New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1870-10-27
pP0TECTT0N TO VOTERS.

l
When the people of the Union adopted
the fifteenth amendment, and authorized
Congress to pass appropriate laws for its en-
forcement, the power to protect voters at
the polls was clearly brought within the
scope of its legislative duties. Any pre-
cedent, or supposed precedent, prior to
the adoption of the amendment is so much
waste paper. The power of Congress to
| regulate elections to some extent, has
been claimed under the grant of authority
to pass naturalization laws, and exercises
a revisory control over the returns, quail
| ications and election of its own members,
| but it was reserved for the fifteenth
| amendment, the latest expression of tie
national will, to sweep away all the cob
webs of doubt, and place the protection
of the rights of American citizens clearly
in the national Legislature, where 1t OF
| right belongs The nation wills it, and it
| must stand as the law and the practice.
Congress has the power to declare who
| are entitled to citizenship, and It may fol-
low up that declaration with ample pro-
visions to enforce their rights. That
body may not however, as the Demo-
cratic papers insinuate, prevent any man
from voting, who is, under the laws, en-
titled to do so. And the precedent cited
in the Times, Of Sir Sidney Smith landing
his boats crew in the town of Dover, and
preventing any one voting for Huskisson,
furnishes no parallel, for the United
States government does not contemplate
any such wrong. The friends of the Mr.
Spencer Smyths. and Mr.. Huskisson's
will, on the contrary, be afforded a free
and fair chance to come up and vote with
out being molested by any one. An at
tempt on the part of the United States
officer to keep legal voter from the polls
would result in his speedy dismissal from
service by the unanimous demand Of the
Republican party. No legal voter has
any reason to object to any provision of
the federal law. No honest man, who ex-
poets to win or lose his election by fair
means, can say word against it. He can
go from his place of business quietly to
the polls and deposit his ballot with as
much facility and with as little hindrance
as he can put letter in the postoffice.
He will, moreover, have the satisfaction
Of knowing that the voter who follows
him, and neutralizes his vote by casting
an opposition ballot is legal voter, and
citizen equal to himself. AS Horace
Greeley remarks, one is willing to have
his vote neutralized by another legal vote,
but he grows FESTIVE and dissatisfied un-
der the knowledge that it is offset by the
ballot of man who has no right to vote
at all, or by the fifth or fifteenth vote Of
some active repeater.
If admission to citizenship confers any
rights at ALL it gives a man fair show at
elections, not only as candidate, but as
a voter Both these objects will be de-
feated if evil-disposed persons may take
possession of the ballot-boxes and drive
honest voters away. 1t is to prevent this
driving away business that the govern
ment interposes its authority. And
whether it uses civil officers, marines or
troops, there will be none of the sort of
work which Sydney Smith was accused of
at Dover But it will take care that no
one else shall do so either. The laws of
all the States are il entire accord with the
provisions of the federal laws, and had it
been possible to enforce them so that JUS
tice could be secured to every man with
out regard to race, color or previous con-
dition, it would never have been necessary
to invoke the strong arm of the natural
guardian of all the States-the federal