negro as well as the white—­above 21 years of age who was resident in these ten States during the rebellion, voluntarily or involuntarily, at some time and in some way did participate in resistance to the lawful authority of the General Government.  The question with the citizen to whom this oath is to be proposed must be a fearful one, for while the bill does not declare that perjury may be assigned for such false swearing nor fix any penalty for the offense, we must not forget that martial law prevails; that every person is answerable to a military commission, without previous presentment by a grand jury, for any charge that may be made against him, and that the supreme authority of the military commander determines the question as to what is an offense and what is to be the measure of punishment.

The fourth section of the bill provides “that the commanding general of each district shall appoint as many boards of registration as may be necessary, consisting of three loyal officers or persons.”  The only qualification stated for these officers is that they must be “loyal.”  They may be persons in the military service or civilians, residents of the State or strangers.  Yet these persons are to exercise most important duties and are vested with unlimited discretion.  They are to decide what names shall be placed upon the register and from their decision there is to be no appeal.  They are to superintend the elections and to decide all questions which may arise.  They are to have the custody of the ballots and to make return of the persons elected.  Whatever frauds or errors they may commit must pass without redress.  All that is left for the commanding general is to receive the returns of the elections, open the same, and ascertain who are chosen “according to the returns of the officers who conducted said elections.”  By such means and with this sort of agency are the conventions of delegates to be constituted.

As the delegates are to speak for the people, common justice would seem to require that they should have authority from the people themselves.  No convention so constituted will in any sense represent the wishes of the inhabitants of these States, for under the all-embracing exceptions of these laws, by a construction which the uncertainty of the clause as to disfranchisement leaves open to the board of officers, the great body of the people may be excluded from the polls and from all opportunity of expressing their own wishes or voting for delegates who will faithfully reflect their sentiments.

I do not deem it necessary further to investigate the details of this bill.  No consideration could induce me to give my approval to such an election law for any purpose, and especially for the great purpose of framing the constitution of a State.  If ever the American citizen should be left to the free exercise of his own judgment it is when he is engaged in the work of forming the fundamental law under which he is to live.  That work is his work, and it can not properly be taken out of his hands.  All this legislation proceeds upon the contrary assumption that the people of each of these States shall have no constitution except such as may be arbitrarily dictated by Congress and formed under the restraint of military rule.  A plain statement of facts makes this evident.