The Portland daily press., 1866-05-23
The Suffrage Question.

A week ago the telegraph announced briefly
that the bill in the national House Of Repre-
sentatives, to amend the organic acts of the
Territories, "was considered and passed-79
to 49," The full significance of the announce
ment was appreciated by very few readers, and
has since attracted much less attention than
it deserves. The ninth section of this bill
Provides
That within the Territories aforesaid there
shall be no denial of the elective franchise to
citizens of the United States because of race or
color, and all persons shall be equal before the
law. And all acts or parts of acts, either of
Congress or the Legislative Assemblies of the
Territories aforesaid, inconsistent with the pro-
visions of this act, are hereby declared null and
void.
Here at last is the provision for which the loyal
people of the North have waited and hoped
a provision which the Declaration of indie
pendence foreshadowed, and towards which
the stream of events is steadily flowing Soon
er or later, but surely at last, whatever barrier
obstructs the free development of the Ameri-
can ideas of freedom and equality, must yield.
No class of American citizens can permanent
ly be excluded from the ballot box. The Amer
lean idea is too clear and transparent for mis-
conception. What it requires is not that all
men shall be equal, but that all men may be-
come whatever nature and education have fit
ted them to become, subject to no legal disabili-
ties and embarrassments. A fair field and no
fayors: that is what the plain people at home
would be glad to see. And because the men
who plunged into rebellion to maintain negro
slavery, and the men who sympathized with a
rebellion for that purpose, are now striving to
fasten upon the blacks permanent disability
to speak for themselves by their votes, a thou
sand tongues speak for them and millions of
votes from the silent multitude who listen,
will respond. If slavery was relic of bar
barism, SO no less is CASTE
1t has been feared that the time was not re-
garded, at Washington, as propitious for the
introduction of measures looking to equal
suffrage. The report of the Committee of
Fifteen did much to strengthen this feeling
by remanding the whole subject to the States
The people at home are prepared to sustain
that report, If nothing better can be given us;
but the action of the House upon this bill en-
courages us to hope that the great principle of
equality, of inclusion instead of exclusion,
may yet be brought before the country. Mr..
LIE Blond, of Ohio, raised the question spe-
officially upon this ninth section. "This bill;'
he said, "inaugu-ates new system" And
again, II conceive that this provision of the
bill before us has and can have no other pur-
pose than to carry out this cherished idea that
all men should be made equal before the law
Once more, and his words deserve especial at
tention: - - t
have made the motion to strike out this
section because it raises directly the issue
whether we in this Congress are in favor of
granting the right of suffrage to all classes ir-
respective of color. Gentlemen can now up
on this proposition place themselves right be-
fore their constituents by declaring whether
they are in favor OF it; for let me say to gen.
tlemen that those tcho v0te against striking
out this section place themselves on record as
favoring equal suffrage throughout the wholo
country. Our record is against granting suf-
frage to the colored race under any circum-
stances whatever by the Congress of the Uni
ted States. aa M
The House answered Mr.. LIE Blond by its
vote, refusing to strike out the section by
vote of IS nays to SO yeas. Among the names
honored by being thus placed on record as
"favoring equal suffrage throughout the whole
country" are those of Messrs. Lynch, Per-
ham, Blaine and Pike. Mr.. Rice is now in
Maine, or his vote would undoubtedly have
been cast on the same side. .. 81.
Now that the "new system" has been inau
gurated by the action of the House, is it too
much to hope that it may yet be Incorporated
in the plan to be submitted to the people for
The restoration of the Southern States to their
former privileges ."