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taken into consideration with the great benefit that was
to accrue? They had been told how hundreds of voter
were taken from Baltimore city into Baltimore county to
control the elections. They had used these frauds in Bal-
timore to press down the right and uphold the wrong, and
it was to prevent this that a registry law was needed.
There was another thing which must be considered—a
trouble which reared its protean head at every side.
Negro suffrage was, it was said, to be conferred by act of
Congress, and to extend over all the States. If it was to
be enforced at the point of the bayonet, it could not be
resisted; but if it was to be done under the semblance of
law, it could be resisted by this registry law, which would
throw its protecting aegis around our ballot box, and he
would then say resist this nefarious scheme with all the
strength of laws.
Mr. Kennedy rose to express his hearty concurrence in
the views of the gentlemen from Kent, (Mr. Wickes, ) and
from Baltimore, (Mr. Gill. ) He regarded this system as
most essential, and could not see that any injury could
possibly result to any country from it. As a safeguard
to the ballot-box, it was necessary—necessary to prevent
the exercise of the franchise by those who were not en-
titled to it. He was convinced that a general registration
system would conduce greatly to the interest of the State.
We are liable upon the whole of the Pennsylvania line to
influences which would be most dangerous to the more
southern and peninsular counties. He had regretted to
see the sectional feeling which had been exhibited—had
deeply regretted the disposition to interfere with the
reports of the committees—thought that they should be
left as nearly as possible as at first reported, and was
satisfied that in nearly every instance where they had
been altered it had caused great injury. If there had
been a system of registration in 1864, would the present
constitution have been fastened upon us, a constitution
which it required the greatest fraud to declare adopted,
and then only by 300 majority.
When in the public service as a member of the Con-
gress of the United States, it had become his duty to in-
vestigate charges of bribes and corruption, and he had
ascertained that one officer of the government had been
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