race, as one marked by God and nature as distinct from that to which we belong. We do not degrade them by acting on this distinction. Did it degrade the females, when the state of New Jersey took from the ladies the right to vote?

Representation and taxation went together, and no man had a right to vote, who did not pay his portion of taxes. A man must be twenty-one years of age, before he can have a right to vote. While these disqualifications were imposed on white citizens, the negro had no right to consider the refusal to admit him to political rights, a degradation. It is in obedience to the natural order of things, that we make a division between distinct species of men.

In the function of government, we are bound to look, not to the interests of a part, but to the welfare of the whole; and, the negro is free to select a country for his residence where he can enjoy the same political privileges which white citizens possess here. The gentleman from Lancaster had referred to the case of a high officer of government, the second in the gift of the people, marrying a black wife, and had asked if she would be received into society, if he were to bring her here? If a gentleman took a negro into domestic association with him, he would be held as degraded in the estimation of his neighbors, and so, on a large scale, the degradation would be the same as in the case of an individual who filled a less space in the eye of the world. Who was there among us who would desire to see any of the fair faces, with the presence of which we had been honored to-day, in this hall, bound for life, to any of these black spirits ?

Are we to do it? Let us pause before we take a step of that kind. Let us see what rights they have. He would go with those who would go farthest to protect them in their lives, their property and their personal liberty. In this community the negro was equally protected with the white man, so far as concerned his person and property. He had his protectors and defenders. He found judges and juries always ready and willing to hear his complaints and to redress his wrongs. But, here we ought to stop, for it was neither our interest, nor that of the negro, that we should grant him the right of suffrage. It would not add to his happiness, nor tend to promote greater harmony between the whites and the blacks. The contrary, would most assuredly be the consequence. The language that we should hold in regard to the blacks should be this: We do not wish you to come here; it is not to our interest, nor to yours, that you should inhabit the same soil, mingle in the same social circles, and we will not invite you here. We will place a few barriers between you and us. We will offer you a premium to go elsewhere, for this is not your home.

He (Mr. Brown) would offer the blacks some inducements to leave us, and go to a climate and country, in which they would be comfortable and happy, and not be degraded as they are now, for degraded they certainly are. This was the sort of language that should be held to the blacks. Who, among us, dare brave popular feeling, and place them on a footing with ourselves? Who, among us entertaining the highest opinion of their capacity and intelligence, would venture to place them on an equality with themselves-to bring them to their tables, and, in fact, to permit them to participate in all the private and social relations of life?

Let the advocates of negro suffrage-of those who are for giving the blacks equal rights, look at home, and reflect on what would be the consequence. Let them shew that they themselves have no prejudices against the negroes. and that the negroes have none against them. He could scarcely listen, with patience, to many of the remarks that had been made in favor of granting the right of voting to the negroes. agitation of this question was only holding out a delusive hope, which, perhaps, could never be realized.

The

The negroes had come here and asked this convention to give them this right. Such a request could not be entertained for a moment. They were not fit to exercise the right of freemen, at present. Let us leave this question to the future amendments that may be made to the constitution to those who may hereafter believe them to be fit to enjoy social equality.

He had no doubt that the sense of justice which characterized the state of Pennsylvania would accord to them that right, when it was ascertained, beyond all question, that they could exercise it without injury to the other portion of the people. Did the blacks fear that the right of suffrage would not be conceded to them, or why did they ask it now? They certainly could not be afraid to trust the people to grant it when they should have increased in numbers, intelligence and wealth.

He would now say a few words in regard to the provision, which had been cited by the gentleman from the city, (Mr. Meredith) as being contained in the amended constitution of New York, requiring that a negro must be worth two hundred and fifty dollars, before he can be permitted to vote. Now, he (Mr. B) would contend that if a man was to have the right to vote at all, that right ought not to depend upon what he was worth. If one was entitled to exercise the right, they were all entitled. If a man was educated, although he might be poor, yet his claim to vote was as strong as that of the wealthy man. Was a man to be rejected because he happened to be so unfortunate as to be poor. He (Mr. Brown) would make no such unjust distinction. He himself knew negroes living in the county of Philadelphia, who were fully as competent to exercise the right of voting as any man in the city or county of Philadelphia.

But, the moral condition, the colour, the degradation which attached to the race, were all circumstances which had created a strong prejudice against the blacks. It was, on this account, therefore, that he would vote against giving them the right of voting, Another of the propositions that had been introduced in reference to this question was to give the legislature the power of deciding when the blacks should be permitted to go to the polls. He could not give his sanction to any such provision. It remained for the people to say whether they would give the right, or not. They were the only tribunal to settle a question of this kind.

