MR. SUMNER. Under the decision of the Supreme Court. So much the better. There is Connecticut. It would obtain three thousand votes there for the good cause. A short Act of Congress will determine the political fortunes of Connecticut for an indefinite period by securing three thousand additional votes to the right side. There is New York, also, where the bill would have the same excellent beneficent influence.
Who, then, can hesitate? Look at it in any light you please. Regard it as the completion of these Reconstruction measures, as a constitutional enactment, or as a measure of expediency to secure results we all desire at the approaching elections, and who can hesitate? There has been no bill before you for a long time of more practical value than this. I hope there will be no question about proceeding with it, and that we may pass it before we separate to-night.
MR. EDMUNDS. I agree with my friend from Massachusetts, that the bill has very great merit. It has supreme moral merit. I agree to every word of it. I am a little afraid, it is true, that there is a higher law that will bind us not to pass it, for want of power.
MR. SUMNER. Want of power! Will the Senator be good enough to state the reason?
MR. EDMUNDS. No, not on this point, because it is not relevant to this question of order.
MR. SUMNER. But, as the Senator is going into the question of the want of power, I really wish he would deign to enlighten us upon that.
MR. EDMUNDS. My friend will have to go without it, so far as I am concerned, for I shall not make it.
MR. SUMNER. Then I shall begin to think the Senator cannot.
MR. EDMUNDS. That is not a very dangerous state of things; but there are others who can.
The Senate decided the motion out of order,--Yeas 12, Nays 22.
July 13th, and again on the 15th, Mr. Sumner made another effort, by a resolution suspending the rule limiting business, so as to allow the consideration of this bill; but he could not get a vote on the resolution. The Senate rose without touching it.
OPENING OF OFFICES TO COLORED PERSONS IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
REMARKS IN THE SENATE, ON A BILL FOR THE FURTHER SECURITY OF EQUAL RIGHTS IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, JULY 16, 1867.
July 16th, Mr. Sumner offered a petition from citizens of Washington, setting forth, that, under the existing charter of Washington, colored persons are excluded from office, and praying relief. He supported the petition with the following bill “for the further security of Equal Rights in the District of Columbia”:--