Mr. DIXON. I offer the following amendment, to beinserted at the end of the 1st section of the amendment reported by the committee: Provided, That no person who has not heretofore voted in this District shall be permitted to vote unless he shall be able at the time of offering to vote to read and also write his own name. Mr. President, the amendment which I have offered provides that no person not heretofore a voter shall be authorized by this bill to vote who is unable to read and also to write his own name. I have offered it not with the in tention of obstructing, but in the hope of aiding the passage of the bill. I intend to vote for it if thus amended. I may be permitted to say that I have always, whenever an opportunity has been presented, voted to extend suffrage irrespective of color. H. thus voted when the question was raised in the territorial bills of recent sessions. Once, I think, in the legislature of Connecticut and twice at the polls I have voted to erase the word “white” from the constitution of my own State. My opinions on the subject have not changed. I still believe that color or race should not be the test of the right of voting. I would deny to no man the right of voting solely on account of his color; but I doubt the propriety of permit ting any man to vote, whatever his race or color, who has not at least that proof of intelligence which the ability to read and write furnishes. It is true, as the Senotor from Massachusetts remarked yesterdayf that there are instances in which remarkable intelligence is found in men who can neither read nor write, yet these are exceptional. As a general rule, while ability to read and write does not prove high intelligence, the want of this ability proves gross ignorance and utter incapacity to vote intelli gently. It is therefore no injustice to say to any man, white or black. Before you share in the direction of public affairs you must at least furnish this evidence of your capacity. This rule is, therefore, with great justice, applied in the State of Connecticut to white men, and in the State of Massachusetts to all men irre spective of color. The reasons for its application exist much more strongly in this district, where the class of black men who cannot read is large, than in the State of Massachusetts where their votes could not perceptibly affect the decision of any public question. Yet the Senfrom .".will allow me to remind him that the “reading test, ” socalled, was inserted in the constitution of that State by the party of which he was a very prominent member, if not with his consent. What is just in Massachusetts cannot be unjust in this District. I ask for the yeas&nays on my amendment. The yeas&nays were ordered.