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majority in Congress, In all future time—subversive, as I
believe, of every principle of justice and equality among the
States, and in times of high party excitement and sectional
alienation, dangerous "to the liberties of the people.

I assume, without;the fear of contradiction, that the effect
of this Amendment of the Constitution as a condition prece-
dent to the re-admission of the revolted States, will be the
ultimate enforcement of negro suffrage and negro equality,
by indirect legislation, depriving the Southern and Border
States of their Constitutional representations in the National
Councils, unless purchased by. the elevation of the negro to
the untrammeled right of suffrage.

Admitting the proposed Amendment to be ever so just and
liberal, ought it in common justice to be thrust upon the people
of the Southern States, to be used as a lever to secure to the
negro in that section, what has not been attempted with the
people of the North by direct legislation ?

There are tea States now held in abeyance by the dominant
party in Congress, without sufficient cause, as I believe. The
war has ceased, and the war power of which we hear so much
has ceased with it. The submission of the Constitutional
Amendment to those excluded States by Congress is a virtual
recognition that they are still in the Union, and have a right
to entertain or reject it, as may seem most conducive to their
political safety. Suppose they reject it, as they certainly
will do, what then? Is the North to re-open the war upon
them ?--to disolve the Union- for it will amount to that—
by reducing them to Territories, or what is worse, as some
have threatened, to degrade them, by confiscating their lands
and allowing the negroes to come in and occupy them. The
South makes no resistance to the edict of exclusion—she can
make .none. She admits her utter prostration. Paralyzed
in all her:, relations, social, commercial and political, she
calmly resigns herself to her fate. This is the universal feel-
ing of the people of the South at the present moment. In
his Message to the Georgia Legislature, November 1, 1866,
Governor Jenkins holds this language: "To submit to in-
jurious changes in the Constitution, when forced upon a State
according to the forms prescribed for its amendment, would
be one thing; to participate in making them by duress against
her sense of right and justice would be a very different thing.
The difference in principle is as broad as that which distin-
guishes martyrdom from suicide. We had better calmly
await a returning sense of justice and a consequent reflux of
the tide now running Strong against us."

Meanwhile, her great staples are neglected—immigration

seeks othe channels, trade languishes, and her contributions

to the national burthens, so important to the general tax-

payer, are represented by merely nominal values. There is