Revisiting Minor v. Happersett

The Post & Email Newspaper ^ | 17 Jul 2023 | Joseph DeMaio

[CDR Kerchner]

(Jul. 17, 2023) — Well, faithful P&E readers, here we go again. As another “exploratory” candidate for president appears on the scene – Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai –, it may be prudent to once again revisit the Supreme Court’s 1875 decision in Minor v. Happersett.

While the major holding of the case (i.e., that Missouri’s denial of suffrage to women did not violate the 14th Amendment) was abrogated 45 years later in 1920 by the 19th Amendment, the question remains as to whether the decision’s other “observations” and “comments” remain viable and relevant to the “natural born Citizen” (“nbC”) presidential eligibility question.

The answer to that question, in turn, may impact not only Ayyadurai’s candidacy – competently explored here – but may in addition cast useful light on the questionable presidential candidacies and bona-fides of many others, including Vivek Ramaswamy; Nikki Haley; Kamala Harris; and, of course, Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. A subsequent offering will address Dr. Ayyadurai’s eligibility arguments.

Turning specifically therefore to the decision in Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S.162 (1875) – and totally apart from the now-abrogated women’s suffrage issue addressed by the Court in ruling against Virginia Minor – the relevance of the surviving, non-suffrage and non-abrogated portions of the opinion to the nbC issue remains. Those portions relate to the Court’s following observations, found at 88 U.S. 162, 167-168: ... continue reading at: https://www.thepostemail.com/2023/07/17/revisiting-minor-v-happersett/

[Ultra Sonic 007]

"... and subject to its jurisdiction", found in the US Constitution, is a grammatical appendage that is REQUIRED to be true for the the whole sentence to be true. If the parents don't have US citizenship when kids are born, they are not subject to US jurisdiction, they are subject to their parent's jurisdiction(s), like Harris.

Do you understand what it means to be subject to a country's jurisdiction?

Do you think illegal aliens are not subject to our jurisdiction? The very categorization of "illegal alien" implies that those in that category are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, because they can be charged for breaking the law. They are governed by our laws, and thus are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

[DiogenesLamp]

I've seen that. Way back when it was an issue, freepers ran down the source from which they fabricated that document.

It's not really a thing anymore. McCain did show his birth certificate to a Reporter, and I used to have a link for that story, but it's been too long ago.

McCain's dead, and now it doesn't even matter anymore.

And by the way, I met John McCain back in 1994. This was before I found out what kind of sleaze he was.

[DiogenesLamp]

Do you think illegal aliens are not subject to our jurisdiction? The very categorization of "illegal alien" implies that those in that category are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, because they can be charged for breaking the law.

If you will notice my tagline, I will inform you that those are the words of John Bingham, primary proponent of the 14th amendment in the Congress. It comes from the debates on the 14th amendment, and he clarifies what group of people are to be covered under the 14th amendment.

It is intended to apply to the children "of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty."

It was never intended to apply to the children of illegal aliens who are still required to have allegiance to their home country.

There are other quotes from John Bingham and other people in the debates, which make it quite clear their intent was to provide citizenship to former slaves and people who immigrated here intending to establish a lawful residence.

[one guy in new jersey]

A child of an American Ambassador born overseas in the country the Ambassador is assigned to.

A child of an American soldier IN HOSTILE OCCUPATION of a patch of turf overseas

That’s kind of it in terms of the Natural Law/Law of Nations.

Everybody else born overseas has to figure out where they fall in terms of Congress’ “An Uniform Rule of Naturalization” power and humbly give up their POTUS and VPOTUS hopes and dreams (Sorry Ted the Cubamerinadian!).

[one guy in new jersey]

“It is intended to apply to the children “of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.””

In other words, parents to whom no other sovereign has any colorable claim in terms of drafting into its military service, should it somehow get hold of them...

[Penelope Dreadful]

It would be a lot more prudent to examine the decision and Won Kim Ark, since that Court actually dealt with the question of what a natural born citizen was. But by all means, continue to flog a dead horse. When that horse has done sailed.

[woodpusher]

"... and subject to its jurisdiction", found in the US Constitution, is a grammatical appendage that is REQUIRED to be true for the the whole sentence to be true. If the parents don't have US citizenship when kids are born, they are not subject to US jurisdiction, they are subject to their parent's jurisdiction(s), like Harris.

That's nonsense.

"subject to its jurisdiction" means subject to its laws. If your position were correct, any alien could kill your kids and dog, rape your wife, and just walk away facing no prosecution because he would not be subject to the laws of the United States. Were you, without diplomatic immunity, to travel to another country, say Mexico, and get caught committing a crime against Mexican law; while you sat in a Mexican jail you could ponder being in the total and complete jurisdiction of Mexico.

As directly held in Wong Kim Ark, the child of two aliens, if born within the territory of the United States, is not only born within the jurisdiction, but is born a United States citizen.

We have already had two Presidents born of one or more alien parents, and two Vice-Presidents born of one or more alien parents. For each, at a joint session of Congress, the votes were tallied by the tellers and the result announced by the President of the Senate. Any objections posed did not succeed.

And then they were administered an oath. Chester Arthur was sworn in as Vice-President by William A. Wheeler, Vice President of the United States. Kamala Harris was sworn in by Sonia Sotomayer, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Presidents are usually sworn in by the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Following the assassination of President Garfield, President Chester Arthur, at his residence in New York, was administered the oath by the Honorable John R. Brady, Justice of the New York State Supreme Court. Two days later the oath was administered in Washngton D.C. by Morrison R. Waite, Chief Justice of the United States. President Barack Obama was administered the oath by John Roberts, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Congressional debate on the 14th Amendment engaged in much hairsplitting about exactly what was meant before the text was approved for presentation to the People for ratification. And then the People ratified the plain black letter text that was proposed to them. They ratified the words with the common meaning applied to them at the time, except for legal terms of art which connoted specific defined meanings. Nobody's intent was ratified. Debating points were not ratified.

