The times., 1901-06-07

Last session in increasing the membership Of th
( House We gave them net increase OF nln'
4 members, when there no necessity for 1t
but we had Democrats who were 50 anxious Il
get their own State representation increased t!ld
they were willing to let the Republicans do a.
they wanted. Tie House was large enough. Now /!
the Republican leaders conclude their naT- l
not sufficient. and claim their right to increase II
by reducing the representation of such states a
! louisiana Mississippi. North and South Carolina
I it would bring turmoil and strife and reopen ths
! issues of the civil war.
For these reasons | do not think it il best ioi
! the Southern States to adopt such constitutional
amendments | think the Georgia election law
remedies the whole trouble complained OF IN the
South Any vote in Georgia II he Is
not iclon and has paid his taxes. He must
/ register and pay his taxes The great ma
( jority of negroes have only poll tax 10 pay
\ negro can refuse TO pay his poll tax Of 81. and
after he has done for twenty years he can vote
any time by paying up But hundreds and nun
| dredS Of them prefer the dollar TO voting. We
have educational qualification. The number OF
negroes in State Is not SO large as II was
formerly. Very many OF them moving away
where agricultural conditions are better than they
are in Georgia. The colored people in the State
are now in the proportion OF four to SIX
It is worth their while for leaders Of
opinion in the South to remember that
political conditions and possibilities
are no longer what they We're be-
fore the advent of the Brown de-
cisions in the insular cases. The
trainers of the State constitutional
amendments in Mississippi. Louisiana,
and the Carolinas may think that their
work has been within the Federal Con-
stitution, but so nearly the whole
American bar thought that the funda-
mental law as expounded by Chief Jus
tice Marshall laid down a plain and
unmistakable rule governing the rights
of our Territories to domestic free trade
with other parts of the common coun-
try. The Supreme Court by a majority
of one held otherwise, and equally
might decide the restrictions placed
upon suffrage in the States above men
toned TO be unconstitutional
Mr.. Livingston undoubtedly is right
in expecting that before long the Re
publicans in Congress will attempt to
strengthen their hold upon the Ma
tional Legislature by reducing the rep
resentation of Southern Common
weaIths which have withdrawn the
privilege of the ballot from illiterates
in such way as to lay them open to
a charge of directing their action prin-
cipally to the negro vote. The prob
ability that a movement of the kind
will take form before long is increased
by the acknowledged fear of the Ad-
ministration that the recent change in
the character of our institutions, due
to the Supreme Court decisions men
toned, may not prove palatable to the
country generally, and may become the
source Of a revulsion of public senti-
ment 10 the disadvantage of the party
in power From that point of view it
may well happen that every seat in the
House of Representatives possible to
gain by means of exclusion will appear
of great value to the majority. The
able Representative from the Fifth dis
trict of Georgia is wise in advising his
state to avoid a fate which is not at
all unlikely to overtake some of its
Southern sisters.