr. STEVENSON. I would like to propound this question to the gentleman from Virginia. I find, by the Constitution of the United States, that there is a limitation on the quali fications of electors for President and Vice President of the United States; but I find, by the same clause, that under the Constitution of the United States the whole number of the electors may be aliens; that there is no restriction of citizenship in any part of the Constitution. Although there is a limitation as to offices, there is none as to citizenship as a qualification of electors for President and Vice President; and I should like to hear from the gentleman on that point. Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. I am very much obliged to the gentleman for bringing me to that point. He is an American citizen. He has a country which extends its wings over him. He has a country's flag to stand by, and sustain him; and will he ever forget that that country is composed of those who are the people of the United States, and the citizens thereof? The Constitution had no more idea of providing against the man in France, or the man in Turkey, being an elector, than against any other absurdity. In speaking of electors, and declaring, in the preamble and elsewhere, that the people of the United States have formed this Constitution, its framers, ex vi termini, restricted its character, and confined it in all its relations to the people for whom it was formed. Will the gentleman remember that the rights of for eigners are grants-that even the right to gentle treatment is strictly social, and particularly that political rights are never his except by express grant, and that presumptions are always against and never for him? Why, sir, I am amazed-perfectly amazed—. that here, in this government of ours, under "Mr. TUCKER said, he was otherwise satis-our Constitution, in this glorious land, there fied with the clause, so far as to make residence a term of admission to the privilege of election." should be an idea that, because a Constitution framed for the people or citizens of the United States does not exclude foreigners from the highest functions of government, therefore the voters who sent him here, and we have a that foreigners have a right to them. Foreigners have no rights except what are granted to them. They have no right even to hold land in the United States, or in the States thereof, without the power is conferred. They are aliens outside of our system, and are as utterly destitute of power as the man in the moon. Instead of showing that there is nothing against it, you have to show that the power exists and is granted. I lay it down that the Federal Constitution gives to this government the exclusive power of saying who of the foreign-born shall be citizens, and having exercised that authority and said who shall be citizens, the exclusive power is in the state government to say who of her citizens shall exercise the right of suffrage. I might produce authorities if I had time. I might refer to Chancellor Kent, who assumes, as a matter of course, that nobody but a citizen has a right to exercise the right of suffrage. It is a political postulate which he does not consider it worth while to argue. Having stated the principles-all that I can do in the present exigency, my time being nearly exhausted-I now apply them. Let us look at the evils which this system is to inaugurate. A majority of foreigners settle one of the states of the American Republic. They give form to the fundamental organization of that state. That is not all; they say who shall vote. Here is the section of this Minnesota constitution upon the subject of suffrage: "SEC. 1. Every male person of the age of twenty-one years or upwards, belonging to either of the following classes, who shall have resided in the United States one year, and in this state for four months next preceding any election, shall be entitled to vote at such election, in the election district of which he shall at the time have been for ten days a resident, for all officers that now are, or hereafter may be, elective by the people: "1. White citizens of the United States. "2. White persons of foreign birth, who shall have declared their intentions to become citizens, conformably to the laws of the United States upon the subject of naturalization. "3. Persons of mixed white and Indian blood, who have adopted the customs and habits of civilization. "4. Persons of Indian blood residing in this state, who have adopted the language, customs, and habits of civilization, after an examination before any district court of the state, in such manner as may be provided by law, and shall have been pronounced by said court capable of enjoying the rights of citizenship within the state." Now, for whom are they to vote? They are to vote for a member of the House of Representatives. He comes here, and we have a right to look into the qualifications of direct right to ascertain whether he has been duly elected by citizens of the United States. That is not all, sir. By their votes the legis lature of the state is elected, which elects United States Senators, and we have a right to ascertain whether those Senators have been elected by proper persons. But that is not all. These same persons have a right, it is contended, to cast their suffrages for electors of the President of the United States. They may decide a presidential election. And that is not all. The election of President may come into this House, and may turn upon the vote of a single state, and the election in that state may have depended on the vote of one individual, and that an unnaturalized foreigner just landed. Will any gentleman say that the introduction of such a system, affecting as it does the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the Presidency of the United States, would not lead to a frightful mass of evils to the Federal organization? If such an idea could have been thought of, dreamed of, or imagined by those who framed the Federal Constitution, when they were seeking to secure uniformity in social intercourse among the states, is it to be supposed for an instant that they would not have provided against it? But no man ever dreamed that voters were to be made out of any but citizens of the United States; that the law for the naturalization of foreigners was itself to be practically repealed, and that foreigners, before they had remained here five years, and had acquired the