of citizenship, were to be reinvested with those rights and armed with power to enforce their observance, men whose every breath has been loyalty to the Government, and all of whose blows have been directed to its maintenance, should not plead in vain to those who labored with them, to those who suffered and sacrificed with them for that legislation proved indispensable to the freest enjoyment of those blessings which are the fruits of their joint toils, sacrifices, and sufferings.

Resolved, That what we demand of our country as citizens of the United States is equality of rights under its laws. As regards the duties and burdens of citizens, we are made to bear and perform them in common with our white fellow-citizens, and we do so cheerfully. If taxes are needed for the support of Government, the levy is as heavy on our property and labor as on those of white persons; if blood be necessary to preserve our territorial integrity, a musket is put into our hands and we are hurried to the front with our white brothers; and therefore what we ask, justice, to say nothing about humanity, will readily concede is but a proper equivalent for the cheerfulness with which we have borne and discharged the burdens and duties exacted of us as citizens of the United States.

"Resolved further, That Mr. SUMNER and those who are coöperating with him to place our rights upon a safe and firm footing, have our confidence, our affection, and our thanks, and they will ever be held by us and our children in grateful remembrance."

These, sir, are public expressions. I add to them a passage from a letter written by Douglass C. Griffing, at Oberlin, Ohio, under date of December 13, 1871. This letter is important as directly meeting the allegation so often made that this is a question of society, when, as I always insist, it is a question of equal rights, no question of society. Society has nothing to do with it. This writer thus expresses himself:

"We do not wish to force ourselves into American society unwelcomed. Social equality seems to be the bugbear at which American justice is frightened, and the colored man denied many public privileges accorded to other American citizens.

What we ask now, is simply equal public privileges, and that the social question be allowed to regulate itself without the interference of the law of any States. We hope that bill will be so framed that the several States of the Union shall be prohibited from passing or enforcing a statute which makes invidious discriminations on account of color. We desire social rights, so far as they are affected by law at present.'

I come now to the State of North Carolina, which is represented on this floor by a Senator who recorded his name, according to my recollection, against the pending amendment, placing amnesty to rebels above justice to his colored fellow citizens. How that is regarded, will appear from a letter which I have received this morning from a member of the house of representatives of North Carolina, as follows:

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA, 15th First, 1872. SIR: I beg permission to tender you my sincerest thanks for all the favors you have done, and are still doing in behalf of my race.

I thank you for the great watchfulness which you have evinced already for securing the rights of the colored people as full American citizens, though I fully avow, sir, that such rights shall, and never will be given us, until you have succeeded in passing the bill which you are now arguing before the Senate of the United States.

free

Sir, until that is passed all our so-called rights" are myth. They are simply "airy bubbles." I have been made to suffer in more than one instance upon the public carriage on account of my color.

Nor is mine an isolated case. All respectable persons of color are daily suffering throughout the length and breadth of this "free America."

Here is an instance unparalleled in history (sacred or profane.) I am a member of the Legislature of North Carolina. I passed a charter through the house in favor of a steamboat company. On returning home my only route is on the line belonging to the said company; and on this I am denied a firstclass passage; am consigned to a prescribed quarter of the boat, a place set apart for colored people:" a place, sir, only suited for the meanest and filthiest Wretches on earth. Such are those which Americans fit up for my race irrespective of wealth, education, or gentility.

Sir, if I am a free citizen of this grand Republic," why am I denied privileges which are given to my white brother, although he might be the basest culprit upon earth. and perhaps fleeing from the arms of justice? Simply because he chances to have a white skin, and mine by the same reason is black. Because the Almighty wills that I should be black I am denied the rights of a free citizen on the very line established through my own instrumentality. Upon another occasion I took passage on a steamboat. I had a first-class ticket, but was refused first-class accommodation; and because I would not consent to go below into the dirty department set aside for my race I had to sleep all night (as best I could) on a seat in the saloon. The night was so bleak that I

took a severe cold, and suffered severely for a considerable time from the effects. I was on my way to represent my people in the Legislature. Again, I once saw a very respectable colored man and his family, consisting of a wife and two small children, denied first-class passage on board the United States mail-boat. The gentleman having got on board with his family, went into the cabin. He was told to get out, but he declined. The manager, in order to avoid carrying this family, took out the mail and sent it by land to its destination. The boat was then carried to anchor in the middle of the stream, and all the water drawn out of the water-casks, leaving the colored family entirely without water and food.

The gentleman and his wife were highly educated and respectable. Their vocation was teaching, and none in the place stood higher in estimation for respectability and neatness in their general attire. The gentleman is now clerk in the chancery court of Warren county, Mississippi.

On another occasion my own wife was told to leave the ladies' cabin, and to take her place in this dirty hole set apart for colored persons, where the firemen and lowest hands of the vessel slept at nights, situated generally near to the water-closet, and men are continually passing to and from it.

Such, sir, are the privileges which we are at present enjoying as free citizens of America.

For the truth of these facts I vouch; and for my character I can refer you to Hon. C. L. COBB, or to ex-Governor Holden.

Wishing you well in all your undertakings, I am, your humble servant, F. A. SYKES.

