Mr. BINGHAM. I 110 e the gentleman will excuse me. The House as kindly extended my time, and I desire to conclude my remarks in as brief time as may be. After I shall have done so, if the House is disposed, I will hear an hing the gentleman may have to say. have endeavored to make the point clear that the issue now before this House is whether the constitution shall be so amended as to secure to the free citizens of each State equal rights. The point raised upon the proposition reported by the committee is whether the declared intent of the constitution of your fathers shall be. enforced, or whether it shall be basely surrendered, by adinittin that when all are free, a minority of the citizens of a State may disfranchise a majority of the male citizens of full age of the U.S. within such State. I deny their right to do so. I might go further in this arment, and say, with the late Chancellor Kent, that whenever the majority of a State inserted the wor “white” as a condition of the exercise of the elective franchise “it deserved consideration whether such exclusion would not be opposedto the constitution of the U.S. ” I believe that the free citizens of each State were guarantied, and intended to be guarantied by the terms of the constitution, all not some, “all” the privileges of citizens of the U.S. in eve State. That is the express provision of the constitution. But the question now presented is a very differ eat one from the case just supposed, of the majority offree citizens restricting some of the rights 1866. 431 of a minority. My friendfrom California Hiom] has informed us that there are 100,000 more free colored citizens of the U.S. in the State of Mississippi today than there are of white citizens; that there are 100,000 more free colored citizens of the U.S. in SCarolina than there are of white citizens, and then we are gravely told that we must not press this amendment because we are abandoning the Constitution and the intent of our fathers. That is a new discovery, one for which the Democracy ought to take out letters patent, that it was ever intended that a minority of free citizens should disfranchise the majority of free male citizens, of full age, in any State of the Union! For myselfI will never consent to it. Well, then, some gentlemen asks, wh not o for a constitutional amendment. which will declare, once for all, that no State in this Union shall make any distinction in the right of voting between male citizens of the U.S., resident within its limits and over 21 years of age, save in the case of persons convicted of infamous crime after due trial? I will answer with all my heart that I am ready to go for that. But a majorit of those with whom I am associated think that this is all that is needed at present, in connection with other propositions to be submitted by them. I am content with that. I want. the American people by adopting such amendments to declare their purpose to stand by the foundation principle of their own institutions, the absolute equaity of all citizens of the U.S. politically and civilly before theirown laws. that is the issue involved in the amendment presented by the committee. Gentlemen will notice that the 1st clause of the amendment proposed by the committee is in the exress language of the constitution of the U.S., except the word “free.” The word “ free” in your constitution has, I said before, become forever meaningless by your amendment to the constitution declaring that hereafter a slave cannot be or breatheanywhere within the Republic. This JtResolution says: Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may he included within this Union accordingto their respective numbers, countin the whole number of persons in each State, excluing Indians not taxed. That is the exact language of the Constitution. Indians not taxed; are excluded, for the reasons suggested by the venerable chairman of the committee [Mr. Srnvsss] the other day, that they are tribal, are not part of the body politic of the U.S. until they are subject to taxation. It is objected to this resolution, among other things, that you retain the provision of the constitution for the apportionment of direct taxes. I ask the attention of the House for a moment to the importance of that provision. I know that in the practice of the Government it has been found entirely useless in time of peace. In the present century there have been but 3 oc casions when that grant of power in the constitution has been exercise, and those 3 occasions were in time of war. The eiicct of the amendment of my honorable colleague [Mr. SCHENCK] is to strike out the 3rd o ause of the 2nd section of article 1 of the constitution, which declares that direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States according to the ratio of representation; but his ainendment leaves and does notstrike out of the constitution the provisions of the 8th and 9th sections of article 1, the 1st of which is that the Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, &c.; and the 2nd of which is that “no capitation or other direct tax shall be laid, unless in proortion to the census or enumeration hereinbe ore directed to be taken.” How, then, will the constitution stand? Why, sir, it seems to me that this fact is a fatal objection to the proposed amendment of my colleague, [Mr. Scumcm] If you are to dispose of the apportionment clause in the 1st article of the Conslitution as to the apportion.ment of direct taxes among the States, you must go further and limit the power of Congress to tax as provided in the 8th section. Take away the power, as my colleague proposes, to apportion direct taxes among the States, and leave the power as my colleague proposes to impose a direct capitation tax; an you introduce into your constitution an express power to make unequal and unjust laws, which was ubhorred by the makers of your constitution, and against which they intended to provide a perpetual safeguard in the clause for apportionment of all direct taxes among the States. The effect of my colleagues substitute, if it be adopted, will be this: the apportionment clause of the constitution as to direct taxes will be stricken out; the granting clause of the 8th and 9th sections, to lay direct taxes, even a capitation tax, will be retained. What will follow? The express power to enaew unequal tax laws, such as are sometimes enacted across the waters under the iron rule of Englandplie imposition of taxes, so as directly to make the ric i richer and the poor poorer. Let me explain. You lay a direct tax of one dollar, or 5 dollars, if you please, perhead upon every, citizen of the U.S., and you strike out the apportionment clause. The result is that the poor man in his hovel, surrounded byhis ragged children, his only earthly treasure, is compelled to pay, according to that assessment, for every member of his whilethe single, cliildlessman, with hhiso$n1soeoh, o0l;o of annual income, pays not a dolar beyond the assessment on his own head. Under the provisions of the 3rd clause of the 2nd section of article 1, which mv colle o would strike out, that cannot be. Why? because a capitation tax is a direct tax, and because the 3rd clause, which my colleague proposes to strike out, requires that every direct tax shall be apportioned, not among the)eople, but among the States of the Union. he moment you so apportion it, it becomes atax upon property, not upon persons. I think, Mr. Speaker, that ifnothing else were said upon the subject, this objection to the proposed substitute of my colleague would of itself be fatal. With my present view of the matter, therefore, I cannot vote for that amendment.