Mr. GORHAI. t would be as improper to take this power from the national Legislature us to restrain the British Parliamentfrom regulating the circumstancesof elections, leaving this business to counties themselves. Mr. MadISON. The necessityofaGencial Government supposes that the State Legislatures will some hmes fail or refusqto consult the common interest at the expenseof their local convenience or pieiudices. The policy of referrinfilthe uppointment of the HoRep to the peep c and not to theLegislatures of the States sup sesthat the result will be somewhat influenc by t a mode. This view of the guestion seems to decide that the Legislatures of the tntes ought not to have the uncontrolled right of regulating the times. places, and manner of holdinl elections. It was impossibleto foreseeall the abuse! that might. be made of the discretionary power. Whether the electors should vote by ballot or 9 core; should assembleat this place or that place; should be divided into districts or all mect at one place; should all vote for all the rercsentative s or all in a district vote for a number a1otted to the district these and many other points would depend on the Legislatures and might materially affectthe appointments. Whenever the State Legislatures h I. avorite measureto carry, they would take care so to mold their regulations as to favor the carididntes they Wished to succeed. Besides, theinequality of the ropresentation in the Leflllltulpfl of particular States would produce a like nequulity in their representation in the national Legislature, as it waspresumabla that the count. “having the powerin the former case would secure t to themselvesin the latter. What dangercould therebe in giving a controlling power to the national legislaturel f whomwas it to consist? 1st, of n enato to be chosen by the State Legislatures. If the latter. thereforc, could betrusted, their Representatives could not be dangerous. 2ndly o Representativeselectedby the samepeople who elect the State Legislatures. Surcly. then. If confidonce is due to the latter. it must be due to the former. It. Seemed as improperin principle. though it might be less inconyeuient in piactico, to givetot o State Legislatures this great authority over the elec theogni so latt thuere REpreitsentatives of the people in th cacral would be to give to the [at a like gowarove r the election of their rspresentatives m the t“aMter Legislature. inc. If this power be not given to the nation Legislature. their “Kilt of )udgin of the returns of their members maybe frustrated. o probability has beensuggestedof its being abusedby them.al though this scheme of ercctrng the General Government on the authority of the State Legislatures has been fatal to the Federal establishment. it would seem as if many gentlemen still foster the dangerous ide“a. Mr. Gouvsnsuen Mourns observed that the States mightmake false returns, and then makeno provisionsfor new elections. “ Mr. SHERMAN did notknow butitinight be bestto retain the clause though be had himself sufficient confidencein the State gislatures., “The motion of Mr. PIRCKNIY and Mr. RUTLEDGI did not prevail. y “The word respectively was inserted after the word state. “0n the motion of Mr. Rssn, the word struck out, and regnlations in such cases 1in1sle2rt"e"wdians placeof provisionsconcerningthem. the clausethen reading: but regulations in each of the foregoing casesmay, at any time. be made or altered by the Legislature 9f the U.S. This was meant to give the patrons] Legislature npower not only to alter the provisions of the States. but to mirke regulations in case the States should fail or refusealtogether. “Article vi, sectionone, as thus amended, was agreed. to. new}c. on. "Aihourned.” and so, Mr. Speaker, that great days business closed, leavmg to us in this hour of trial for our country a rule of action which, if adhered to, will settle all our difficulties and establish the fact that there is on earth a reublic founded 11 on the imprescriptible rights o man, in which the humblest man, when he recounts his political rights sets forth all that the strongest the wisest, and the proudest may claim. Social inequalities there will be, and natural inequalities are ordained of God; but when our fathers less. 402 gave us the constitution they meant that within the wide limits of our country the measure of one mans politicul rights should ascertain the extent of those of every other man dwelling beneath that dome which is the fit cano y for a continent, the constitution of the U.S. A few words more and I shall have done. The power which the framers of the constitution believed they had incorporated in it is essential not only to protect the negro but the white man. The Gentfrom NewYork [Mr. Coxxuzm] said that but one race had been enslaved. His hasty assertion has been well qualified by the clo guent Gentfrom Maine, [Mr. PIKE;] but beg leave to add a word to what he has so well said. the assertion thatwhite persons have been sold into slavery does not depend on common report, but is proven by the reports of the supe prior courts of almost every southern State. One poor German woman, who had arrived in our country at 13 years of age, was released from slavery by the supreme court of Louisiana, but not until she had become the mother of 3 mulntto children, her owner having muted her with one of his darker slaves. Toward the close of the last century the supreme court of NewJersey decided that American Indians could be reduced to and legall held in slavery and so long ago as 1741 whiite slave women were so common in NCarolina that the Legislature passed a law dooming to slavery the child of every “white servant woman” born of an Indian father. Sir, under the infernal system of American slaver all races have been enslaved. I remember tailing from this District what was known here as a negro boy, and who, though free, was the associate of slaves; but in in home, where he was known as the companiono my own child, nobody suspected a taint in his blood. I placed him among the children of the most respectablepeople in the country, in the celebrated in stitute of learning maintained near my residence by my friend, Rev. Professor E. 1). Saunders, and though he was there the playmate of more than 100 boys, none suspected a taint in his blood; and for nearly a year he attended one of our populous grammar schools where he mingled With well nigh 1,000children; and when he returned to his worthy fathers roof in this District, nobody but he and myself knew that he was returning to the degradation imused by our laws on the American citizen of African descent in the capital of his country. But still further. The enforcement of thislong dormant power of the constitution is needed by the wise, the stron, and the wealthy of our country, as well as y the poor, the ignorant, and the weak. There is now pending before the Legislature of regenerated, and as gentleinan would have us believe, reconstructs Virginia, a bill to require 5 years residence on the part of citizens of other States who may invest their capital and settle within the metalimits of the Old Dominion before they can acquire citizenship. If they may pass a limitation of 5 years, why may they not pass a limitation of 50? Why will not any limitation that comes within the ordinary duration of human life be admissible? Sir, if Congress cannot control the question of suffrage by exercising the power which Madison and his colaborers in the Federal and Virginia conventions believed they had vested in the constitution, what restraint is there upon such legislation as this, and how can it enforce the 1st clause of section 2 of article 4 of that constitution, which provides that “the citizens of each State shall)8 entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States?” Gentlemen tell me that this is a new construction of the constitution, and I reply that it is the true one, which is enough for me, and that the old and false one was the fruitful source of discord and war and misery. Sir, if we do not assert this power, which the men of Virginia when they adopted the constitution of the ll U.S., knew to be in it, how can we restrain them from debarring northern emigrants from citizenship in their States? I proved the other day that the Convention of that State adopted the constitution in the face of the fact that an exposition of the meaning of the word “manner, ” which embraced the idea upon which I now insist, had been given to it and I have now given you the evitence that the whole country, so early as the lJth of Au gust, 1787, 2 years before the final adoption of the constitution, were informed that that word in the clause in question embraced not merely the method ofvoting. the place of voting and the order of voting. but the grand fundamental questionofwho should vote, and by what power they might be invested with the right of suffrage.