Hon. CHARLES SUMNER,

United States Senate, Washington, D. C.

I have also a letter from a person of familiar name, H. R. Helper, dated at Salisbury, North Carolina, January 1, 1872, from which I will read a brief passage:

"The country needs speedy pacification and a lasting reunion. Your Civil Rights Bill and the Universal Amnesty bill enacted into law would do much to hasten these desirable ends."

This is the testimony of a white citizen in North Carolina; but this is not all. Among the conspicuous citizens there is Judge Cant well, who on January 1. (the anniversary of emancipation) made an eloquent address, which is published in the North Carolina papers, from which I read a brief extract:

"The immediate passage of the supplemental civil rights bill of Mr. SUMNER, and the election of a Republican President in 1872, are still necessary, in my opinion, to isolate and crystallize beyond disturbance, dispute, or recall the rights then acquired. If I were a colored man I should not cease to agitate, nor would I feel safe until these results had also been achieved. Thenceforward I think we may anticipate for this country a permanent and unchangeable organization of our political system, based upon the free and cordial recognition of the political individuality and equality of all men, irrespective of race and former condition. This the great Magna Charta of your liberty I consider indispensable to any fixed constitutional adjustment, and from them I perceive a future of untold and brilliant national triumphs, and the beginning of a new epoch." "The leaders of an unsuccessful revolt are seldom propitiated by conciliation, unless they have felt the exposures of war: their loyalty is ordinarily measured by their fears; their latent hostility is demonstrated by the secret and mean attempts recently made to restrain the freedom of opinion and elections, and to embarrass the citizen in the exercise of his newly acquired civil rights. The sooner these things are stopped and the public mind impressed with the conviction that all further struggles in that direction are hopeless-and the passage of Mr. SUMNER's bill will contribute to that result-the sooner will mutual interest be developed, the animosities of race disappear as in England, and our country resume its predestined and inevitable and peaceful career.'

Sir, in those words of this North Carolina orator there is much that may be a guide to the Senate. He clearly sees what is needed for our country, that we can have peace, final, enduring peace, only on the basis of the equal rights of all.

From the former slave State of North Carolina I pass to a constant free State, Rhode Island. I have here the report of a meeting held in Providence on the 1st of January to commemorate Emancipation, where certain resolutions were adopted, of which I will read

one:

"Whereas there are certain papers circulating in the North, stating that the colored people do not wish Senator SUMNER'S supplementary bill to pass Congress: Therefore,

"Resolved, That we colored people pray earnestly to God that this bill may become a law and cover every inch and foot of this great Republic."

There was also a meeting at Newport in Rhode Island, where resolutions were adopted, some of which I will read:

"Resolved, That we, citizens of the State of Rhode

Island, do most sincerely pray that every member of Congress will interest himself in our behalf for rights and justice; and we appeal especially to the Republican members, as we claim to be a component part of that party, hoping that they may be true and just to an ever loyal people, and not withhold from us such protection as will protect us in our civil rights before the law; that by passing such laws it affects the rights of nearly one million legal voters in the United States of America whose rights are now ignored.

"Resolved, That we instruct the president and secretary of this meeting to forward the above memorial and resolutions to Hon. CHARLES SUMNER, to present the same to the Congress of the United States of America, asking them in the name of a hundred thousand martyrs of our race, who have sacrificed their lives on the battle-fields of rebellion that our country might live, to pass Senator SUMNER'S supplement to the civil rights bill, that it may become a law."

A colored citizen of Providence, Rhode Island, Rev. William F. Dickerson, expresses himself in a letter to myself as follows. I read only a brief extract:

"We watch with pleasure and interest all that is said or done in favor of your bill, and shall beseech the throne of Almighty God that He may grant its early passage."

A colored citizen of Rhode Island has furnished me with a memorandum, in his own handwriting, of an injustice to a colored family which came within his own personal knowledge. I read it:

"A few years ago a charming child, four years old. died in Newport, Rhode Island. Its father sought decent and unproscribed burial for its remains in the cemeteries of the city. He was refused, and could give it in that city interment only in a pauper's grave. He lived by the ocean side. He resolved to incase his darling in a leaden coffin and bury it in God's grave-yard, the ocean, but the mother would not consent. The remains were put in a vault and finally conveyed for interment to another State."

Here is another instance mentioned by this writer:

"Within a few years, a colored woman of exemplary character died in the city of Newport, Rhode Island. She was the member' of a Baptist church. It was admitted that she contributed more generously, considering her means, than any other member of her church. Her character was in accordance. Her last request was that her remains should be taken to her church, a white church. On the day of the funeral services her remains were left in the vestibule. They were refused admission into the church because of her color. The very Bible used for the services was presented by this member while living." It is evident that this reform is needed in Rhode Island as well as in North Carolina.

