American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1869-04-24
The Eligibility of Negroes tosOMce

! AA0 4A6ibA4iIy VI Asc6I uSa IV$UMc0,
The Superior Court of Chatham
county has been engaged in hearing
argument on the question of eligibili-
ty of negroes to Office, The Savan-
nah Republican gives the following
synopsis of the arguments pro and |
con:
The Court was opened at 10 |
O'Clock, A. NJ, and the argument in |
the quo qcarrGnto case against Rich
ard III. White resumed.
Gov. johnson, for the defendant,
admitted that in the origin of the
government, State and Federal, ne
groes had no civil or political rights,
and that such rights could only be
conferred upon them by constitution
al enactment, but that the law max
ing power of the land had swept the
distinction from the statute book.
Under the constitution Of Georgia
nobody is excluded from the ballot
box, either on account of participa-
ton in the rebellion OF of race or
color, and all were entitled to hold
Office. He admitted that under the
Code OF Georgia negroes cannot hold
office, but insisted that this provision
of the Code was in conflict with the
Constitution of the United States and
Of the State, and was therefore void.
Counsel indulged in considerable
eloquent defamation about the
great principles Of liberty upon which
the action of Cromwell and the Puri-
tans of Massachusetts was based,
and which love of liberty has de
scended to the present generation,
and swept away all political distinc-
ton on account of race or color. all
of which appeared to us to have a
very slight bearing upon the ques-
ton of law before the Court.
He insisted that the right of citi-
/. zenship which had been conferred
upon the negro by the supreme law
) of Georgia carried with it the right to
hold office.
| He read the second section of tho
, third article of the Constitution ol
Georgia, as follows: "The Senators
, shall be citizens Of the United States
who have attained the age of twenty
five years, and who after the firSt
: election, under this constitution, shal
have been citizens of this State tol
two years, and for one year a resi-
dent of the district from which elect
ed > and sought to draw the infer
5 ence that inaSmuch as no person wht
1 is not citizen of the United State:
: can be Senator, therefore all wht
5 are citizens may hold that office, pro
G vlded they are twenty-five years o
t age, and have resided in the Stat,
: and district during the time prescrib
ed by the constitution
$ Mr.. Hartridge made the closin:
e argument for the relator, in which h,
I confined himself exclusively to thu
+ question of law before the Court
o and made a clear, logical and crush
L ing argument In support of the propo
e sition, that neither by the Constitu
t ton of the United State or of Geor
4 gia were colored men eligible to office
:. He showed that the identical Con
t gress which proposed the Fourteenth
e Amendment to the constitution, ant
o which enacted law comforting thu
:. privilege of citizenship upon the nc
v grOes in the District of Columbia
where that body has exclusive juris
h diction, did not hold the doctrin
d that the privilege of citizenship car
n ried with it the right to hold offict
1t and therefore they deemed it i'm
peratlvely necessary in order to cor
fer that right to enact special la,
for that purpose. He also read a
extract from the proceedings of tn
Georgia Constitutional Convention
ia which showed conclusively that tha
70 body rejected proposition to conft
upon the negro the right to hol
, office by an overwhelming majority
~ showing that neither the trainers {
the 14th amendment to the Constitl
n ton of the United States or of til
m Constitution of Georgia ever dream
ed that either one or the other col
O. ferred upon the negro the right
"a hold Office. He also exposed with
. master hand, the fallacy of the arg,
~ ment drawn from the second sectio
" of the third article of the Constitl
,o ton of Georgia, and showed that
e that section conferred the right upo
1e negroes to hold office, it also co
nj ferred the same right upon wome
an whether white or black, because ii
% proposition that they were citizel
no of the United States is incontrovert
M MIU bic.