Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1876-09-13
The Problem Before Us.

One OF the most difficult Of the problems
before US as people giows out Of the differ
ent races and classes by which our country
is occupied There would be little difficulty
in preserving and perpetuating free popular
government with homogeneous population,
whose traditionary ideas and habits Of
thought and action were the same. II in
this country we were all Anglo Saxons and
all Pedestrians, the most dangerous elements
in the way Of our future prosperity as a ma
ton would be eliminated. But our electors
are composed Of all races and Of all religions
We have no basis Of citizenship, no electoral
qualifications but the natural and inalienabe
rights Of men, The theory Of our govern
ment makes every man a brother, and every
man a citizen. Now just here is the great
danger Of the future. IL has always seemed
to us that We might legitimately recognize
every man to be a brother, without clothing
him with the rights of citizenship. The
great mistake of the country, out of which
the greatest possible danger to free nstitu-
tions springs, is this making the natural
brotherhood of man, or the equal and inalien-
able rights of men, the basis of citizenship,
There would be as much proprety in max
ing natural rights the basis OF the family, of
manufacturing or railroad corporations, Of
commercial aud financial institutions. Of
banks, insurance companies and social clubs
and parties. The equal brotherhood Of men,
and their rights under law, TO life liberty
and the pursuit of happiness, can be fully
recognized without making them partners
Of our domestic social business or civil life.
The right to life. to protection of all legiti-
mate interests is one thing to which all are
entitled, aud the right to vote is another
thing, and ought to rest on a different basis
entirely.
The rightto vote is not anatural right, but
is permitted and arbitrary right. Arailroad
corporation, a commercial company, bank
ing institution, determine the qualifications
of the voters in them. SO popular gov
eminent may decide the qualifications Of its
voters. The right to exercise the privilege
of determining the character and destiny Of
government or a nation is not natural, but
is acquired. 1t belongs to a man not by
gift of God, but by the laws Of his fellow
men. A man may be a brother and deserve
the treatment of brother when it would be
absurd to accord TO him the rights of a
ruler and treat him as entitled to sover.
eighty. The failure to make this very sim
pie distinction has brought our government
into the neighborhood of very dangerous
and perhaps fatal evils in our political and
national life. We do not question the right
or the power of government to extend its
electoral privilege to degree commensurate
with human brotherhood. We only ques-
ton the wisdom, the prudence and the
safety of it. There is no moral obligation
resting on a government TO extend the sover-
eign privileges of citizenship and the cleo
toral right beyond its own highest welfare,
according to its own judgment. A hotel is
bound TO accord all its privileges to its Gus
toners, but it is under no obligation to take
them into its management aud give them
voice in its general direction. A bank is
under obligation to furnish money to those
who can comply with its terms, but is under
no obligation to make all its creditors re-
sponsible for its direction. A railroad is
bound to transport freight and passengers
safely and uniformly, but its passengers have
no business in its annual meetings and no
right to vote for its directors For govern
ment to give the right of voting to all its
citizens, irrespective of any special qualif-
cation, on the ground merely of natural
right, is very much like bank giving
the right of voting for directors to all
its customers, or railroad giving the right
of voting for its managers to all who ride
in its cars, on the basis of natural equality.
The original holders and possessors of the
eminent domain of any country, whether ac-
quired by purchase, discovery or conquest,
are the responsible rulers of that country,
and are to determine its political affairs in
their best judgment. They can admit to
their partnership whom they please. They
can hold the government in their own hands,
or they can offer to share it with all corners,
without regard TO race religion or previous
condition. The original holders and possess
ors of the eminent domain of this country,
so fast as they have acquired it by conquest,
treaty or purchase, have invited all the
world, with exceptions, to share with them
in its political management The Indians
are excluded; the Mongolians are excluded
minors, idiots and women are excluded.
Electoral qualification does not rest exactly
on the basis of nature, but on the basis of
laws that haye had a constant tendency TO
make political rights commensurate with
the rights Of nature or the right TO exercise
political power commensurate with the right
to enjoy political protection. There are CA
ceptions enough to show that even in our
own-the most popular government there
is under the sun-we hold that dictatorship
must rest on law and not on natural right,
and that il may and must have limitations.
The great problem of the future in our re-
public, therefore, and one which cannot be
solved by centennial or Fourth of July decla.
nations, relates to questions growing out of
the extension of suffrage to all classes, races
and conditions of men. 1t is question
which puzzles the ablest thinkers how to
preserve republican institutions amid the
clashing interests and preiudices of so many
voters who array themselves against each
other with increasing bitterness on matters
of race or of religion questions which have
always stirred the bitterest prejudces and
and reused the most active animosties of
men. At the South the political division is
likely to run on the line of color and of race.
The attempt to mass the negro vote against
the white vote, or the white against the
negro, on any pretext is one fraught with
SO much peril to our republic and to the
cause of popular freedom, that no one but an
insane man would dream of it. And yet the
attempt is persistently made to array the
whites and blacks against each other, by
both sides, as il questions OF principle could
ever be settled on a color line. As well