moral and intellectual qualifications required, were to be put into full fellowship with our nativeborn citizens, and allowed to wield as large a mass of political power: Look at the consequences of such a condition of things. From three to five hundred thousand foreigners-many of them, I admit, very meritorious and unexceptionable persons-come into this country every year, and settle in our new states and territories; and under this system they are to be permitted at once to organize themselves into states, to send representatives to this House and to the Senate, and to participate in the election of the President of the United States, without ever having conformed to the requisition of the naturalization laws. In the name of God! is it not necessary to put a stop to this state of things? We are running downwards with hot haste. We are disregarding our ancestors and their wise and patriotic example. A new element of progress has been introduced, but all progress is not improvement-facilis de scensus Averni, sed revocare gradum, &c. I insist upon it, then, that in view of the principles and doctrines of the Constitution, we ought not to tolerate the introduction of a system of franchise that must be productive of such consequences, and which admits to the ballot-box men who, it may be, are unable to speak our language, unacquainted with our institutions, and unfriendly to the principles of our government. My time will not allow me to expand this subject, and give other views which I would be glad to lay before the country. Mr. MILLSON. I desire, Mr. Speaker, to make a few remarks suggested by the remarks of my colleague (Mr. SMITH), in regard to what he characterizes as alien suffrage. Now, Mr. Speaker, if I supposed that it was at all competent for Congress to pass upon the constitution of a state applying for admission into the Union to the extent of approving or disapproving any provisions that might be contained in that constitution, I should see more direct application than I now suppose there is in my colleague's remarks. In what I am about to say I do not wish to be understood as approving of the extension of the right of suffrage to unnaturalized foreigners; for many in the House may remember that it was on my motion in the last Congress that the House adopted an amendment to the Oregon bill, restricting the suffrage to the citizens of the United States. But if my colleague objects to the admission of a state into the Union because of an objection of that character to her constitution, I beg leave to suggest that we are travelling far beyond our appropriate sphere; and I would suggest to him, further, that in making animadversions on the Constitution of Minnesota, he is animadverting upon the constitution of his own state. I ask my colleague whether he did not vote for the constitution of Virginia, adopted in 1831? I would ask him whether he did not vote for the constitution of Virginia adopted four or five years ago? and now I beg leave to remind him that from the earliest period of the history of the commonwealth of Virginia alien votes have been taken at all of the elections, and are still taken. Does not the gentleman know that? Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. I do not, nor do I admit it. Mr. MILLSON. I am surprised that my colleague does not admit that to be so; for if he will look to the old constitution of Virginia, he will find that it expressly admits to the right of suffrage citizens of Virginia. If he will look to the constitution of 1831, he will find that the same provision is made there-" citizens of this commonwealth." And if he will look to the very last constitution, he will find the very same phraseology is preserved, and all are entitled to vote who are citizens of the commonwealth of Virginia. Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. Of course, that is proper phraseology; but, sir, citizens of Virginia are citizens of the United States. Mr. MILLSON. And now, sir, to deprive my colleague of the benefit he thinks he has secured by the last explanation, I will tell him that if he will look at the statutes of Virginia, he will find a law coeval with the earliest history of the commonwealth of Virginia and existing in the statute-book until four or five years ago, in which the mode 18 pointed out for admitting aliens to be citizens of the state of Virginia. Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. I wish to ask my colleague whether he does not know that the act to which he refers was ante-revolutionary, and passed before the adoption of the consti tution, and whether it is not unrecognised in the revised code of Virginia? Mr. MILLSON. So far from it, I will tell my colleague that it was enacted in 1792, reenacted and continued in the revisal of 1819, and continued under the constitution of 1831, and it was only dropped from the revised code under the revision of Messrs. Patten and Robertson, some four or five years ago. That law, I will tell my colleague, has never been repealed to this day, although omitted in that code. I beg leave to say only this-as I do not wish to detain the House, having promised to occupy its attention for a few moments only-that I have myself, in my capacity as attorney and counsellor at law, assisted in the conferring of citizenship upon many foreign voters; and that nothing was more common, before a warmly-contested election in Virginia, than for the county court to meet two or three days before the opening of election, and sometimes an hour or two before the election, for the express purpose of admitting aliens to the right of voting, who never had been naturalized under any act of the United States. And, again, I will tell my colleague that I do not know that this right was ever questioned in the Congress of the United States, or else where, but once. It was once questioned in a contested election, originating in the district which I now represent the contested election between Newton and Lawyer. The sitting member, Mr. Newton, contested a number of votes in the poll of Mr. Lawyer, upon the ground that the voters were not entitled to vote, not having been naturalized under the laws of the United States. The case turned upon that question. I well remember it, sir, for it was about the earliest political election I ever remember to have witnessed. I remem ber that the majority of Mr. Newton was about eleven or thirteen, and that about forty or fifty votes of the character