United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898)

169 U.S. 704

The fact, therefore, that acts of Congress or treaties have not permitted Chinese persons born out of this country to become citizens by naturalization, cannot exclude Chinese persons born in this country from the operation of the broad and clear words of the Constitution, "All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

VII. Upon the facts agreed in this case, the American citizenship which Wong Kim Ark acquired by birth within the United States has not been lost or taken away by anything happening since his birth.

[...]

169 U.S. 705

The evident intention, and the necessary effect, of the submission of this case to the decision of the court upon the facts agreed by the parties, were to present for determination the single question, stated at the beginning of this opinion, namely, whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicil and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States. For the reasons above stated, this court is of opinion that the question must be answered in the affirmative.

[woodpusher]

These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents.

I had forgotten from which case that statement came, and I am glad you posted it.

As I documented, it was irrelevant dictum when written, and remains irrelevant. There was no issue of citizenship in the Minor case as an Agreed Statement of Facts established that Virginia Minor was a citizen of the United States and of Missouri. At issue was voting rights which a distinction between natural born and naturalized has no relevance.

There was no citizenship holding in Minor. Any irrelevant doubts the justice had in Minor were resolved in the case of Wong Kim Ark where the citizenship issue was directly relevant.

As directly held in Wong Kim Ark, the child of two aliens, if born within the territory of the United States, is not only born within the jurisdiction, but is born a United States citizen.

Being born a citizen is the definition of a natural born citizen.

[4Zoltan]

“But since the Minor v Happersett court says “Authorities”, which is plural, perhaps you can tell me who else other than Rawle was pushing the idea that American Citizenship descended from English common law dealing with “subjects”?”

IMO, Justice Waite is referring to other Justices on his Court. Specifically Justice Miller and Justice Field. They appear to have different views on the term “subject to the jurisdiction.”

Justice Miller - “The phrase, “subject to its jurisdiction” was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.” Slaughterhouse Cases, 83 U.S. 36 (1872)

Justice Field in his dissenting opinion in the Slaughterhouse Cases pointed to the dissent by Justice Curtis in the Dred Scott decision. - “In the Dred Scott case, this subject of citizenship of the United States was fully and elaborately discussed. The exposition in the opinion of Mr. Justice Curtis has been generally accepted by the profession of the country as the one containing the soundest views of constitutional law.”

And in Dred Scott, Justice Curtis wrote, “The first section of the second article of the Constitution uses the language, “a natural-born citizen.” It thus assumes that citizenship may be acquired by birth. Undoubtedly, this language of the Constitution was used in reference to that principle of public law, well understood in this country at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, which referred citizenship to the place of birth.”

Later Justice Fields explained his opinion - “The first section of the fourteenth amendment to the constitution declares that ‘all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States, and of the state wherein they reside. ‘ This language would seem to be sufficiently broad to cover the case of the petitioner. He is a person born in the United States. Any doubt on the subject, if there can be any, must arise out of the words ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof.’ They alone are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States who are within their dominions and under the protection of their laws, and with the consequent obligation to obey them when obedience can be rendered; and only those thus subject by their birth or naturalization are within the terms of the amendment. The jurisdiction over those latter must, at the time, be both actual and exclusive. The words mentioned except from citizenship children born in the United States of persons engaged in the diplomatic service of foreign governments, such as ministers and ambassadors, whose residence, by a fiction of public law, is regarded as part of their own country. This ex-territoriality of their residence secures to their children born here all the rights and privileges which would inure to them had they been born in the country of their parents.”

“With this explanation of the meaning of the words in the fourteenth amendment, ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’ it is evident that they do not exclude the petitioner from being a citizen. He is not within any of the classes of persons excepted from citizenship, and the jurisdiction of the United States over him at the time of his birth was exclusive of that of any other country.” In re Look Tin Sing 21 F 905 (1879)

Justice Waite then had two Justices on his Court wiho appear to have different views on birthright citizenship and the meaning of “subject to the jurisdiction.” That may be why they chose not to pursue the issue in Minor v Happersett.

[woodpusher]

[Reno 89519] Congress addressed this by affirming that he was a Natural Born Citizen because the family was there with the military.

[DiogenesLamp] Firstly, he was born in the naval hospital. There are records and I have seen them. That business about him being born off base is just a lie that has been spread around.

Congress did not affirm anything. It was a Senate Resolution. It carries the legal effect of nothing.

McCain could not have been born in a CZ Naval Hospital in 1936. It was built in WW2. You have not seen the records for the non-existent hospital. John McCain never produced a birth certificate and you have not seen that either.

For official documentation of when and where USN Hospitals operated, there is he BUMED Library and Archives Finding Aid. It seems a tad difficult to find online these days, but I have a 2007 copy.

Here is th 1941 Executive Order to build the hospital.

https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/executive-order-8981-navy-hospital-area-coco-solo-canal-zone

Executive Order 8981—NAVY HOSPITAL AREA, COCO SOLO, CANAL ZONE

December 17, 1941

EXECUTIVE ORDER 8981

NAVY HOSPITAL AREA, COCO SOLO, CANAL ZONE

December 17, 1941

By virtue of the authority vested in me by section 5 of title 2 of the Canal Zone Code, approved June 19, 1934, and as President of the United States, it is ordered as follows:

SECTION 1. Setting apart of reservation; boundaries. The following- described area of land in the Canal Zone is hereby reserved and set apart as, and assigned to the uses and purposes of, a naval reservation, which shall be known as Navy Hospital Area, Coco Solo, and which shall be under the control and jurisdiction of the Secretary of the Navy, subject to the provisions of section 2 of this order:

Being born on a naval base overseas carries no distinction from being born off base. The base is the sovereign territory of the host nation and we operate under a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA).

