Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, several centuries of civilization have so instructed the white race to which we belong that, as a general rule, all male persons of that race, on arriving at their majority, are capable of exercising the right of suffrage; but such is not the fact in relation to the other races. There is no man on this floor who will rise and give it as his deliberate opinion that a majority of either the Indian race, the African race, or the Asiatic race within the U.S. are capable of exercising the right of suffrage. There is not one Senator who will rise and give it as his opinion that, as a general rule, either the Indians, the Africans, or the Chinese are capable of discharging this highest duty of the citizen. In reference to the white race, the exception is incapacity. The few, the exceptions only of the white men of this country, are incapable of discharging this duty; but with the Indians, the Africans, and the Chinese it is only the option. that are capable of exercising this right. What is this proposition? Not to provide for these exceptions who are capable of discharging the duty of the elective franchise here in the DistCol; but the proposition is to give and force universal suffrage to every male negro in this District, or who shall come into this District from the States which surround it. That is the bald proposition. Is there a Senator here will the Senfrom Ohio, [Mr. SHERMAN] in his conscience and upon his judgment, say that he believes these people, as a general rule, are capable of exercising this right in the DistCol, or that those who are to flow into this District from Maryland and Virginia and all the States of the South are capable of exercising it? I admit there are exceptions; there are some very honorable exceptions, men of color who are educated, good peaceable citizens in the District; and if the bill provided for those who were qualified it should not meet with my opposition; but it is to this unqualified, unlimited extension of the right of suffrage to this race which in Africa, in its original condition, stood at the very lowest of all the races of mankind, and which in this country for almost 200 years has been held in slavery; it is to this idea that now, upon the 1st instant of breaking the chains of slavery, at once this whole population is to have the right of suffrage bestowed upon them, that I am opposed. Mr. President, there are gentlemen who stand up and say that the judgment of the people in the last elections was in favor of universal negro suffrage in the DistCol. How can that be inferred? This bill passed the HoRep early in the last session; it was among the 1st bills which passed that body; it came to the senate; it was here pending during the whole of that long session. Why did you not pass it through the Senate? Because, in my humble judgment, you believed the powere against it; and you dared not take the responsibility. Men speak of universal negro suffrage as having been pronounced in favor of in o: late election. Let us look at that proposition for a moment. What was the question subThe honorable Senfrom Massachusetts [Mr. SUMNER] says that while the constitutional amendment was submitted to the people, it was by no means the definite issue iod to them to pass upon, and under which Congress was pledged, in case it should be adopted, to admit representation from the state of the south as properly reconstructed. There are other gentlemen on this floor, it is true, who maintain that that constitutional amendment was submitted by Congress to the States of the South, and if adopted by those States it would be evidence that they were reconstructed so as to be entitled to admission. But, sir, in that constitutional amendment, if you say that that was the issue submitted, negro suffrage was repudiated, so far as the action of Congress was concerned. It was left to the States to decide for themselves. How, then, can gentlemen stand up here and say the judgment of the people in the last election was in favor of universal negro suffrage? In my judgment, there is not a State in this Union outside of NewEngland, and I doubt even if there is one there unless it may be Vermont, which, on the direct question being put to the people, would vote in favor of universal negro suffrage. Even in Massachusetts, if the direct question of universal negro suffrage, whether the negro can read or write or not, whether he knows anything about the Constitution of his country or not, were submitted to the people of Massachusetts, I doubt whether they would vote for it, few as the negroes are in the State of Massachusetts. If you proposed that it should be qualified by intelligence, that they should be required to be able to read or write, to read the Constitution of the U.S. States or to write their names, Massachusetts might votein favor of it; so might Connecticut; so might Wisconsin; so might other States. But when gentlemen tell me that the people of Ohio, the people of NewYork, and Pennsylvania, and the people of the whole North, by anything that, transpired in the late election have decided in favor of universal, unqualified negro suffrage, they assume that for which there is no foundation whatever. Your very constitutional amendment repudiated the idea of universal negro suffrage. There was not a stump in anyone of the northern States on.you did not, over and over again, declare that you did not follow THADDEUs STEVENs of the House and Mr. SUMNER of the Senate in their views of universal negro suffrage, but that you left it to the people to decide for themselves. These are the facts. Sir, had universal negro suffrage to be imposed upon the DistCol and upon all the States of the South as a condition of reconstruction been declared as the basis of the issue before the American people by Congress before the election, as you now assume it after the election, and had that issue been presented in Pennsylvania, Ohio, New.o. Illinois, and Wisconsin, there would have been no such result at the elections as was witnessed. I say, then, that this assumption which is made by gentlemen here, that the people in the last election have decided in favor of the pass age of this bill, in favor of universal negro suffrage here, is an assumption without foundation, and we, therefore, are at liberty to look into this question and discuss it upon its merits. I come back to the merits of the question when I say that while the exceptions to the general rule may be qualified to discharge this duty, as a general rule the African race are incompe tent to do it. It is not so with the white race. Therefore, while the law has allowed universal suffrage to the whites of the District, it ought to qualify that suffrage when it, extends it to the negro. Inasmuch as this bill gives it without qualification, I voted against it on its pass age, and I shall vote against it now.