I pass now to Arkansas; and here I read a letter from a distinguished citizen of Arkansas-I believe that the Senators from that State will vouch for his character and his abilityW. H. Grey, a colored gentleman, an orator, a strong Republican, and a devoted supporter of the present Administration. The letter is as follows:

WASHINGTON CITY, D. C.. January 9, 1872. DEAR SIR: The importance to us of the passage of your supplementary civil rights bill cannot be overestimated. To-day colored men in the South, acting in high and responsible positions, both State and national, are often treated with less consideration than favored servants in hotels and upon public conveyances. In my recent trip from Little Rock, Arkansas, to this city I was sold a first-class ticket at the depot in Memphis. The Memphis and Charleston company permitted me to ride in their first-class coaches, but the East Tennessee and Virginia roads would not permit it, though I insisted. I was refused a sleeping-car along the whole route, and for three days and nights I was compelled to buy cakes, &c., and subsist precariously along the whole line of these roads, every hotel and eating-house being closed against me.

It is said by some southern Senators that their colored constituents do not ask the passage of this bill. If you desire an expression of the wishes of the colored people of the South on this subject you will find it in their united prayer to you (rom their convention held in Columbia, South Carolina, in October, 1871) to use the power of your influence in the Senate of the United States to procure the passage of this righteous act.

It used to be said the negro was contented and did not want to be free. As to the correctness of such assertions let mankind judge.

The colored people of Arkansas, and, I may say, the entire Mississippi valley, desire it; for they are subjected to untold inconveniences daily, thereby materially crippling their intercommercial intercourse, now in its infancy, by reason of the prejudices of persons specially interested in amnesty.

It affords the people of my State especial satisfaction to know that the Senators of Arkansas support your bill.

No one truly patriotic, and whose philanthr

He

I believe, sir, that you will admit that this letter is written in the spirit of a statesman. The writer naturally vindicates his race. sees how much higher justice is than generosity, and how absurd it is to place what is called amnesty to rebels before justice to the colored race.

From Arkansas, a former slave State, I pass to Pennsylvania, always a free State. Here the evidence is ample. I have in my hand a petition from the Pennsylvania State Equal Rights League, signed by persons in all the leading counties of Pennsylvania, sent to me by the secretary of the league, William D. Forten, who writes thus:

"This petition is from an organized body of ten years' standing, embracing the colored voters of the State, and extending into nearly all the counties. Its influence, weight, and action, represent the people's will, and it can command the balance of power of Pennsylvania. Will you, sir, present this in our name, that the country may know how we feel at this day on this important subject?"

And now would you know how these voters, constituting the balance of power in Pennsyl vania, feel on this great question? Listen to their prayer:

We

"The undersigned, officers and representatives of the Pennsylvania State Equal Rights League, most respectfully ask your honorable body to speeduy pass the bill presented by Hon. CHARLES SUMNER, as supplementary to the civil rights bill. ask this that our Government may be in fact a true Republic, the rights of the humblest citizen acknowledged, and his person protected. We ask this on behalf of the colored voters of this State, who have commissioned us to pray you for the removal of these discriminations which virtually destroy our constitutional rights. The restoration of our political franchise and acknowledgment of our citizenship by the supreme law of the land should alone have placed us beyond the reach of the tyrants who still linger among us, the living landmark of slavery's degrading entailments; but alas, it is not so! We now ask the interposition of positive law to prevent the daily outrages on the law-abiding colored citizen. We ask this, because in performing our duties, fulfilling our obligations, or seeking enjoyment, we are ill-treated, insulted, and common civility denied us. The anomalous position we occupy is cruelly and needlessly degrading. Equal in the law, equal with the ballot, equally taxed, and bearing equally all the responsibilities of the citizen, we are stripped of the habiliments declared self-evident by the fathers through a defiant, unlawful, unchristian sentiment.

We ask the passage of this bill that the spirit and letter of the law may be in strict conformity; that the rights, privileges, and immunities conferred on all citizens by the statute shall not be denied to us by the base practices of the disloyal in sentiment; that the sacred pledges of the Constitution of the United States to maintain us in freedom impartially, in the enjoyment of all rights equally, shall not be annulled by the baletul sentiment of secession and slavery exercised by petty despots who defy the law as it now exists, and outrage colored citizens with impunity.

For the passage of this bill, which will secure simple justice to all, your petitioners will ever pray, &c."

In harmony with this petition is a letter which I hold in my hand from one of the most intelligent and cultivated young gentlemen that I know of his age in the country, Richard T. Greener, a graduate of Harvard University, with all the scholarship which could be ob tained at that seat of learning, a colored youth, now at the head of the Institute for Colored Youth in Philadelphia. He writes me, under date of November 27, as follows:

"DEAR SIR: I have noticed the report in the prominent journals that you intend to introduce at the approaching session your bill supplementary to the civil rights bill.

Since some such measure is imperatively needed by the colored people of the country, all measures falling short of this being mere stones instead of bread, I have determined to ask you whether it would not help to strengthen your appeal were you sustained by a petition from the colored people of the entire country? I could guaranty twenty-five thousand names from Pennsylvania alone."

I have also a letter from a colored clergyman, Rev. Moses Anderson, of Greencastle,

Franklin county, Pennsylvania, from which I will read a brief sentence:

"SIR: This bill of yours is the best measure that has been offered yet. I hope you may be sustained by the people, and that Congress will see the necessity of promptly passing the bill."

