The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1865-07-08
Formal Regulation Of the Right I
of Suffrage.

that the franchise is privilege conferred by
the governing power and not right inner
ent IN the citizen, springs q too common re-
mark, that the right of suffrage ought to be
restricted rather than extended by our Gov
eminent. And hence arises the numerous
suggestions in favor of an educational or prop
erty qualification to entitle the citizen to the
privilege of suffrage. But in view of the
righstul equality of all men, announced BY
our fathers, and the fundamental principle OF
free government, all such qualifications, how
ever desirable they might be, are an infringe
ment of the natural rights of equality, unjust
. In itself and palpably inconsistent with the
true system of Democratic Republic. For,
! If you vary from the fundamental principle OF
equality in a single particular, then on princi-
pie you may vary in thousand particulars
and there can be no limitation, either in prin-
cipIe or in practice, to the grounds of exclu-
sion from equal rights. To-day it is color;
tomorrow it may be poverty; next day, iSno-
rance and the day after, sectarianism of this
or that character, may be made the test of
exclusion from a voice in the Government.
But our fathers. not only proclaimed the
doctrine of EQUALITY as the very fundamental
principle of the free institutions in whose be-
half they spoke, in the face of the despots and
the aristoerats of Europe, but they also enun-
ciated the cognate principle that "govern-
ments derive their just powers from the con-
sent Of the governed Can that, then be
just government which absolutely excludes
the assent of population more numerous
than the people in whose name that famous
\ Declaration was made? These principles are
directly hostile to the principle and spirit of
. the divine right of kings" and the proscrip-
uve privileges of dominant aristocracy. and
were so understood the world over And the
most distinguished champions of republican
Institutions in our revolutionary epoch, hdad-
ed by FRANKLIN, JEFFERSON, and PArHIc K
Henry. labored just as earnestly for the all
rogation OF the laws of primogenture and fer
{ universal suffrage, as they did for the aboh-
ton Of slavery. But in process of time
Conservatism was shocked by the excessas of
the French revolution. The enthusiasm for
ssfserty was checked by the profits of slav cry,
and ambitious popular leaders covered be-
fore the organized political cohorts of the
slave power, and slavery and the denial of
the equality of political rights maintained
their position in our country. in spite of the
spirit of the Declaration of independence and
the views of the champions of our free insti-
i tutions.
Now, afteE- four years of bloody war, in
which the lives of myriads of our fellow 1citi-
zens, with that of the head of the nation him
\ self, has been sacrificed to the Moloeh of
slavery, it would seem to be time to heed the
4 voice of cur fathers, return to the true wor-
ship of the Temple of Liberty, based on the
corner Stone of equality, and cease running
8 racy, who found their temple on the co rner
stone of slavery and the inequality of man.
+ We must, as a people, do this, or a. worse
thing than the great war from which We have
just emerged, may befall the country Tha,
war, brought on US in consequence of oui
want of fidelity to the principles of human
{ freedom, has resulted, in spite Of ourselves
almost, in giving liberty to the slaves, and
thus wiping out that foul blot on our national
escutcheon. But if we shall persist in the
disregard a the principles of our fathers and
continue to prove disloyal to the fundamental
principles of free government, and refuse to
recognize the doctrine of equal rights in prac-
tice, our conduct may eventually result in the
loss of our own liberties under Providence
God may punish Us if we deny the first prin-
ciples of republicanism by suffering our Gov
ernment to be converted into an oligarchic OF
a military despotism, under which we may
taste in our own bitter experience something
of the evils of the inequality of rights which
we seem now so willing to inhict on others.
And now, to come back to the point from
= which we digressed. The Constitution Of the
& United States recognizes free persons of col
or as ''people of the United States, and under
the article providing for the apportionment Of
representation, they are counted precisely a.
white men, aud the States in which they re
side are allowed the same representation il
Congress as if they were SO many white men
tWhy should they not be allowed to cast tn,
/ votes for which their State is allowed repre-
sentation? Why adhere to the rotten Dor
n ough system of the aristocracy of England Oh
his subject? Why not stand by the princi
pies of our fathers and of republicauism
rather than fall back on the system of the to
~ aristocracy of Great Britain? We compe
the colored man to bear the fhusket in max
ing up the quota of the States, and to pay
axes direct and indirect, and in divers othe
Ays recognize both his manhood and his cit
zs(pship.
But say some who support the British
privilege theory of franchise, don't we ex.
elude women and children and Indians en-
rely, and fOreigneu for certaia pssisd,
~ she pcllss 70 b surs W - Dsts'