Saint Paul weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1858-1859, 1859-05-07

FOREIGN BORN CITIZENS READ!
Senator Wilson and the Two Years
Amendment.
NATIcK, Mass, April 20, 1869.
Hon. Francis Gillette, Hartford, Conn.,
Dear Sir: You express, in your note, the fear
that the adoption by the people of Massacu-
sets Of the Two Years Amendment will pre-
JUDGE the Republican cause in the country,
and the hope that it will be promptly voted
down. Your are not, my dear sir, the only
devoted friend of the anti-slavery cause who
entertains this fear and expresses this hope.
Before left Washington several of our most
devoted and distinguished men-such men as
Mr.. Harlan, Mr.. Doolttle, Gov Grimes, and
Gov. Bingham-expressedt tome their profound
regret that the proposition had received the
sanction of the Legislature, and their earnest
hope that the people would reject it. Since
my return home | have received, especially
from the Northwest, many letters expressing
the opinion that the Republican cause would
be prejudiced by its adoption, and the strong
est desire that it should be rejected. That
the Republicans, outside of Massachusetts, are
quite unanimously opposed to this amendment,
| is manifest to every man of ordinary intelli-
| gefce. The voice of the Republicans of the
Northwest has been most emphatically pro-
nounced through the public press; and the
sentiment of our Republican associates in
other sections is manifestly againstits adoption.
| Pending the late election in your State, en-
gagged for two weeks in the canvass; many
| Republicans declared to me their opposition to
it-no one expressed to me his approval of it.
Upon us of Massachusetts alone rests the re-
sponsibility and whether it shall be adopted
or rejected, whether its adoption or rejection
will be for good or for evil, for honor or dis
honor, we, the Republicans of Massachusetts
mot the Republicans of other States-must
bear the entire responsibility. After mani
Testing, as our Republican friends of other
States have done, their opposition to its adop-
ton, and after receiving, as they have received
from its advocates here, significant hints that
it is local question, State issue, which they
would not be permitted to interfere with, they
ought not surely to be compromised by our
adoption of proposition against which they
have entered their emphatic protest
That the adoption of this two years amend
ment will, as you suggest, work harm to the
Republican cause in the country, no man, who
understands the condition of public affairs
and the relations of political parties, can for a
/
pledged to the doctrine embodied in the Dec
laration of Independence that all men are
created equal, "-it deems human slavery a
continual and prominent violation of human
rights, and it proposes to vindicate the ina
lienable rights of men by prohibiting slavery
in the territories, destroying it's influence as
an element of political power in the govern
ment, and placing the nation entirely on the
side of equal, universal and impartial liberty.
In this age, when the sublime words of the
Declaration of Independence are scoffed and
jeered at, and millions of men are declared to
have no rights which we are bound to re-
spect, this position of the Republican party
is high and noble one. 1t will be held to a
strict responsibility for its lofty professions of
regard for the rights of man. Every failure of
the Republicans or any portion of the Repub-
leans, Of any State, to act up to the idea that
'all men are created equal" will harm the Re-
publican cause in all the States. How often
have we of Massachusetts,, where the equal
rights of all men are acknowledged and pro-
tected by law, been tainted with the action OF
some of our Republican associates in support
ing the odious black laws which dishonor some
of the free States, and with refusal of some OF
the free States, your own State of Connect
cut among them, to secure to the cOlored man
the right of suffrage If the Republicans Of
Massachusetts, adopt this proposed amend.
ment, the Republicans of other States will be
reproached and tainted for this action o.
their associates. They will be told, as they
have already been told, that Massachusetts
allows the ignorant, brutalized, fugitive negro
slave to vote after residence of one year
while she requires of the Englishman, the
German, and the Frenchman, who may have
resided five years within her limits, a further
residence of two years after he becomes citi
zen Of the Unitod States. before he can be al
lowed the right of suffrage. Massachusetts
will be held up, as she has already been, be-
fore men jealous of their own rights, as the
fountain-head Of anti-slavery, the citadel o
Republicanism, and this act of hers will bt
branded as an act of intolerance, bigotry ant
fanaticism. And these denunciations and ap
peals cannot but mislead and deceive in Other
States, as they did in your State at the las
election, some men who are just beginning t.
see and to realize that the great contest ir
America between freedom and slavery, be-
tween free territory and slave territory, be-
tween free labor and slave labor, is battle
for the toiling millions of every race and kin
dred. Republican presses and speakers in
other States will be forced to meet sternel
contest, to win the victory for freedom, which
our action may delay but cannot arrest.
This two years amendment is intended tc
correct an admitted evil. During the past
few years, a practice has grown up which
must receive the condemnation of men who
wish to keep our elections free from, falsehood
fraud and corruption. l refer to the practices
of party committees, by which men are hunt
ed up, rushed in crowds to the courts, and
their naturalization papers procured and paid
for by such committees, to affect pending
election. The effect of this pernicious prac
tice is to induce, in some cases, falsehood and
fraud, and to make many of the men thus nat
uralized the tools of the men who pay 70,
their papers. This advocates ofthis two years
amendment believe that its adoption will tend
to correct these abuses, and many good mer
will vote for its adoption who have no preju
dice against men born in other lands Did
the proposed amendment require only of the
adopted citizen a residence of one year in the
State after naturalization before he could cx
crcise the right Of suffrage, the same time
now required of native-born citizens in othe,
States, or six months residence in the town.
the same time.now required of our own native
born citizens, all the benefits hoped for by the
advocates of this amendment would be secur-
ed, and little if any opposition would be made
to it from any quarter of the country. But
the amendment in its present form seems to
have an invidious and offensive distinction
against men who were born in any other
lands.
That there are great abuses growing out Of
the loose administration of the naturalization
laws, especially in our large Atlantic cities
and towns all fair-minded men must admit.
1t has appeared to me that these admitted
abuses could be remedied, either by the mod
ification or revision of the naturalization laws,
or by reform in their administration, and /
have ever been ready in any practical mode