At the time McCain was born in 1936, pursuant to the Constitution and Federal law, he was apparently born an alien, whether born in the CZ or elsewhere in Panama. He was declared a citizen by the Act of August 4, 1937. The Act of May 24, 1934 screwed up, as explained below.

https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/pan001.asp

Hay-Bunau Treaty, 1903

ARTICLE III

The Republic of Panama grants to the United States all the rights, power and authority within the zone mentioned and described in Article II of this agreement and within the limits of all auxiliary lands and waters mentioned and described in said Article II which the United States would possess and exercise if it were the sovereign of the territory within which said lands and waters are located to the entire exclusion of the exercise by the Republic of Panama of any such sovereign rights, power or authority.

"would possess … if it were the sovereign" establishes it was not the sovereign.

The 14th Amendment applied to all those born within the territory and jurisdiction of the United States. McCain was not born within the territory of the United States.

Act of May 24, 1934; 48 Stat. 797, "To amend; the law relative to citizenship and naturalization, and for other purposes, starts out amending Section 1993 of the citizenship law.

"Sec. 1903. Any child hereafter born out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States...."

And Congress showed off its intelligence and logic. They reasoned, if you can call it that, that "out of the limits and jurisdiction of the United States" would cover all who were not born "within the territory and jurisdiction of the United States." What they were looking for was "out of the territory or jurisdiction of the United States. They wiffed at the reqired logic.

McCain was born no-man's land outside the territory of the United States, but where the United States exercised jurisdiction as if it were the sovereign. He was born within the jurisdiction of the United States and neither fell within the 14th Amendment, nor the statute law. Looks like he was born an alien in Panama because Congress had a misplaced sense of logic.

The screwup was soon brought to the attention of Congress and they wrote a new Act.

Act of August 4, 1937, 50 Stat. 558, "Relating to the citizenship of certain classes of persons born in the Canal Zone or the Republic of Panama.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House o f Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That any person born in the Canal Zone on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this Act, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.

SEC. 2. Any person born in the Republic of Panama on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this Act, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States employed by the Government of the United States or by the Panama Railroad Company, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.

Approved, August 4, 1937.

The 1934 Act was botched. McCain was born in 1936. The Act of 1937 sort of fixed the problem for everyone not running for President. It appears the question is whether one born an alien can become a natural born U.S citizen retroactively.

[4Zoltan]

Here is a law review article on how the Fifth Amendment negates the “natural born citizen” clause making naturalized citizens eligible to the Presidency.

https://repository.law.uic.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1287&context=lawreview

[woodpusher]

If you will notice my tagline, I will inform you that those are the words of John Bingham, primary proponent of the 14th amendment in the Congress.

I will inform you that the citizenship clause was an amendment initated in the Senate by Senator Jacob Howard. Bingham's draft did not even have a citizenship clause.

The Bingham quote in your tagline has nothing to do with th 14th Amendment. It pertains to the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Bingham argued that the CRA was unconstitutional.

https://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llcg&fileName=071/llcg071.db&recNum=332

Congressional Globe, House of Representatives, 39th Congress, 1st Session, March 9, 1866, pg. 1291

Has the Congress of the United States the power to pass and enforce the bill as it comes to us from the committee? Has the Congress of the United States the power to declare, as this bill does declare, in the words which I propose to strike out, that there shall be no discrim­ination of civil rights among citizens of the United States in any State of the United States, on account of race, color, or previous condition of slavery.

I find no fault with the introductory clause, which is simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Consti­tution itself, a natural-born citizen; but, sir, I may be allowed to say further, that I deny that the Congress of the United States ever had the power or color of power to say that any man born within the jurisdiction of the United States, not owing a foreign allegiance, is not and shall not be a citizen of the United States. Citizen­ship is his birthright, and neither the Congress nor the States can justly or lawfully take it from him. But while this is admitted, can you declare by congressional enactment as to citi­zens of the United States within the States that there shall be no discrimination among them of civil rights?

Obviously, John Bingham was talking about a bill and not about the Fourteenth Amendment which was not even introduced for consideration until several months later.

[Mr Rogers]

No, Vattel didn’t define NBC that way. He didn’t use the term, but instead used “indigenes” and “natives”. It took a bad translation made AFTER the US Constitution to insert that.

[woodpusher]

There was no citizenship issue before the Court in Minor. Virginia Minor's citizenship was never in question before the court because it was a stipulated fact, agreed to by both parties before the trial. Minor, Transcript of Record, page 8:

Agreed Statement

STATEMENT

[excerpt]

It is admitted by the pleadings that the plaintiff is a native-born, free white citizen of the United States and of the State of Missouri; that the defendant is a registrar, qualified and acting as such; that the plaintiff, in proper time and in proper form, made application to him to be registered and that the defendant refused to register the plaintiff solely for the reason that she is a female, (and that she possesses the qualifications of an elector in all respects, except as to the matter of sex, as before stated.)

Both parties agreed, as a matter of stipulated fact, that Virginia Minor was a native-born, free white citizen of the United States and of the State of Missouri, and that she was qualified as an elector in all respects, except as to the matter of sex. The question before the Court was whether a woman, being a native-born, free white citizen, could be barred from voting solely on account of sex.

[woodpusher]

Vattel wrote a text book in French called The Law of Nations. The Law of Nations is the archaic term for International Law. No nation answers to International Law when making a domestic decision about its own citizenship laws.