Another letter from A. H. Phillipps, of Reading, Pennsylvania, reveals one of the inequali ties which now exist in the educational system of the country. I think no Senator can hear this without feeling the outrage:

READING, PENNSYLVANIA, January 8, 1872. DEAR SIR: You no doubt will wonder who is addressing you from the Democratic stronghold of Pennsylvania. The subject I wish to refer to and ask your advice is as follows, which has reference to our schools: several years ago the Reading school board provided a separate school-house for the colored people, which is situated outside of the populated part of the city. The colored people had no other remedy but to submit, although their children had to tramp the snows and rains of winter for several miles; but at last a new era has dawned upon that race who have borne the chains of slavery so many years. The civil rights bill has erased the lines of distinction which our school board made. To-day I, as one of the controllers, have given orders to admit four colored children into the section in which they reside; that is, I admitted them into the white schools. I have done what all the rest of the controllers refused to do. I am now threatened with impeachment in the board, and there are also threats made to dismiss the colored scholars, and send them back to their own school, out of the section. Can you not give me advice what course I shali pursue? If the colored man votes in the section, can the school board send his children out of his section to school? Will you ask the Attorney General of the United States his opinion? Then I will fight them.

You will oblige, yours, truly,

Hon. CHARLES SUMNER,

A. H. PHILLIPPS.

United States Senator, Washington, D. C.

Does any one say that the separate school provided for these colored children is an equiv alent for the common school? Does not this case reveal the very hardship which I tried to portray the other day in my remarks? I then insisted that it was only through the common school that equal education could be obtained, that the separate school from its very nature must be a failure, and that it never could afford equal education; and now comes this testimony in support of my remarks.

I now come to Alabama, unhappily once a slave State, unhappily at this moment troubled by what is known as the Ku Klux. I have in my hand the constitution and by-laws of the Ku Klux in one of the counties of Alabaina, and with your permission will read the preamble:

"Whereas, in the present condition of the country, it is necessary that there should exist some organization by and through which good citizens may be enabled to act promptly and efficiently in securing the election to office of competent men; men who have never pandered to the detestable doctrine of negro equality, nor forsaken the cause of their race for the contemptible object of selfaggrandizement; and whereas it is also necessary that the civil authorities should be sustained and upheld in a strict, prompt, and rigid enforcement of the law against all wrong-doers; and whereas there are certain offenses that may be committed by a class of the population in our midst which the law neither does nor can punish: Therefore, "To secure a white man's Government"

Mark, if you please, the words of this Ku Klux constitution

"to enforce the law, to preserve order, and to protect all good citizens and persons in the full and peaceful enjoyment of life, liberty, and property, and in the prosecution of their daily business, free from fear of molestation or hinderance, we do adopt for our government the following constitution and by-laws."

Then follow the constitution and by-laws, I need not say brutal and atrocious in character; but you will not fail to mark that the central point of this whole organization is to secure a white man's Government; that is, to carry out the original object of the rebellion as declared by Jefferson Davis, on this floor, in his farewell address, and afterward announced by Alexander H. Stephens, vice president of the rebellion, in his too famous speech. The object of the rebellion was to establish a white man's Government, to overturn the declared principles of our national Government, and to substitute instead principles of inequality; and now the Ku Klux Klan of Alabama take

66

up the lost cause" of the rebellion and embody it in their preamble and constitution. Sir, against that I declare my opposition at all times. I stand on the great principles declared by our fathers, those axiomatic and self-evident truths, which, being axiomatic and selfsist shall be maintained by the legislation of evident, are beyond question, and those I inCongress carrying out the provisions of the Constitution of the United States.

This testimony from the Ku Klux Klan reveals to us the necessity of the legislation that I now propose. But this is not all. I have a letter from H. J. Europe, of Mobile, Alabama, from which I will read a few passages:

"Perhaps you may think that we ought to be satisfied that enough has been done for us; that we are ungrateful. I have tried to think so, too. We may be ungrateful. Yes, we are ungrateful. But we are men, although incased in black skins. And, sir, the fact that we are men, having the same faculties, though for the most part undeveloped, and subjected to the same aspirations, passions, and weaknesses as other men, should explain all."

"It may not be out of place to state that the colored women, no matter of how good a character, of how much dignity and refinement, if they wish to visit a theater, are obliged to climb three or four flights of stairs, and then sit among the harlots; to stand on the platforms of street cars, sleep on the floors of steamboats, and on railroads to ride in the smoking-cars, and in nearly every case are charged first-class fare. We hope, however, with assistance of God, that you will triumph.'

"I see from the papers that you voted against amnesty to these unrepentant rebels. I hope the papers told the truth, for, in my humble judgment, f cannot believe that such men as John Forsyth ought ever to hold office. Why, here the police wear confederate_gray, and the lives of colored people and white Republicans are not safe in our State. There are several men now on trial before the United States circuit court, charged with Ku Kluxing.' And until our lives are safe, I think, with all of my people, that we want no amnesty bills passed."

I come now to the State of Virginia. You have already had many petitions presented from that State, asking for the passage of the supplementary bill. One was presented the other day by the Senator from that State, [Mr. LEWIS, signed by several thousand colored citizens. I presented one this morning, signed by a large number of the senators and repre sentatives in the Legislature of that State. Now, if you please, I will read a brief leuer from P. K. Jones, of the house of delegates: HOUSE OF DELEGATES, RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, December 30, 1871.

