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States was, and should be, left to the
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States respectively, and exclusively, viz., {217} the proposed Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution. Reference has already been made to the inconsistent doctrine, we might almost say the timorous subterfuge, of the Republican platform on the matter of negro suffrage, and to the growing conviction on the part of the Republicans during the campaign that this question must be settled for the entire country alike, and by a constitutional amendment. At the opening of Congress in December, and during the first days of the session, the proposition was presented which finally took on the form given it by the conference committee of the two Houses in the words:
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The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. It was passed by both Houses with the requisite two-thirds majority on the 26th of February and sent to the legislatures of the
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States for ratification. The Republicans had at last come to the view that the emancipation of the freedmen involved their civil equality with the whites, and that such equality could not be maintained unless they possessed the elective franchise, and that it was cowardly for the
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States
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States might amend negro suffrage out of their
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State constitutions, and thus destroy the Republican party in these
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States,