[woodpusher]

In their debate over the 14th Amendment, the Senate spoke of Cau­casians, Chinese, Indians, Blacks, Gypsies, Mon­gols, Hottentots, the Zingara, Australians "or people from Borneo, man-eaters or cannibals if you please."

ON THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT - TEXT

CONGRESSIONAL GLOBE
May 30, 1866

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Page 2890

RECONSTRUCTION.

Mr. HOWARD. I now move to take up House joint resolution No. 127. The motion was agreed to; and the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, resumed the consideration of the joint resolution (H. R. No. 127) proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The ques­tion is on the amendments proposed by the Senator from Michigan, [Mr. Howard.]

Mr. HOWARD. The first amendment is to section one, declaring that "all persons born in the United States, and subject to the juris­diction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the States wherein they reside." I do not propose to say anything on that sub­ject except that the question of citizenship has been so fully discussed in this body as not to need any further elucidation, in my opinion. This amendment which I have offered is simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already, that every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Govern­ment of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. It settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citi­zens of the United States. This has long been a great desideratum in the jurisprudence and legislation of this country.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The first amendment proposed by the Senator from Michigan [Mr. HOWARD] will be read.

The Secretary read the amendment, which was in line nine, after the words "section one," to insert:

All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the States wherein they reside. So that the section will read :

Sec. 1. All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the States wherein they reside.

- - - - -

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due pro­cess of law, nor deny to any person within its juris­diction the equal protection of the laws.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I presume the honor­able Senator from Michigan does not intend by this amendment to include the Indians. I move, therefore, to amend the amendment — I presume he will have no objection to it — by inserting after the word "thereof" the words "excluding Indians not taxed." The amend­ment would then read: All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, excluding Indians not taxed, are citizens of the United States and of the States wherein they reside.

Mr. HOWARD. I hope that amendment to the amendment will not be adopted. Indians born within the limits of the United States, and who maintain their tribal relations, are not, in the sense of this amendment, born subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. They are regarded, and always have been in our legislation and jurisprudence, as being quasi foreign nations.

Mr. COWAN. The honorable Senator from Michigan has given this subject, I have no doubt, a good deal of his attention, and I am really desirous to have a legal definition of "citizenship of the United States." What does it mean? What is its length and breadth? I would be glad if the honorable Senator in good earnest would favor us with some such definition. Is the child of the Chinese immi­grant in California a citizen? Is the child of a Gypsy born in Pennsylvania a citizen? If so, what rights have they? Have they any more rights than a sojourner in the United States? If a traveler comes here from Ethio­pia, from Australia, or from Great Britain, he is entitled, to a certain extent, to the protec­tion of the laws. You cannot murder him with impunity. It is murder to kill him, the same as it is to kill another man. You cannot com­mit an assault and battery on him, I appre­hend. He has a right to the protection of the laws; but he is not a citizen in the ordinary acceptation of the word.

It is perfectly clear that the mere fact that a man is born in the country has not heretofore entitled him to the right to exercise political power. He is not entitled, by virtue of that, to be an elector. An elector is one who is chosen by the people to perform that function, just the same as an officer is one chosen by the people to exercise the franchises of an office. Now, I should like to know, because really I have been puzzled for a long while and have been unable to determine exactly, either from conversation with those who ought to know, who have given this subject their atten­tion, or from the decisions of the Supreme Court, the lines and boundaries which circumscribe that phrase, "citizen of the United States." What is it?

So far as the courts and the administration of the laws are concerned, I have supposed that every human being within their jurisdic­tion was in one sense of the word a citizen, that is, a person entitled to protection; but in so far as the right to hold property, particu­larly the right to acquire title to real estate, was concerned, that was a subject entirely within the control of the States. It has been so considered in the State of Pennsylvania; and aliens and others who acknowledge no allegiance, either to the State or to the Gen­eral Government, may be limited and circum­scribed in that particular. I have supposed, further, that it was essential to the existence of society itself, and particularly essential to the existence of a free State, that it should have the power, not only of declaring who should exercise political power within its boundaries, but that if it were overrun by another and a different race, it would have the right to abso­lutely expel them. I do not know that there is any danger to many of the States in this Union; but is it proposed that the people of Cal-

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Page 2891

ifornia are to remain quiescent while they are overrun by a flood of immigration of the Mon­gol race? Are they to be immigrated out of house and home by Chinese? I should think not. It is not supposed that the people of California, in a broad and general sense, have any higher rights than the people of China; but they are in possession of the country of California, and if another people of a different race, of different religion, of different man­ners, of different traditions, different tastes and sympathies are to come there and have the free right to locate there and settle among them, and if they have an opportunity of pour­ing in such an immigration as in a short time will double or treble the population of Cali­fornia, I ask, are the people of California pow­erless to protect themselves? I do not know that the contingency will ever happen, but it may be well to consider it while we are on this point.

As I understand the rights of the States under the Constitution at present, California has the right, if she deems it proper, to forbid the en­trance into her territory of any person she chooses who is not a citizen of some one of the United States. She cannot forbid his en­trance; but unquestionably, if she was likely to be invaded by a flood of Australians or people from Borneo, man-eaters or cannibals if you please, she would have the right to say that those people should not come there. It de­pends upon the inherent character of the men. Why, sir, there are nations of people with whom theft is a virtue and falsehood a merit. There are people to whom polygamy is as natural as monogamy is with us. It is utterly impossible that these people can meet together and enjoy their several rights and privileges which they suppose to be natural in the same society; and it is necessary, a part of the nature of things, that society shall be more or less exclusive. It is utterly and totally impossible to mingle all the various families of men, from the lowest form of the Hottentot up to the highest Cau­casian, in the same society.