DEAR SIR: The supplement to the civil rights bill, now before Congress, is agitating the country from one end of the land to the other, a bill which every colored man in the land needs. I see that you are the author of the same, as you are of all the great progressive movements in this country. I cannot enumerate the wrongs that are perpetrated upon our people in this State. We cannot go to the capitol unless being proscribed in the street cars in which we ride. Sir, cannot something be done? Yours, truly, P. K. JONES.

Hon. CHARLES SUMNER.

I have here, also, a Virginia newspaper, the National Virginian, of January 6, from which I will read a brief article:

The Supplementary Civil Rights Bill.-At the last session of Congress Mr. SUMNER presented a bill in the United States Senate providing that the same rights shall be enjoyed by colored people on steamboats, railroads, and at hotels as are accorded white people. The measure is eminently just and proper, and we most sincerely trust will speedily become a law of the land.

"The twaddle in the United States Senate of weakkneed Republicans over amnesty to rebels who scorn to ask them for it, and would contemptuously refuse to recognize them upon the highways, is really dis gusting to those knowing anything of the opposition we have here to deal with. It is not the rebel Democrats, but the true and loyal men who need the care and kindness of Congress.

"Give the colored man bis plain, clear, civil rights as an American citizen. Give us a measure to protect us, white and black, from a Ku Klux judge and jury, and you will have done your duty to us. We claim, by reason of our fidelity and work, your first consideration.

"If amnesty is not worth asking for, assuredly it is not worth the time it costs to discuss the question, and the passage of any such measure would be a disgraceful gratuity to an unpenitent and malignant foe."

Such, sir, are the sentiments of the colored people in Virginia, expressed in one of their public organs. They do not agree with Sen ators who ask that the rights of the colored

prevent the proscribing of a Representative in Congress from the colored race by railroad companies, steamboat-owners, or hotel-keepers.

"The colored voter demands from all for whom he casts a vote, from President of the United States down, that they give of whatever influence or power they may have to assistance in the demolition of every barrier that blocks the way of their enjoyment of manhood's rights. If a full pardon is to be extended to the rebels of the South by Congress, we demand of the Republican party in Congress, and of the Administration, that justice be done to the black men who have ever been loyal. We feel and know that the safety of the party in the southern States requires the passage of just such a law as the supplementary civil rights bill of Senator SUMNER. The work has been well begun by Hon. CHARLES SUMNER in the Senate of the United States, and will be carried out if the Administration and the Republican party are determined that the year 1872 shall see all races and all colors in this nation equal before the law."

I might read much more of the same character, but I come to an important address, characterized in the newspapers at the time

"argumentative and powerful," adopted at a meeting of the officers and students of Howard University. I call attention to that admirable paper, which is in itself an irresistible statement of the case for our colored fellow citizens better than anything I can say. I only covet on this occasion something of the strength that is contained in these words. I cannot read the whole paper. I will read a few passages:

"We feel that we can speak authoritatively in this matter for even a larger number than ourselves, since as officers and students we represent perhaps every State in the Union, and particularly the southern portion of our country, where we suffer more severely than in any other section by reason of the cruel and unjust discrimination on account of color, which we believe the passage and enforcement of the supplemental civil rights bill will fully correct. We earnestly and respectfully press upon the honorable Senate and House of Representatives the passage of Senator SUMNER's bill, not only because we believe it will guaranty to us the rights to which we are entitled under the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments to the Constitution, and the civil rights bill, but because as a just measure we believe it is essential to all classes of citizens. No Government or party can long afford to permit even the humblest sitizen to suffer under an injustice; it must sooner or later redound to the injury of those who uphold it, or having the power to correct it fail to do so.'

Omiting a part of this address I proceed to read further from it:

"We further urge the passage of this bill because we believe that the sooner the legal status of all classes in the country is completely settled, the better it will be for all parties concerned."

I ask you, sir, if that is not wise, if it is not statesmanlike; but these are colored fellowcitizens who say it:

"Let it be distinctly understood that the amendments and their legitimate results are finalities, that there is to be no distinction on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude in reality as well as name. Then, and not till then, can we confidently look for a cessation of a system of outrageous treatment toward a class which is a disgrace to humanity and the American people."

These words are strong; but are they not the natural expression of colored fellow-citizens? The address, in a later part, proceeds:

"As to the other point, that the people will not bear it, we by no means admit that such is the case; but, on the contrary, we believe that the majority of the people in this country confidently look to the Republican party to complete the work which they have so well begun. As students we are trying to educate ouselves. We ask of the Republican party, as our friends, that we be assisted in this effort and not retarded by being reminded on every hand that we are regarded as inferiors, and that however well educated, and however respectable, we can not receive the same treatment in the public schools, in the cars, on steamboats, at hotels, and at places of amusements and instruction, as is accorded to other citizens. Of social equality we say nothing"

Here they come back to the point which has been so often made in this Chamber

"Of social equality we say nothing, because there is no such thing as social equality; every white man can never be the social equal of every other white man; no more can every colored man be the social equal of every other colored man. It is a matter which ought to be regulated by character and culture, certainly not by legislation.' *

