Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, I do not propose to discuss the constitutional amendment which has been submitted by Congress to the several States; nor I do propose to discuss at the present time the policy of the Government toward the States of the South. My purpose is in a very few words to give my opinions upon the precise questions which are pending before the Senate. The Senfrom Missouri proposes as an amendment to the bill for the admission of Nebraska, a fundamental condition to be ac: cepted by the people of Nebraska which shall forever prevent the State of Nebraska from disfranchising any person on account of color, and shall secure that all shall be permitted to exercise the elective franchise. And he cites as a precedent the case of Missouri. Now, Mr. President, in my judgment, and with all due respect to my honorable friend, that case is no precedent at all, and for this simple reason; the constitution of Missouri when it asked admission contained a clause directly in hostility to the Constitution of the U.S., and therefore the Congress of the U.S. insisted that that clause in the constitution of the State of Missouri which was in hostility to the Constitution of the U.S. should be forever declared null and void and the State should never undertake to enforce it. But, sir, what he now proposes to attach to the bill for the admission of Nebraska is a very different thing. He does not propose to strike from the constitution of Nebraska a section which is in hostility to the Constitution of the U.S. It is a section which the Constitution of the U.S. expressly permits. That is the difference. What Congress forbade to Missouri was something in violation of the Constitution of the U.S. What he seeks to forbid to Nebraska is that which the Constitution of the U.S. expressly permits, because the Constitution of the U.S. as it is certainly allows the several States to define the qualification of electors, and all of the States in the exercise of that power have imposed qualifications, sometimes of property and sometimes of race and color. And, Mr. President, not only is the proposition of my friendfrom Missouri to attach a fundamental condition which is in hostility to the constitution of the U.S. as it is, but is in hostility, also, to the Constitution of the U.S. as it is proposed to be amended by the very amendment which is now pending before the Legislatures of the several States. This constitutional amendment, which was submitted by Congress last summer, in the 2nd section in express words implies this power in the several States, because the 2nd section expressly says: "When the right to vote at any election for the choiceof electors for President and VEEP of the U.S. Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State being 21years of age and a citizen of the U.S., or in, any way abridged except for participation in rebellionor other crime” then the basis of representation shall be changed. That 2nd section of the constitutional amendment, which was submitted by Congress last summer, which is now pending before the States, and which, for aught we now know, may be adopted by a sufficient number of States to make it a part of the Constitution of the U.S., gives to each State the very power which this amendment to this bill denies. Can we do it? Can we do it under the Constitution as it is? When the Constitution as it is gives to each State the power to define the qualification of its electors can we, the congress of the U.S., set up some fundamental article which shall override the Constitution? Can we enter into a compact with one of the States which will deny to the State a power which the Constitution gives to the State? Is Congress above the Constitution, or is the Constitution above Congress? such a provision, in my judgment, will be perfectly null and void. ides, I have one further objection to my honorable friend's amendment, and it has nothing to do with the negro question at all. There are hardly enough negroes in Nebraska to count. There are probably more than there were in Montana when we had that question up. There was but one negro in that Territory and he had died really before the question was raised in the Senate. The objection which I am about to present may grow out of the fact that I have been connected more or less with Indian affairs, and hence it is that I think of the Indian sometimes when he seems to be entirely forgotten by all the other members of this body. This proposition of my honorable friend would confer the right of suffrage on every Indian in Nebraska. are Omahas and Ottoes and Sioux and Cheyennes and Arapahoes in Nebraska, and in an excited election had in this new State the Indian agent or somebody else might bring up the whole Indian tribes of that Territory under this amendment and vote them all at an election. That is a question that does not concern the negro, and upon which we are not yet so much and so deeply interested but that we can actually see what the result would be. Now, look at the proposition: he imposes as a fundamental article of the constitution of Nebraska forever that they shall admit every Indian in that Territory to the exercise of the right of franchise, for it covers the Indian just as much as it does the negro; it covers all persons; it forbids the denial of the right of suffrage to any person on account of race or color. Mr. President, that is all I desire to say as to the present pending amendment of the Senfrom Missouri. I desire to say a single word in relation to the bill itself. gave no tice of an intention to introduce an amendment which has no effect upon the constitution, but is to have effect simply upon the question of the admission of the State into the Jnion, to wit, that the constitution shall 1st be submitted to the people of the Territory of Nebraska, and if they vote in favor of its admission and in favor of the constitution, then, without any further proceeding on the part of Congress, by proclamation of the President, they may be declared admitted into the Union as one of the States. A similar provision was adopted in the case of Wisconsin. In one of the acts passed by Congress for the admission of Wisconsin it was provided that the constitution should be submitted to the people, and if ratified by them, then, upon the proclamation of the President, the State should be admitted without further action by Congress. My difficulty in relation to Nebraska is 2 fold. I certainly desire as a representative of one of the new States to welcome into this Union all the new States, and indeed I am willing to welcome the old States into the Union also, North. South, ".; they are properly prepared to." . enter. My difficulty. twofold; 1st, we have no legal evidence before us that the people of Nebraska desire admission; and 2nd ly, we have no such evidence before us as to satisfy us that Nebraska has yet a sufficient population to entitle her to admission. What evidence have we that the people of Nebraska desire admission? It is true that Congress in 1864 passed an enabling act authorizing the people of that Territory to elect delegates to form a constitution, to submit it to the people, and if adopted by the people they were to be admitted into the Union as one of the States. But, sir, instead of their forming a constitution under this provision of the act of Congress, they held an election and chose a convention, and the convention adopted no constitution and submitted no constitution to the people at all, because it was found when the convention was chosen and the delegates came together that a majority of the delegates were elected opposed to any constitution at all, and therefore they did not act. Certainly they refused to submit any constitution to the people; the convention did not form any constitution.