It must be evident to every man intrusted with the power and duty of legislation, and qualified to exercise it in a wise and temperate mannor, that these things cannot be; and in my judgment there should be some limitation, some definition to this term "citizen of the United States." What is it? Is it simply to put a man in a condition that he may be an elector in one of the States? Is it to put him in a condition to have the right to enter the United States courts and sue? Or is it only that he is entitled as a sojourner to the protec­tion of the laws while he is within and under the jurisdiction of the courts? Or is it to set him upon some pedestal, some position, to put him out of the reach of State legislation and State power?

Sir, I trust I am as liberal as anybody to­ward the rights of all people, but I am unwill­ing, on the part of my State, to give up the right that she claims, and that she may exercise, and exercise before very long, of expelling a certain number of people who invade her borders; who owe to her no allegiance; who pretend to owe none; who recognize no authority in her government; who have a distinct, independent government of their own — an imperium in imperio; who pay no taxes; who never perform military service; who do nothing, in fact, which becomes the citizen, and perform none of the duties which devolve upon him, but, on the other hand, have no homes, pretend to own no land, live nowhere, settle as trespassers where ever they go, and whose sole merit is a univer­sal swindle; who delight in it, who boast of it, and whose adroitness and cunning is of such a transcendent character that no skill can serve to correct it or punish it; I mean the Gypsies. They wander in gangs in my State. They fol­low no ostensible pursuit for a livelihood. They trade horses, tell fortunes, and things disappear mysteriously. Where they came from nobody knows. Their very origin is lost in mystery. No man today can tell from whence the Zin-

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gara come or whither they go, but it is under­stood that they are a distinct people. They never intermingle with any other. They never intermarry with any other. I believe there is no instance on record where a Zingara woman has mated with a man of any other race, al­though it is true that sometimes the males of that race may mate with the females of others; but I think there is no case in history where it can be found that a woman of that race, so exclusive are they, and so strong are their sectional antipathies, has been known to mate with a man of another race. These people live in the country and are born in the coun­try. They infest society. They impose upon the simple and the weak everywhere. Are those people, by a constitutional amendment, to be put out of the reach of the State in which they live? I mean as a class. If the mere fact of being born in the country confers that right, then they will have it: and I think it will be mischievous.

I think the honorable Senator from Michi­gan would not admit the right that the Indians of his neighborhood would have to come in upon Michigan and settle in the midst of that society and obtain the political power of the State, and wield it, perhaps, to his exclusion. I do not know that anybody would agree to that. It is true that our race are not subjected to dangers from that quarter, because we are the strongest, perhaps; but there is a race in con­tact with this country which, in all character­istics except that of simply making fierce war, is not only our equal, but perhaps our superior. I mean the yellow race; the Mongol race. They outnumber us largely. Of their indus­try, their skill, and tlieir pertinacity in all worldly affairs, nobody can doubt. They are our neighbors. Recent improvement, the age of fire, has brought their coasts almost in im­mediate contact with our own. Distance is almost annihilated. They may pour in their millions upon our Pacific coast in a very short time. Are the States to lose control over this immigration? Is the United States to deter­mine that they are to be citizens? I wish to be understood that I consider those people to have rights just the same as we have, but not rights in connection with our Government. If I desire the exercise of my rights I ought to go to my own people, the people of my own blood and lineage, people of the same religion, peo­ple of the same beliefs and traditions, and not thrust myself in upon a society of other men entirely different in all those respects from myself. I would not claim that right. There­fore I think, before we assert broadly that everybody who shall be born in the United States shall be taken to be a citizen of the United States, we ought to exclude others be­sides Indians not taxed, because I look upon Indians not taxed as being much less danger­ous and much less pestiferous to society than I look upon Gypsies. I do not know how my honorable friend from California looks upon Chinese, but I do know how some of his fel­low-citizens regard them. I have no doubt that now they are useful, and I have no doubt that within proper restraints, allowing that State and the other Pacific States to manage them as they may see fit, they may be useful; but I would not tie their hands by the Consti­tution of the United States so as to prevent them hereafter from dealing with them as in their wisdom they see fit.

Mr. CONNESS. Mr. President, I have failed to learn, from what the Senator has said, what relation what he has said has to the first section of the constitutional amendment be­fore us; but that part of the question I propose leaving to the honorable gentleman who has charge of this resolution. As, however, the State of California has been so carefully guarded from time to time by the Senator from Pennsylvania and others, and the pas­sage, not only of this amendment, but of tho so-called civil rights bill, has been deprecated because of its pernicious influence upon society in California, owing to the contiguity of the

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Chinese and Mongolians to that favored land, I may be excused for saying a few words on the subject.

If my friend from Pennsylvania, who pro­fesses to know all about Gypsies and little about Chinese, knew as much of the Chinese and their habits as he professes to do of the Gypies, (and which I concede to him, for I know nothing to the contrary,) he would not be alarmed in our behalf because of the oper­ation of the proposition before the Senate, or even the proposition contained in the civil rights bill, so far as it involves the Chinese and us.

The proposition before us, I will say, Mr. President, relates simply in that respect to the children begotten of Chinese parents in Cal­ifornia, and it is proposed to declare that they shall be citizens. We have declared that by law; now it is proposed to incorporate the same provision in the fundamental instrument of the nation. I am in favor of doing so. I voted for the proposition to declare that the children of all parentage whatever, born in California, should be regarded and treated as citizens of the United States, entitled to equal civil rights with other citizens of the United States.

