The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-02-18
SUFFRAGE AMENDMENT PASSED
HOUSE BY OVER THREE
FIFTHS MAJORITY.
Amid Applause, With Galleries and Lobbies
Crowded With Interested Spectators, 1t
Passed Both Readings-Great
Speeches by Rountree
and Winston.

now we know it was most egregious
mistake mistake that amounted to Il
crime. Since that time even the hearth
est enthusiast has seen his hopes wither,
and year by year they have lost faith in
their panacea. Recent events have as
celerated this change in sentiment until
today we find many States putting into
their constitutions limitations upon the
right of suffrage.
louisiana, Mississippi, South Caro-
lima, Massachusetts and other States
have laws similar to this. In Hawaii
the National government has very much
abridged the right to vote: while in
Cuba only about 20 per cent of the peo-
pie are said to be fitted for exercising
the elective franchise. And in the Phil
ippines the right to vote will be still
more abridged. for the reason that the
people there do not know bow to use
it wisely.
"The results of the lasr four years in
North Carolina, and especially Of the last
two years. have completely demonstrated
the fact that the negro is untitted for
lf-government. You all know the con-
ditions that have prevalel The con
dtions in my own county were SIMPLY
intolerable. But / shall not stop here
to rehearse that. 1t has often been told
in the newspapers Of this and other
States. But it teaches me- tkis-that
something must be done. The nroble II
must be solved, and solved III Il Just. hu-
mane and legal way.
I'm doing this we were met with two
difficulties On the one side was the
Constitution of the United States, on the
other was the illiterate white voter.
These latter must not be disfranchised.
Among them are some of the States
best citizens-men who have fought and
lahored for their country built its very
foundations and builded well. They are
as capable Of selfsovernment. Mr..
Speaker. as You or / and must not he
disfranchised. ,Applause.)
Mr. Rountree explained in detail the
provisions of the amendment. which is
printed elsewhere, and gave the reasons
that influenced the committee in draft
ing the amendment.
The principle on which the committee
acted. he said, was this: u. That per-
sons guilty of crime have not sufficient
character to participate in the govern
ment; CD that persons without a home
or fixed habitation have not sufficient in
terest in the State or its welfare to take
part in its government; t3.) that those
who are not thrifty and patriotic enough
to pay their taxes-bear their just part
of the burden of government should
have no voice i'll that government, :nd
az they must be possessed of sufficient
intelligence to rightly exercise the duties
and privileges of citizenship.
'.We provided that every voter must
pay his poll tax and be able, to a certain
extent to read and write
Touching the incompetency of the ne
gro for exercise of the elective franchise,
Mr.. Rountree declared that fitness for
self-goyernment was largely matter of
heredity. 1T must be obtained by in
heritance ana not by schools and learn
ing.
This is the very doctrine laid down
by Hare in his American Constitutional
Law So on page ) lie says: The art
Of self-government cannot be taught by
school masters or learned from books,
but must be acquired through the ac-
cumulated experience of generations,
handed down additionally. 1t is to such
a cause, rather than to any original SUI
periority of the Anglo-Saxon people over
the other Indo-Germanic tribes, that We
tutions in England and the United
States
While the committee had this amend
ment under consideration, along with
that touching taxes for public schools,
number of the leading negroes of the
State came before the committee. They
acknowledged that their race had made
little progress during the last thirty
years, and assigned as reason that they
were but few years out of sayagery
and fewer out of slavery: that the habits
and traditions of that debased state still
clung to them. They assigned the true
cause.
Edmund Burke in his criticism of the
French Revolution. laid down the postu-
late that no people can break entirely
with the past. Whether government is
good or bad depears solciy upon The
people governed You can't impose self
government upon the Chinese or the peo-
pie of Russia 1t is difficult thing
to do even in France, the most en-
lightened nation of Europe.
'.These are the reasons why we nave
so framed this amendment as 10 except
from its provisions the men who, for n
| hundred years, have helped control TINS
government, and make it what it is to-
! day.
/ "But, some one asks. what are you
i going to do with the 10Th amendment
/ to the United States Constitution? Does
! it not provide that the right to vote
shall not be denied or abridged on ac-
count of race, color or previous condl-