*

Now, in the providence of God, an opportunity is allowed the American Congress to unite a measure of justice with one of magnanimity. We pray the American people, through their Congress, that if it is now too late to be first just and afterward generous, that they be at least just and generous at the same time, now that an opportunity presents

itself. We have forfeited no rights, we have broken no laws, we have never rebelled against what we yet hope will be best Government the world has ever seen. On the contrary, we have given our lives and our treasures unstintingly, in the revolutionary war, in the war of 1812, and in the suppression of the great slaveholders' rebellion, and that, too, for a land in which, until recently, it has been our only privilege to fertilize it with our labor and bedew it with our tears. Are we, then, asking too much when we petition tho Congress of the United States to give to us the same rights they propose to give to traitors and rebels? We cannot abate our efforts in this matter. Nay, we will not. We ask our friends; we ask the Republican party; especially do we ask those Senators and Representatives whose constituency is largely colored, that they see to it that we secure all the rights guarantied to us by law. If in seeking to accomplish this amnesty to rebels must fail, then let it fail, and it deserves to."

Sir, this is an address from colored professors and students; but does it not do them honor? Does it not awaken an echo in your bosom? I know that I do not put that question in vain. I know, sir, that you must generously respond to it. I know, sir, that you must sympathize with every word uttered by these colored fellow-citizens; that you must feel that they are right when they insist that they shall be secured in their rights before you talk about amnesty.

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One of the most important aspects of the pending measure is its operation on the common school, making it what is implied in its name, a school open to all. The term common explains itself. Originally, in England under the law, it defined outlying land near a village open to all the inhabitants; and the common school is an institution of education open to all. If you make it for a class, it is not a common school, but a separate school, and, as I have said frequently to-day, and also before in addressing the Senate, a separate school never can be a substitute for the common school. The common school has for its badge equality. The separate school has for its badge inequality. The one has open doors for all; the other has open doors only for those of a certain color. That is contrary to the spirit of our institutions, to the promises of the Declaration of Independence, to all that is implied in the recent constitutional amendments. So long as it continues the great issue of the war remains still undecided; for, as I explained the other day, that great issue as stated by Jefferson Davis, and then again accepted by Abraham Lincoln, was equality. Only by maintaining equality will you maintain the great victory of the war.

Now, sir, here in Washington this very question of separate schools has for some time The colored people agitated the community.

have themselves acted. They speak for equal rights. I have in my hand a communication to the Senate from the Secretary of the Inte. rior, under date of January 18, 1871, covering a report from the trustees of the colored schools of Washington and Georgetown, in which they make most important and excellent recommendations. How well at last the colored people do speak! Who among us can speak better than they speak in the passages I am

about to read?

"It is our judgment that the best interests of the colored people of this capital, and not theirs alone, but those of all classes, require the abrogation of all laws and institutions creating or tending to perpetuate distinctions based on color, and the enactment in their stead of such provisions as shall secure equal privileges to all classes of citizens. The laws creating the present system of separate schools for colored children in this District were enacted as a temporary expedient to meet a condition of things which has now passed away. That they recognize and tend to perpetuate a cruel, unreasonable, and unchristian prejudice, which has been and is the source of untold wrong and injustice to that class of the community which we represent, is ample reason for their modifieation. The experience of this community for the last few years has fully demonstrated that the association of different races in their daily occupations and civic duties is as consistent with the general convenience as it is with justice. And custom is now fully reconciled at this capital to the seating side by side of white and colored people in the railway car, the jury-box, the municipal and Government offices, in the city councils, and even in the Halls of the two Houses of Congress. Yet while the fathers may sit together in those high places of honor and trust, the children are required by law to

be educated apart. We see neither reason nor justice in this discrimination. If the fathers are fit to associate, why are not the children equally so?

"Children, naturally, are not affected by this prejudice of race or color. To educate them in separate schools tends to beget and intensify it in their young minds, and so to perpetuate it to future generations. If it is the intention of the United States that these children shall become citizens in fact, equal before the law with all others, why train them to recognize these unjust and impolitic distinctions? To do so is not only contrary to reason, but also to the injunction of Scripture, which says, Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.'

"Objection to the step here recommended has been made on the ground of expediency. Every advanced step in the same direction has been opposed on the same superficial allegation,

The right of the colored man to ride in the rail. way cars, to cast the ballot, to sit on the jury, to bold office, and even to bear arms in defense of his country, has encountered the same objection. We are confident that it will prove of no greater weight in the present case than it has in the others. There is no argument for equality at the ballot-box, in the cars, or on the jury, in holding office, and bearing arms, which is not equally applicable in the present case. We may go further, and insist that equality in the other cases requires equality here; otherwise, the whole system is incomplete and inharmonious.

It is worthy of note in this connection that some of the most distinguished men in literary, social, and political circles in this section of the country have recently, in setting forth their claims to be considered the best and truest friends of the people of color, taken pains to inform the public that they were reared with colored children, played with them in the sports of childhood, and were even suckled by colored nurses in infancy; hence, that no prejudice against color exists on their part. If this be so, then with what show of consistency or reason can they object to the children of both classes sitting side by side in school?

