Mr. ROGERS. Itisimmaterial what the laws of Congress were; I am talkinw about the laws of NewHampshire. I am talking of the laws of that extremely loyal and patrrotic State of NewwHampshire, and the laws of extremely platriotic and loyal NewEngland. The State of NewHampshire, in 1855, by solemn enactment atiirmed the legislation of 1815, that no man should be enrol edin the militia but free white citizens. Now, I do not suppose that the members from NewHampshire will vote that the downtrodden people of this District shall be degraded by being put upon apoliticalequality with the negroes whom the State of NewHampshire would not allow even to fight for the country or make a part of her militia. With what grace can they vote for this bill? This bill goes further than ever was pretended by any State where levislution has been had on the subject. If that bill passesit allows the negroes not only to have the right to vote but to become judges of the courts, mayors of the city, and to hold the highest offices within the of the qualified voters of the District. That is its effect, and it will not be contradicted by anyone on the other side. As it has been reported by the ComJudiciary, it not only allows these negroes to vote, but to hold any office to which they may be elected. such a course would disgrace and degrade us before the nations of the earth. Shall this fairtemple which has been reared by the genius and wisdom of our fathers, be despoiled and the city built in the name of Washington be so far insulted that a black man shall be mayor of the city or sit as judge in the capital of the U.S.; that a negro shall preside over the rights and liberties of white men and women in this district? I conceiVe that the Providence that has watched over this country from its infanc, and guarded the cradle in which it was reare, will not allow such degradation here as will result in amalgamation and miscegenation, and end in insurrection and murder and a war of races. I have read in history of fires kindled in the name of religion, of atrocities committed under the pretext of order and libert, but I believe, if negro suffrage is adopted all over this land, it will lead to scenes in this country more bloody than the world has yet seen. I believe the horrors of StDomingo and Jamaica will be repeated. Because I do not believe that the white men who are rearing their sons and daughters in the ways of virtue, honor, and liberty, will be willing to lay their heads in their aves with such a legacy as negro suffrage to care to them. I want to refer to another NewEngland State, and that is RhdIsland, becanse these States are considered authority by many. I know their citizens are patriotic and noble. I give them due credit. NewEngland is the spot where abolitionism held greater sway than on where else; and yet from the State of RhdIsland or any other State no petition ever came to congress asking for the abolition of slavery that urged or suggested the scheme ofequality of the black man with the white at the ballotbox. NO such petition was made at any time by the most ardent advocates of the abolition of slavery. Therefore, gentlemen, I ask you in the spirit of candor and honesty, in the spirit of the ays of our fathers, in behalf of the soldiers who fought to free the negroes, those soldiers whose deeds and memory constitute the glory of the present and the proudest inheritance of future generations, do not discc those soldiers who have laid down their lives and those who have come back to protect their little homes, by allowing those living to be overrun and overpowv ered at the ballot ox by 8 or 900,000 Africans for whose freedom from slavery the blood of many of the soldiers was spilled. I think I have too much patriotism, too much consideration for the brave soldicrthat left his wife and little ones tofight for his country, to say that he suffered and b edfor the purpose of peretuating the political rights of a race that e clped to relieve from bondage. Now, RhdIsland, in 1822, and also in 1844, in its revised code, forbade any white person to marry any Indian, negro, or mulatto, under penalty of $200, and declared the marriage null and void. Why did RhdIsland do that? I ask the honorable gentlemen from that State, why did RhdIsland declare such a marriage null and void, and inflict heavy penalties upon those who entered into the contract? why? Because the people of RhdIsland knew that there was an imassable ulf which Godal mighty himself adestab ished between the white man in his condition and the black man in his. It was because the wisdom of ages, as handed down to us from days of the most remote antiquity, had impressed upon their minds that there was that inequality which had shown itself by experience existing between the 2 races which could not be obliterated by any human law which could be established upon earth, as the law of God had ordained it. I stand by that law. But gentlemen upon the other side of the House say that there is no impediment in the constitution of the U.S. to the passage of this bill. I am not here to deny the authority, the legal authority, of this Congress to inflict this punishmentupon the people of this District if they see fit; but I am are to ask them to allow the people of the District to say whether they will have negro suffrege or not. I ask them to heed thalangunge which was uttered by James Madison, and which was read by the Gentfrom Pennsylvania. to stand by the warning voice of Madison, and allow those who are to be governed by the law to say by their votes whether they want this Legislature to pass this law. James Madison says, in one of the papers read by the Gentfrom Pennsylvania: Under everyview of the subjeot it seems indispensable that the mass of the oitlzens should not be without a voice in making the laws which they are to obey, and in choosing the magistrates who are to administer them.” Who are citizens? Who were citizens when James Madison wrote that letter? The white people. Does not this decision of the Supreme gourt which I have read show that the persons spoken of by James Madison as citizens, and whom he wanted to vote, were the white men who made up the parts, the integral minutia, of the sovereign power of the States? Why did he write this letter? Because when the Constitution of the U.S. was framed and the constitutions of the different States were made, there was not a State in this whole Union which allowed all white persons to vote. The States of this Union, when their constitutions were originally made, put exclusive restrictions upon the privilege of voting. Eve State, without one single exception, require that a man in order to vote or hold office should have a property qualification. That was the objection in the mind ofJaines Madison. That was what he intended to condemn, and it was to that that his language referred. Why, sir, by the constitution of my own State until 1844, a man could not vote unless he had 50 in proclamation money. He could not go to the lower house of the Legislature unless he hod 250 in proclamation money. He could not go to the Senate of the State unless he had 500 in proclamation money. It went upon the principle that if a man had a jackass worth 50 on one day he could vote, but if he sold the Jackass next day the jackass could vote, but the man could not vote at all. [A laugh.] That was what James Madison was compdaining of; and remember that while so complaining he was adhering to and recommending the great doctrine of selfgovernment; that the people who were to be controlled by the laws siiiiu d have the right to say whether the laws should be passe or not. Gentlemen on the other side of the House claim that the people are the sovereign power. It was so claimed by them in the memorable fight on the Kansas bill that, because the constitution framed at Lecompton was not submitted to the people of the Territory of Kansas, the State should not be admitted under that constitution. Men of all parties, including many of the great shining lights of the dominant party, with the lamented Stephen A. Douglas at their head, all declared against allowing the Lecompton constitution to be the organic law of the people of Kansas, unless that constitution was 1st submitted, not to a Legislature, not toaconvention, but to the people of Kansas, to decide what kind of a constitution they would have, so that Congress might know that the power emanated from the people, through the people; and when they did allow that Territory to come into the Union, it was upon the ground of a sovereign exercise of power on the part of the people.