I have referred to were given for Mr. Lawyer. The House of Repre sentatives in that case determined that these votes were valid and legal, and Mr. Lawyer took his seat, ousting Mr. Newton. Mr. SMITH, of Virginia. I will ask my co league if he knows of any other district? I will ask my other colleagues if they know of a single case in which any foreigner but a naturalized foreigner has exercised the right of suffrage in Virginia, except in the Norfolk district? If there is one, let us hear it. I cannot be accountable for what my colleague may do as Commonwealth's attorney, but I beg him to look to the law and the authorities which I have quoted. Mr. MILLSON. In reply, I can only say that as I have never been a resident of any district in Virginia, or in the United States, except the district which I now represent, I cannot, of course, give my colleague any personal information in regard to the practice at elections in other districts. But I give him the law and the constitution of the State of Virginia. I show him that these constitutions have always admitted to the right of voting citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia; and I point him to the law under which these aliens may be admitted to citizenship in the Commonwealth of Virginia. What more could my colleague reasonably demand? I ask the gentleman's attention to the very first article of the Constitution, and he will find that the House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every two years by the people of the several states. And must the electors have the qualifications of being citizens of the United States? No; they shall only have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature. That is to say, recognising that each state will have a legislature, as being the republican form of government, whosoever you, gentlemen, who govern the State of VirPennsylvania, shall consider entitled to vote for members of the House of Representatives of our several states, may vote for members of the House of Representatives of the United States. There are no words of exclusion there. I have risen only for the purpose of suggest-ginia, or we, who help to govern the State of ing to my colleague that however strong may be his objections, (and I admit their force,) when he undertakes to exclude a state from this Union because of the exercise of a right which his own state constantly exercised from the beginning of the Union to the present day, it strikes me that he is taking a position not in accordance with the doctrine of state rights, which has heretofore been one of his characteristics. Mr. PHILLIPS, of Pennsylvania. I will do no more than refer to the Constitution of the United States, and assert what I believe to be the right of my state-a state which, though she has not said as much about state rights as the state of Virginia, will stand up equally firmly in resistance to Federal usurpation. The gentleman says that the powers reserved to the states are enumerated powers. I insist that those given up to the general government are the enumerated powers, and all others are expressly reserved and retained. It cannot be sustained that a state can exercise only enumerated powers. Sovereignty includes all power; and such part of a state's sovereignty only as she has contributed to the national stock is lost to her. If the Constitution of the United States shows no delegation of authority to Congress to regulate the qualifications of electors in the states, it cannot be seriously argued that Congress can exercise such right. And now, if the gentleman will look at the next section, he will find that no person shall be a representative who shall not have attained the age of twenty-five years, and been seven years a citizen of the United States-not of the state, Mr. Speaker, but of the United States. Those who made that Constitution recognised the difference. I Mr. STEPHENS, of Georgia, [May 11, 1858.] now come to the main question in this de bate-the alien suffrage clause, as it is called, in this constitution. I have said that it was no new question. It is a grave and important one, but it is coeval with the government. Mr. Speaker, if there was any subject which was seriously watched and guarded, in the forma tion of the Constitution of the United States, above all others, it was that the Federal Government should not touch the right of suffrage in the states. The question of who should vote in the several states was left for each state to settle for itself. And so far as I am concerned, I say for myself that there is nothing in the doctrine of state rights that I would defend and stand by longer, and fight I want the gentleman to tell me where such for harder, than that which denies the right a right exists. I ask him to show me in the of the Federal Government, by its encroachConstitution of the United States, if he can, ments, to interfere with the right of suffrage where any state of this Union has surrendered in my state. The ballot-box-that is what to the Federal Government the right to pre- each state must guard and protect for itselfscribe the qualifications of electors; for such that is what the people of the several states ought to be his task. But I will take the never delegated to this government, and of labour on myself, and save the gentleman the course it was expressly, under the Constitutrouble, and show him the contrary thereof. tion, reserved to the people of the states. I will show him that, by that very Constitu- Upon the subject of alien suffrage, about which tion, there are recognised, as among the people we have heard so much lately, I wish in this of the United States, the "people" of the Uni- connection to give a brief history. I state to ted States, and also "citizens" of the United this House that the principle was recognised States; and it is not asking too much to sup-by the ordinance of 1787, which was before pose that those who made the Constitution, the government was formed. who studied it for hours, days, weeks, and months, did not put into it words which were not well studied and thought over, and that they had not as much intelligence, and did not as well understand the meaning and bearing of them, as ourselves. [Mr. Stephens after referring to the various acts of Congress recognising alien suffrage which have been previously quoted in this book, continued.]. Of the Presidents of the United States who, in some form or other, gave the principle their |