That the custom of separation on account of color must disappear from our public schools, as it has from our halls of justice and of legislation, we regard as but a question of time. Whether this unjust, unreasonable, and unchristian discrimination against our children shall continue at the capital of this great Republic is for the wisdom of Congress to determine."

Sir, are not these excellent words? Is not that statement clear and well-sustained? Is there any Senator here who can answer it? Is there any Senator here who will set himself against this colored school committee in stating the rights of the colored children? I think there is no Senator, whatever may be his ability or experience in debate, who will not fail when he undertakes to encounter that simple text. The words will stand unanswered and unanswerable.

Sir, I bring this testimony now to a close. I have adduced letters, resolutions, addresses from various States of the Union, showing the sentiments of the colored people. I have adduced them in answer to allegations on this floor that the pending measure of equal rights was not needed, that the pending measure was one for social equality. Listening to these witnesses, you see that they all insist that it is needed, and that it is in no respect a measure of social equality. It is a measure of strict legal right. I adduce this testimony also in auswer to the allegation so loftily made in debate the other day that the colored people were willing to see the former rebels amnes. tied, trusting to some indefinite future to obtain there own rights. I said at the time that such an allegation was irrational. I now show you that it is repudiated by the colored people. They do not recognize the Senators who have undertaken to speak for them as their representatives. They insist upon their rights before you undertake to be generous to rebels. They insist that they shall be saved from indig. nity when they travel, when they offer their child at the common school; that they shall be secured against any such outrage, before you undertake to remove the disabilities of those who struck at the life of this Republic.

Now, sir, will you not be just before you are generous? Or if you do not place the rights of the colored people foremost, will you not at least place them side by side with those of the former rebels, put them both where I seek now to put them, in the same statute, so that hereafter the rebels shall know that generosity to them was associated with justice to their colored fellow-citizens; that they all have a common interest; that they are linked together

in the community of a common citizenship and in the enjoyment of those great liberties promised by the Declaration of Independence and guarantied by the Constitution of the United States?

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Mr. President, I have but very few words to say in reference to this measure.

Mr. MORTON. Will the Senator allow me to suggest to him that if he would prefer to speak to-morrow morning, or at some other time, I will move to introduce some other business.

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. It is a matter of indifference to me.

Mr. MORTON. Just as the Senator chooses. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I have a few remarks to make upon this subject. The provisions contained in this amendment are so important that I do not feel at liberty to pass them simply with my vote. They are important, as we have seen by the testimony which has been adduced, to a large class in the country who desire the benefit of the law, to many individuals and corporations affected by the law.

Common carriers, innkeepers, the prineipals of places of amusement, colleges, churches, and cemetery organizations are interested in it, and if, as I do not question, we are serious in entertaining the proposition, as it wanted but one vote of passing a few days ago, I think it important that we should carefully scan and perfect it.

In the passage of this law we are for the first time invoking the exercise of a new and delicate power of the General Government, and I confess to some surprise that Senators who have voted in favor of the amendment, and who are in the habit of being critical, have not given us the benefit of their criticism. Permit me, too, to express surprise that the mover of the amendment has not preferred to submit it to a majority, rather than, as it must now be, to a vote of two thirds of the Senate. There is, I admit, a poetic beauty in the idea, or at least in the expression, of being just before we are generous, and of promoting reconciliation before conciliation, but those who seek to be profited by the enactment would, I think, prefer that it should become a law by the vote of a majority, rather than fail to become such by a two-thirds vote, which, as the question is now presented, is made necessary to its passage.

I desire to submit, in the hearing of the Senator from Massachusetts, a few suggestions, in reference to the amendment which he has offered to the pending bill. The first section of his amendment, in its last clause, contains the directory part of the law, and provides that "this right shall not be denied or abridged on any pretense of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." That is all well, but the previous part of the section, the declaratory part, states a proposition which cannot commend itself to the judgment of any Senator, and which none can desire to enact. The section reads:

That all citizens of the United States, without distinction of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, are entitled to the equal and impartial enjoyment of any accommodation, advantage, facility, or privilege furnished by common carriers, whether on land or water, by innkeepers, &c.

In other words, it declares that all citizens, white or black, are entitled to the equal and impartial enjoyment of these privileges of common carriers, inns, schools, churches, &c. Mr. President, that is not true, and neither we nor the Senator from Massachusetts desire to make it true. No one desires that all, white or black, shall be entitled to the equal accom. modation furnished by common carriers, inns, schools, &c. No one seriously proposes that we should render it illegal for a railroad company to provide a class of cars for ladies and gentlemen, or for an innkeeper to exclude persons having contagious disease, or who are

intoxicated, or indecently clad. We do not desire the passage of a law that shall make it obligatory upon the trustees of cemeteries, established especially for asylums or hospitals, to admit to burial every one for whom a license may be sought. Such is not the object of this law or the purpose of the Senator from Massachusetts; and yet that is the effect of the provision, that all citizens are entitled to these privileges.