Now, I will say, for the benefit of my friend, that he may know something about the Chi­nese in future, that this portion of our popula­tion, namely, the children of Mongolian parent­age, born in California, is very small indeed, and never promises to be large, notwithstand­ing our near neighborhood to the Celestial land. The habits of those people, and their religion, appear to demand that they all return to their own country at some time or other, either alive or dead. There are, perhaps, in California to­day about forty thousand Chinese — from forty to forty-five thousand. Those persons return invariably, while others take their places, and, as I before observed, if they do not return alive their bones are carefully gathered up and sent back to the Flowery Land. It is not an unusual circumstance that the clipper ships trading be­tween San Francisco and China carry at a time three or four hundred human remains of these Chinese. When interred in our State they are not interred deep in the earth, but laid very near the surface, and then mounds of earth are laid over them, so that the process of disinterment is very easy. That is their habit and custom; and as soon as they are fit for transmission to their own country they are taken up with great regularity and sent there. None of their bones are allowed to remain. They will return, then, either living or dead.

Another feature connected with them is, that they do not bring their females to our country but in very limited numbers, and rarely ever in connection with families; so that their pro­geny in California is very small indeed. From the description we have had from the honora­ble Senator from Pennsylvania of the Gypsies, the progeny of all Mongolians in California is not so formidable in numbers as that of the Gypsies in Pennsylvania. We are not troubled with them at all. Indeed, it is only in excep­tional cases that they have children in our State: and therefore the alarming aspect of the application of this provision to California, or any other land to which the Chinese may come as immigrants, is simply a fiction in the brain of persons who deprecate it, and that alone.

I wish now to address a few words to what the Senator from Pennsylvania has said as to the rights that California may claim as against the incursion of objectionable population from other States and countries. The State of Cal­ifornia at various times has passed laws re­strictive of Chinese immigration. It will be remembered that the Chinese came to our State, as others did from all parts of the world, to gather gold in large quantities, it being found there. The interference with our own people in the mines by them was depre­cated by and generally objectionable to the miners in California. The Chinese are re-

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garded, also, not with favor as an addition to the population in a social point of view; not that there is any intercourse between the two classes of persons there, but they are not re­garded as pleasant neighbors; their habits are not of a character that make them at all an inviting class to have near yon, and the people so generally regard them. But in their habits otherwise, they are a docile, industrious peo­ple, and they are now passing from mining into other branches of industry and labor. They are found employed as servants in a great many families and in the kitchens of hotels; they are found as farm hands in the fields; and latterly they are employed by thousands — indeed, I suppose there are from six to seven thousand of them now employed in building the Pacific railroad. They are there found to be very valuable laborers, pa­tient and effective; and, I suppose, before the present year closes, ten or fifteen thousand of them, at least, will be employed on that great work.

The State of California has undertaken, at different times, to pass restrictive statutes as to the Chinese. The State has imposed a tax on their right to work the mines, and collected it ever since the State has been organized — a tax of four dollars a month on each China­man; but the Chinese could afford to pay that and still work in the mines, and they have done so. Various acts have been passed im­posing a poll tax or head tax, a capitation tax, upon their arrival at the port of San Francisco; but all such laws, when tested before the su­preme court of the State of California, the supreme tribunal of that people, have been decided to be unconstitutional and void.

Mr. HOWARD. A very just and constitu­tional decision, undoubtedly.

Mr. CONNESS. Those laws have been tested in our own courts, and when passed under the influence of public feeling there they have been declared again and again by the supreme court of the State of California to be void, violative of our treaty obligations, an interference with the commerce of the nation. Now, then, I beg the honorable Senator from Pennsylvania, though it may be very good cap­ital in an electioneering campaign to declaim against the Chinese, not to give himself any trouble about the Chinese, but to confine him­self entirely to the injurious effects of this pro­vision upon the encouragement of a Gypsy invasion of Pennsylvania. I had never heard myself of the invasion of Pennsylvania by Gyp­sies. I do not know, and I do not know that the honorable Senator can tell us, how many Gypsies the census shows to be within the State of Pennsylvania. The only invasion of Penn­sylvania within my recollection was an inva­sion very much worse and more disastrous to the State, and more to be feared and more feared, than that of Gypsies. It was an inva­sion of rebels, which this amendment, if I un­derstand it aright, is intended to guard against and to prevent the recurrence of. On that occasion I am not aware, I do not remember that the State of Pennsylvania claimed the ex­clusive right of expelling the invaders, but on the contrary my recollection is that Pennsyl­vania called loudly for the assistance of her sister States to aid in the expulsion of those invaders — did not claim it as a State right to exclude them, did not think it was a violation of the sovereign rights of the State when the citizens of New York and New Jersey went to the field in Pennsylvania and expelled those invaders.

But why all this talk about Gypsies and Chi­nese? I have lived in the United States for now many a year, and really I have heard rnore about Gypsies within the last two or three months than I have heard before in my life. It cannot be because they have increased so much of late. It cannot be because they have been felt to be particularly oppressive in this or that locality. It must be that the Gypsy element is to be added to our political agita­tion, so that hereafter the negro alone shall

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not claim our entire attention. Here is a sim­ple declaration that a score or a few score of human beings born in the United States shall be regarded as citizens of the United States, entitled to civil rights, to the right of equal defense, to the right of equal punishment for crime with other citizens; and that such a pro­vision should be deprecated by any person having or claiming to have a high humanity passes all my understanding and comprehen­sion.

