The tri-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1866-1868, 1866-09-22


The Union of the States must be restored
at all hazards and on the best terms that
can be obtained, and the plan of the Presi-
dent having failed through the treachery and
selfishness of politicians, what now remains
to be done2
There are but two plans before the coun-
try-the Executive plan, and that OF the
Congress or law-making power. The Presi-
dents plan provides first, that the States
exist as States, though by rebellion they had
lost their governments; secondly, that slave
ry must be formally abolished by an amend
| ment to the federal Constitution; thirdly,
that the right of secession must be abandon
ed; fourthly, that the rebel debt must be re-
pudiated, and, as a matter of course, the
national debt must be paid; filthy, that
loyal persons only should reorGaniZe govern
ments for the States. and that no members
elect to Congress from the Southern States
should be prevented for admission, who can
not take the test-oath.
This is the Presidents plan. What is the
Congressional plano 1t is as follows, in the
shape ola joint resolution, proposing amend
ments to the federal Constitution:
ARTICLE IA.
SECTION 1. All persons born naturalized in
the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction
thereof, citizens of the United States and of
the State wherein they reside. No State shall
make or enforce any law which shall abridge The
privileges immunities of citizens of the United
States; nor shall any State deprive any person
of life, liberty, or property without due process
OF law, nor deny to any person within its juris-
dictioL the equal protection of the laws.
SEC. 3 Representatives shall be apportioned
among the several States according to their re-
spective numbers, counting the whole number
OF persons in each State, excluding Indians not
taxed. But when the right to vote at any cleo
tion for the choice of electors for President and
Vice President of the United States, representa-
tives in Congress- the executive and judicial Off
GERS of a State, or the members of the legislature
&c
of such State, being twenty-one years of age
and citizens of the United States, or in any way
abridged, except for participation in rebellion or
other crime, the basis of representation therein
shall be reduced in the proportion which the
number of such male citizens shall bear to the
whole number of male citizens tWenty-one years
of age in such State.
Sec. 3. No person shall be Senator Repre-
sentative in Congress, or elector of President and
tary, under the United States, or under any State,
who, having previously taken an oath mem
Der of Congress, or as an officer of the United
States, member of any State legislature
as an executive or judicial officer of any State
to support the Constitution of the United States,
shall have engaged in Instruction rebellion
against the same, or given aid or comfort to the
enemies thereof. But Congress may, by vote
OF tNo-thirds of each House, remove such dis
ability.
SEC. l. The validity of the public debt of the
United States, authorized by law, including debts
incurred for payment of pensions and bounties
for services in suppressing instruction or rebel
United States nor any State shall assume or pay
any debt or obligation incurred in aid of iusur
rection or rebellion against the United States,
any claim for the loss or emancipation of any
slave; but all such debts obligations, and claims
shall be held illegal and void.
SEC 3. The Congress shall have power to en-
force, by appropriate legislation, the provisions
of this article.
This plan, after recognizing, as the Presi-
dents plan does, the existence of the S tates
as States, proposes, first, that colo red man
from Massachusetts shall have the same
librety in North Carolina that he possesses in
his own State, and that colOred man from
rth-Carolina shall have the same liberty
in Massachusetts, which he possesses at home.
1t provides that no State shall abridge the
privileges or immunities of citizen of the
United States, or deny to any person life, lib
erty, or property, or the equal protection
Of the law. Who objects to that am
sure President johnson does not for the
civil rights bill, now in existence a a law:
and which will in no event be repealed,
makes the same provision for the colored
race, and the objection of the President was
not to this feature OF that law, but to that
part of it which as he thought, improperly
the State Courts to the Courts
of the United States. If it be said
that there is some concealed purpose in this
provision hereafter to force negro sutfra ge on
the States, as the only means of securing to
colored people the privileges or imtnuni
ties =" referred to, the answer is that this can
not be so, for the reason that a subsequent
sectin in the amendment leaves the quest ion
of suffrage wholly and solely with the
States.
The Congressional plan also proposes that
in Congress shall be appor-
toned among the States in proportion to
that Under the Constitution while slavery
existed, not only were the white inhabitants
counted in apportioning representatives, but
three-tifthS of the slaves were added to the
whites. This rule has ceased with the eX-
tinction of slavery. There are now no such
50 persons - as those referred to in the Consti--
tuition, OF whom three tifths must be counted.
but the whole population of both whites and
blacks must be counted in apportioning re-
Under this new rule it has
been estimated that the Southern States
would gain eight members of Congress. Is
it to be expected that the free white popula-
ton of the North will agree to this9 As it
is and as it has been from the beginning of /
the government, five negroes have had as |
much weight in the Congress OF the United |
States as three white men, for, for every three |
white men five negroes have been counted in
pportioning Representatives The proposed |
amendment provides that the Southern States |
shall be entitled to their present number of |
members until the period of the next appor |
In 1872; but after that time repre- !
must be apportioned according to
voters, and not, as now, according to the |
whole population. Up to 1872 this State
will be entitled to seven members the pres
ent number; after that time, she will be en- |
titled for the next ten years to eight mem
bers, provided the colored people are allowed
to vote, and ii they are not allowed to vote,
she will be entitled to five members. The |
same rule will apply to all the States. If it
is said that this rule is unjust, and that the
whole population should be counted, an
swer, that representation and taxation should |
go together, and that it is not just to claim
on a certain class of popula-
ton, and then deny to that population the
privilege of voting for those representatives.
If am told that the whole population ought
to be counted, though one class Of it only
should be allowed to vote, I answer that the
free white men of the North will never con-
sent that the Southern States shall add by
the result OF their rebellion to their power in
the House of Representatives by counting
the non-voting negro population and that,
as a citizen of North-Carolina I am unMil- |