I suggest that we strike out the words, "that all citizens of the United States, without distinction of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, are entitled," &c., and substitute the words, "that race, color, or previous condition of servitude, shall not debar or deprive any citizen of the United States of the equal and impartial enjoyment of any accommodation, advantage, facility, or privilege furnished by common carriers," &c. That will not have the effect of asserting the unreasonable proposition that all citizens have the equal right to enjoy the facilities of cars, inns, schools, churches, &c., whether intoxicated or afflicted by contageous disease, whether indecently clad, or whether violating the customs and proprieties appertaining to the sexes; but it will have the effect of enacting that there shall be no discrimination on account of color, and that is all that the Senator seeks to obtain.

Mr. SUMNER. I listen with great respect to the Senator, of course. I can only say that I cannot see myself the difference between the text of the bill and his amendment. The bill "that all citizens of the United States, says without distinction of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, are entitled to the equal and impartial enjoyment of any accommodations," &c.; that is, that there shall be no distinction of race, color, or previous condition of servitude in the enjoyment of any accom. modation; and then it adds that "this right | shall not be denied or abridged on any pretense of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The amendment as it stands declares that all citizens, white or black, are entitled to equal accommodations and facilities in all these institutions named. No one thinks that true, or desires that it shall be. What we seek is, that race, color, or previous condition of servitude, shall not deprive or debar any person from these privilegesa very different proposition. Let us say so. That will produce the equality which the Senator seeks.

The second section of the amendment contains the sanction of the law, and imposes penalties for any violation of the law as stated in the first section; that is, if any common carrier, innkeeper, &c., refuses the full use of cars, inns, schools, churches, &c., to any citizen whatever, he shall be subjected to the penalties stated. The Senator does not seek any such unreasonable end. The amendment proposed simply destroys discrimination between citizens of different races.

Mr. SUMNER. My object, as the Senator knows, both from what I have said in the Senate and in private conversation, is simply to get this measure in the best shape possible, and I shall certainly be very glad to accept any proposition from the Senator or from any other Senator with regard to it, and if the Senator will allow me I will consider carefully the amendment that he proposes. I do not feel quite as strongly as he does the difference between his language and that of the text; but still I am very anxious to harmonize with the Senator.

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I desired to submit the amendment I have stated and one or two others to the Senator from Massachusetts, that his amendment may be perfected. After it shall have been thus amended there will still be objection to it. There is in almost every town in the land a church where the real estate has been purchased and the building

erected from the hard earnings of colored people, the congregation being composed entirely of colored people, and the church their property. We do not seek to pass a law that shall divest them of such churches. The white population are the more numerous, and possibly grasping; the property has appreciated in value; there is no propriety in enabling the white citizens, by giving them the same privileges in these churches that the colored people possess, to wrest this property from the colored people. There are churches of that kind in this city, in the city in which I reside, and throughout the Union. This is also true of schools and of colleges. I would avoid this effect of the law by adding as an amendment at the end of the first section, as follows:

Provided, That churches, schools, cemeteries, and institutions of learning established exclusively for either the white or the colored race, shall not be taken from the control of those who established them, but shall remain devoted to their use.

You cannot make the amendment I propose extend only to the colored people without falling into the absurdity of discriminating against whites while attempting to abolish the distinction of races. Therefore. let the law be that churches, schools, cemeteries, &c., established exclusively for either of the races, shall not be taken from their control, but remain devoted to their use. That provision modifies to some degree the law, but it does not affect the main subjects of the law, to wit. common carriers, innkeepers, schools, &c., but does perpetuate to the colored people their own institutions.

The second section provides:

That any person violating the foregoing provision, or aiding in its violation, or inciting thereto, shall, for every such offense, forfeit and pay the sum of $500 to the person aggrieved thereby.

If a whole congregation or all the passen gers of a steamboat or car violate some of the provisions of the foregoing section every one so aiding in or inciting to such violation should not be liable to and the party aggrieved be entitled to recover from each one a penalty of $500. And in case the offense complained of be a refusal of burial, who is to recover the penalty? The deceased is not aggrieved, and cannot bring suit if he is. I suggest after the word "grave," eleventh line of the second section, this amendment:

Provided, That the party aggrieved shall not recover more than one penalty; and where the offense is a refusal of burial, the penalty aforesaid may be recovered by the heirs-at-law of the person to whose body burial has been so refused.

There is still another amendment to this second section, and that is to strike out all the residue of the section, which is in these words:

And any corporation, association, or individual, holding a charter or license under national or State authority violating the aforesaid provisions, shall, on conviction thereof, forfeit such charter or license. I understand that the Federal Government, excepting for a national purpose, cannot grant a charter, cannot incorporate a bank or railroad company for a State, that being beyond the jurisdiction of Congress; and so unquestionably it is bevond the power of Federal jurisdiction to forfeit a State charter. Besides, the penalty suggested is unreasonable. Were I ejected from the cars of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, there would be no propriety in mulcting them in damages to the amount of $20,000,000. I suppose that the franchises of that company, which the bill would under such circumstances forfeit, are worth that. The penalties imposed in the previous part of the section, $500 by personal suit and $500 on indictment for misdemeanor, are sufficient for the offense committed. And further, the stockholders of the company offending might be favorable to the spirit of the bill he would promote; they might be the very colored people whom we seek to protect and who had been guilty of no offense, and yet the forfeiture of the charter would destroy their property and render them