Skip Skip PETITIONS and MEMORIALS.R. WADE presented a resolution of the Legislature of Ogiio, against the passage of an law under which the General Government sha assume the war debt of the several States, in curred in raising and paying bounties to volunteers; which was referred to the ComMilAffrs . Mr. CHANDLER presented a petition of citizen of Michigan on god in the manufacture o agricultural imp ements, praying for a reduction of the taxes on the sales of agricultural implements; which was referred to the ComFinance. Mr. TltUiiIBUliL presented the petition of Lewis Tappan, praying that in all enactments the colored people may be treated as white citizens; which was referred to the JtComReconstruction. Hc also presented the petition of Seward o. Nelson, J. F. Brooks, and others, citizens deWitt county, Illinois praying for such legislation as will equalize the beauties paid to volunteers; which was referred to the ComMilAffrs . Mr. NESMITH presented the petition of ColonelA. J. Slcmmer and other Army officers, praying for increased compensation; which was referred to the ComMilAffrs . Mr. HARRIS. A few do s ago I obtained leave to withdraw from the lee of the Senate the petition and other pagers relating to the claim for services during the revolutionary war of the heirs of Joshua C amberlain. I now desire to represent the petition and opera accompanying it, and I move that theygw referred to the ComRevClaims. The motion was agreed to. Mr. WADE. I present the memorial of 500 colored so diers of the 56th regiment U.S. colored infantry, stationed at Helena, Arkansas, in which they say: “We the undorsigned colored soldiers do respect fully petition your onorable body in behalf of ourselves and our colored brethren. we ask equality before the law, the same rights and privileges accorded to white men. Believing that without the safeguard of suffrage freedom will be of little permanent benefit to our people. We ask your honorable body not to admit the rercsentatives of our late masters until we shall be allowed a voice in the elections. “We do not ask social equality, for a higher law than human must forever govern social relations. Our peopleare now making zealous efforts to educate themselves and if loyalty. wealth, industry or intelligence be made the test of suffrage, we are willing to submit: but we beg that color be no longer permitted to exclude us from the rights and privileges of other men. In the name of 4 million people who have been under all circumstances loal to the Government. of 186,000 loyal colored soldiers who have served in the late war, of 60 8,000of our dead comrades. in the name of God, humanity, and justice, we implore you not to surrender us againto the mercies of the white people of the South.” I move that this memorial be referred to the ComReconstruction. The motion was agreed to. Mr. WADE also presented a “ memorial of the Friends Association of Philadelphia for the Aid and Elevation of the Freedmen, ” praying that the right of suffrage be conferred irrespective of race or color; which was referred to the JtComReconstruction. Mr. SUMNER. I have in my hands a me morial and protest signed by George T. Downing Frederick Doug ass, Lewis I. Douglass, A. W. Ross, and others, bein a delegation representing the colored pen o of the several States now sojourning in Washington. They memorialize the Senate of the U.S. by way of protest against a proposed amendment to the constitution which is now pendin in this body. The set forth in their memorithat being here in ashington and charged with the duty of looking after the best interests of the recently emancipated, they most respect fully but earnestly pray this honorable body to favor no amendment to the constitution of the U.S. which will grant or allow anyone or all of the States of this Union to disfrauchisa any class of citizens on the ground of race or color for any consideration whatever. The further respectfully represent that the Constitution, as adopted bte fathers of the Republic in 1789, evident y contemplated the result which has now happened, to wit, the abolition of slavery. The men who frained it and those who adopted it, framed and adopted it for the people, and the whole people, colored men being at the time legal voters in most of the States. In that instrument, as it now stands, there is not a sentence nor a syllable conveying any 1866. 849 shadow of right orauthority by which any State may make color or race a disqualification for the exercise of the right of suffrage; and they say they will regard as a real calamity the intro(luction of any words expressly or by implication giving any State or States such power; and they respectfully submit that if the amendment now pending shall be adopted it will enable any State to deprive any class of citizens of the “elective franchise, notwithstanding it was obviously framed with a view to affect the question of negro suffrage only. For these and other reasons they respectfully pray that the amendment to the constitution recently passed by the House and now before this body enot adopted. I do not know that I have at any time preseated a memorial which was entitled tomore respectful consideration than this. from the character of its immediate signers and from the vast multitudes they represent. I hope I shall not depart from the properprovince of presenting it if I express my entire adhesion to all that it says, and if I take this occasion to entreat the Senate, if they will not hearken to arguments against the pending proposition, that they will at least hearken to the voice of these memorialists representing the Colored race of our country. ask that the memorial lie upon the table.