The gentleman from Lancaster (Mr. Reigart) had given utterance to sentiments which he (Mr. B.) had never expected to hear within these walls. He must say that he heard them with regret. The gentleman had made appeals to the party politics of the day, and adverted to and commented on, the course which had been pursued by distinguished political characters.

He (Mr. B.) thought all this was unnecessary and uncalled for. He (Mr. B.) trusted that delegates would look only to the policy of Pennsylvania and do what they deemed best to promote her best interests, without paying any regard as to what might be doing in the southern or any of the states of this Union. It appeared to him as if it were almost impossible for this body to dispose of any question that came before it. unless party politics were introduced. Nothing could be settled-no mat ter how important it was, unless the machinery of party was brought in contact with it.

The gentleman would have us put ourselves in an attitude of defiance to the southern states, instead of doing all that lay in our power to quiet the apprehensions and alarm which the mad schemes and conduct of northern abolitionists had created among them! The gentleman would not have the constitution amended, as was proposed, lest the south should imagine they had, by their threats, induced us to make the amendment ! What, were we to place ourselves in open defiance to the south? The gentleman wanted this question settled. How? By granting the right of suffrage. Would he open the door to abolition? Would he have the people of the south emancipate their slaves forthwith? The gentleman was under the impression that to insert the word "white" would be construed by the south as a triumph of southern principles in Pennsylvania !

He maintained that the members of this convention had nothing to do with what might, or might not be thought, beyond the borders of the state of Pennsylvania, as respected their proceedings. Did the gentleman from Lancaster and others, who approved his sentiments, wish to dissolve the Union! Did they desire that the people of the south should emancipate their negroes in order that they might come upon our soil} What, he would ask, were the mad schemes which some gentlemen would support? To what did they tend?

He begged gentlemen to pause in their career, lest they jeoparded the fate of this Union, under which the people had lived happily and prosperously for more than fifty years. Would gentlemen dissolve it for the purpose of giving the negroes the right to vote? Would they, to accomplish that end, abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, and in the southern states? Let gentlemen look at home, before they undertake to interfere in the affairs of their neighbors. What constituted slavery? Was it that one man was obliged to labor for another? Every man was a slave until the truth made him free.

Let gentlemen go to that small place in Pennsylvania, which was put down in the record as containing two thousand four hundred and fifty negroes; let them visit the lanes and alleys of this city, and there they would find negroes-and no doubt there were many now within the sound of his voice-who were equally as much slaves in mind, as their brethren of the south. Gentlemen might find enough to do at home in instructing and enlightening the poor negro, without troubling themselves about breaking the shackles of those at the south. Let them prepare their own negro population to exercise the right of freemen, before they talked of giving them the right to exercise the elective franchise.

By arraying one state against the other, the abolitionists might succeed in accomplishing their atrocious ends, and at the same time, the dissolu

tion of the Union. The north, it is true, might overpower the south: they had, perhaps, the numbers to do it. And, they might bring their negroes to our northern soil; but, God only knew what would be the result of such an attempt.

But, he repeated, let gentlemen look at, and consider what is the condition of the negroes even in this free state. For himself, he would say that he would rather be a slave at the south than a free negro in Philadelphia, for he would be much better off. But, again, he would inquire whether gentlemen desired that we should array ourselves against the south?

Did they wish to tear down our glorious stars and stripes, under which our fathers fought so bravely in the revolution? Did our fathers ask the south to emancipate their slaves? Was the question asked by those who fought at Saratoga, or at Monmouth, on whose plains the best blood in the land was shed? He would ask, if the negroes of the south did not pour out their blood as freely as those of the north? He trusted that the day was far distant, when the people of Pennsylvania would so far forge their duty to the Union, as to be guilty of any indiscretion which migh break the links which bind this happy Union together. If the right of the negroes to vote was to be put in the scale against the union of these states, he feared not the issue.

But, while, as he had already said, it was our duty to protect, and also improve the moral and social condition of the negroes, we ought not to do anything that was calculated to endanger their safety. In the district, which he had the honor to represent, the coloured population amounted to between three and four thousand, and he entertained not the slightest doubt that the signal for them to attend and give their votes would be the signal for their destruction. Yes! in twenty-four hours from the time that an attempt should be made by the blacks to vote, not a negro house in the city or county would be left standing.

Men have prejudices and passions, and they would exercise them. It was, therefore, the duty of legislators, to consult the public feeling, and not do violence to it by any of their acts. The question of whether we should or should not insert the word "white," was a question of state policy, and had nothing whatever to do with the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, or elsewhere. In conclusion, then, he could only express his sincere hope that the amendment of the gentleman from the county of Philadelphia (Mr. Martin) would be adopted.

On motion of Mr. MERRILL, of Union,

The convention adjourned.