Mr. President, let me give an instance here, in this connection, to illustrate the necessity of the civil rights bill in the State of Califor­nia; and I am quite aware that what I shall say will go to California, and I wish it to do so. By the influence of our "southern breth­ren,'' who I will not say invaded California, but who went there in large numbers some years since, and who seized political power in that State and used it, who made our statutes and who expounded our statutes from the bench, negroes were forbidden to testify in the courts of law of that State, and Mongolians were forbidden to testify in the courts; and therefore for many years, indeed, until 1862, the State of California held officially that a man with a black skin could not tell the truth, could not be trusted to give a relation in a court of law of what he saw and what he knew. In 1862 the State Legislature repealed the law as to negroes, but not as to Chinese. Where white men were parties the statute yet remained, depriving the Mongolian of the right to testify in a court of law. What was the consequence of preserving that statute? I will tell you. During the four years of re­bellion a good many of our "southern breth­ren'' in California took upon themselves the occupation of what is there technically called "road agents." It is a term well known and well understood there. They turned out upon the public highways, and became rob­bers, highway robbers; they seized the treas­ure transmitted and conveyed by the express companies, by our stage lines, and in one instance made a very heavy seizure, and claimed that it was done in accordance with the authority of the so-called confederacy. But the authorities of California hunted them down, caught a few of them, and caused them to be hanged, not recognizing the commis­sion of Jeff Davis for those kinds of trans­actions within our bounds. The spirit of insubordination and violation of law, pro­moted and encouraged by rebellion here, affected us so largely that large numbers of — I will not say respectable southern people, and I will not say that it was confined to them alone — but large numbers of persons turned out upon the public highways, so that robbery was so common upon the highways, particu­larly in the interior and in the mountains of that State, that it was not wondered at, but the wonder was for anybody that trav­eled on the highways to escape robbery. The Chinese were robbed with impunity, for if a white man was not present no one coald testify against the offender. They were robbed and plundered and murdered, and no matter how many of them were present and saw the per­petration of those acts, punishment could not follow, for they were not allowed to testify. Now, sir, I am very glad indeed that we have determined at length that every human being may relate what he heard and saw in a court of law when it is required of him, and that our jurors are regarded as of sufficient intelli­gence to put the right value and construction upon what is stated.

So much for what has been said in connec­tion with the application of this provision to the State that I in part represent here. I beg my honorable friend from Pennsylvania to give himself no further trouble on account of the Chinese in California or on the Pacific coast. We are fully aware of the nature of that class of people and their influence among us, and feel entirely able to take care of them and to provide against any evils that may flow from

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their presence among us. We are entirely ready to accept the provision proposed in this constitutional amendment, that the children born here of Mongolian parents shall be de­clared by the Constitution of the United States to be entitled to civil rights and to equal pro­tection before the law with others.

Mr. HOWARD. There is a typographical error in the amendment now under considera­tion. The word "State" in the eleventh line is printed "States." It should be in the singular instead of the plural number, so as to read "all persons born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States and of the State" (not States) "wherein they reside." I move that that correction be made.

Mr. JOHNSON. I suggest to the Senator from Michigan that it stands just as well as it is.

Mr. HOWARD. I wish to correct the error of the printer; it is printed "States" instead of "State."

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The cor­rection will be made.

Mr. JOHNSON. I doubt whether it is an error of the printer.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The ques­tion is on the amendment proposed by the Senator from Wisconsin to the amendment of the Senator from Michigan to the resolution before the Senate.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I moved this amend­ment because it seems to me very clear that there is a large mass of the Indian population who are clearly subject to the jurisdiction of the United States who ought not to be included as citizens of the United States. All the Indians upon reservations within the several States are most clearly subject to our jurisdic­tion, both civil and military. We appoint civil agents who have a control over them in behalf of the Government. We have our mil­itary commanders in the neighborhood of the reservations, who have complete control. For instance, there are seven or eight thousand Navajoes at this moment under the control of General Carlton, in New Mexico, upon the Indian reservations, managed, controlled, fed at the expense of the United States, and fed by the War Department, managed by the War Department, and at a cost to this Government of almost a million and a half of dollars every year. Because it is managed by the War Department, paid out of the commissary fund and out of the appropriations for quartermas­ters' stores, the people do not realize the enor­mous expense which is upon their hands. Are these six or seven thousand Navajoes to be made citizens of the United States? Go into the State of Kansas, and you find there any number of reservations, Indians in all stages, from the wild Indian of the plains, who lives on nothing but the meat of the buffalo, to those Indians who are partially civilized and have partially adopted the habits of civilized life. So it is in other States. In my own State there are the Chippewas, the remnants of the Winnebagoes, and the Pottawatomies. There are tribes in the State of Minnesota and other States of the Union. Are these persons to be regarded as citizens of the United States, and by a constitutional amendment declared to be such, because they are born within the United States and subject to our jurisdic­tion?

Mr. President, the word "citizen," if applied to them, would bring in all the Digger Indians of California. Perhaps they have mostly dis­appeared; the people of California, perhaps, have put them out of the way; but there are the Indians of Oregon and the Indians of the Territories. Take Colorado; there are more Indian citizens of Colorado than there are white citizens this moment if you admit it as a State. And yet by a constitutional amendment you propose to declare the Utes, the Tabahuaches, and all those wild Indians to be citizens of the United States, the great Repub­lic of the world, whose citizenship should be a

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title as proud as that of king, and whose danger is that you may degrade that citizenship.

Mr. President, citizenship, if conferred, car­ries with it, as a matter of course, the rights, the responsibilities, the duties, the immunities, the privileges of citizens, for that is the very object of this constitutional amendment to extend. I do not intend to address the Sen­ate at length on this question now. I have simply raised the question. I think that it would be exceedingly unwise not to adopt this amendment and to put in the Constitution of the United States the broad language proposed. Our fathers certainly did not act in this way, for in the Constitution as they adopted it they excluded the Indians who are not taxed; did not enumerate them, indeed, as a part of the population upon which they based representa­tion and taxation; much less did they make them citizens of the United States.

