Virginia,[613] in 1866, provided that Negroes and Indians should be competent to testify in cases in which a Negro or Indian was a party. The testimony of Negroes had to be “_ore tenus_, and not by deposition.” The next year, this law was repealed and a statute[614] enacted that colored persons should be competent to testify “as if they were white.”
Thus far the legislation on Negro testimony in the Southern States only has been given. Similar questions have arisen in some of the other States. Thus, by an early statute of California[615] “no Indian, or person having one-half or more Indian blood, or Mongolian, or Chinese,” was permitted to give evidence in favor of or against a white person. The Supreme Court[616] of the State held in 1869 that this statute violated the Civil Rights Bill and was therefore null and void. A minority of the court, however, dissented on the ground that the Civil Rights Bill itself was unconstitutional as interfering with the domestic relations of citizens.
A law of Indiana[617] of 1865 provided that all persons of competent age, without distinction as to color or blood, should be competent as witnesses, but provided that no Negro or mulatto who had come, or who should thereafter come into this State in violation of the thirteenth article of the Constitution of the State (prohibiting the immigration of free Negroes) should, while said article continued in force, be competent as a witness in any case in which a white person was a party in interest. It also provided[618] that where a Negro, Indian, or person excluded on account of mixed blood was a party in the case, his opponent should be excluded. Nevada,[619] the same year, gave Negroes the right to testify, but not in favor of or against a white person, and also provided that the credibility of such Negro, black, or mulatto person should be left entirely with the jury. Washington,[620] in 1866, provided that no one should be incompetent as a witness “by reason of having Negro blood.” But in 1869, the legislature[621] said that Indians or persons having over one-half Indian blood should not be competent to testify in an action or proceeding to which a white person was a party. West Virginia[622] passed a law in 1866 that no person should be incompetent as a witness on account of race or color.