Mr. President, before the subject of the con­stitutional amendment passes entirely from the Senate, I may desire to avail myself of the opportunity to address the body more at length; but now I simply direct what I have to say to the precise point contained in the amendment which I have submitted.

Mr. FESSENDEN. I rise not to make any remarks on this question, but to say that if there is any reason to doubt that this provision does not cover all the wild Indians, it is a serious doubt; and I should like to hear the opin­ion of the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, who has investigated the civil rights bill so thoroughly, on the subject, or any other gentleman who has looked at it. I had the impression that it would not cover them.

Mr. TRUMBULL. Of course my opinion is not any better than that of any other member of the Senate; but it is very clear to me that there is nothing whatever in the suggestions of the Senator from Wisconsin. The provision is, that ''all persons bom in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are cit­izens." That means "subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof." Now, does the Senator from Wisconsin pretend to say that the Navajoe Indians are subject to the complete juris­diction of the United Slates? What do we mean by "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States?" Not owing allegiance to any­body else. That is, what it means. Can you sue a Navajoe Indian in court? Are theey in any sense subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States? By no means. We make treaties with them, and therefore they are not subject to our jurisdiction. If they were, we would not make treaties with them. If we want to control the Navajoes, or any other Indians of which the Senator from Wisconsin has spoken, how do we do it? Do we pass a law to control them? Are they subject to our juris­diction in that sense? Is it not understood that if we want to make arrangements with the Indians to whom he refers we do it by means of a treaty? The Senator himself has brought before us a great many treaties this session in order to get control of those people.

If you introduce the words "not taxed," that is a very indefinite expression. What does "excluding Indians not taxed" mean? You will have just as much difficulty in regard to those Indians that you say are in Colorado, where there are more Indians than there are whites. Suppose they have property there, and it is taxed; then they are citizens.

Mr. WADE. And ought to be.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Senator from Ohio says they ought to be. If they are there and within the jurisdiction of Colorado, and subject to the laws of Colorado, they ought to be citizens; and that is all that is proposed. It cannot be said of any Indian who owes allegiance, partial allegiance if you please, to some other Govern­ment that he is "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States." Would the Senator from Wisconsin think for a moment of bringing a bill into Congress to subject these wild Indians with whom we have no treaty to the laws and regulations of civilized life? Would he think of punishing them for instituting among them-

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selves their own tribal regulations? Does the Government of the United States pretend to take jurisdiction of murders and robberies and other crimes committed by one Indian upon another? "Are they subject to our jurisdiction in any just sense? They are not subject to our jurisdiction. We do not exercise jurisdiction over them. It is only those persons who come completely within our jurisdiction, who are sub­ject to our laws, that we think of making citi­zens; and there can be no objection to the proposition that such persons should be citi­zens.

It seems to me, sir, that to introduce the words suggested by the Senator from Wisconsin would, not make the proposition any clearer than it is, and that it by no means embraces, or by any fair construction — by any construc­tion, I may say — could embrace the wild Indians of the plains or any with whom we have treaty relations, for the very fact that we have treaty relations with them shows that they are not subject to our jurisdiction. We cannot make a treaty with ourselves; it would be absurd. I think that the proposition is clear and safe as it is.

Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. President, the partic­ular question before the Senate is whether the amendment proposed by the Senator from Wisconsin shall be adopted. But while I am up, and before I proceed to consider the necessity for that amendment, I will say a word or two upon the proposition itself; I mean that part of section one which is recommended as an amendment to the old proposition as it originally stood.

The Senate are not to be informed that very serious questions have arisen, and some of them have given rise to embarrassments, as to who are citizens of the United States, and what are the rights which belong to them as such; and the object of this amendment is to settle that question. I think, therefore, with the commit­tee to whom the matter was referred, and by whom the report has been made, that it is very advisable in some form or other to define what citizenship is; and I know no better way of accomplishing that than the way adopted by the committee. The Constitution as it now stands recognizes a citizenship of the United States. It provides that no person shall be eligible to the Presidency of the United States except a natural-born citizen of the United States or one who was in the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution; it provides that no person shall be eligible to the office of Senator who has not been a citizen of the United States for nine years; but there is no definition in the Constitution as it now stands as to citizenship. Who is a citizen of the United States is an open question. The decision of the courts and the doctrine of the commentators is, that every man who is a citi­zen of a State becomes ipso facto a citizen of the United States; but there is no definition as to how citizenship can exist in the United States except through the medium of a citizen­ship in a State.

Now, all that this amendment provides is, that all persons born in the United States and not subject to some foreign Power — for that, no doubt, is the meaning of the committee who have brought the matter before us — shall be considered as citizens of the United States. That would seem to be not only a wise but a necessary provision. If there are to be citizens of the United States entitled every­where to the character of citizens of the United States there should be some certain definition of what citizenship is, what has created the character of citizen as between himself and the United States, and the amendment says that citizenship may depend upon birth, and I know of no better way to give rise to citizen­ship than the fact of birth within the territory of the United States, born of parents who at the time were subject to the authority of the United States. I am, however, by no means prepared to say, as I think I have intimated before, that being born within the United States, independent of any new constitutional

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provision on the subject, creates the relation of citizen to the United States.

The amendment proposed by my friend from Wisconsin I think, and I submit it to the Sen­ate, should be adopted. The honorable mem­ber from Illinois seems to think it unnecessary, because, according to his interpretation of the amendment as it stands, it excludes those who are proposed to be excluded by the amendment of the Senator from Wisconsin, and he thinks that that is done by saying that those only who are born in the United States are to become citizens thereof, who at the time of birth are "subject to the jurisdiction thereof," and he supposes and states very positively that the Indians are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. With due deference to my friend from Illinois, I think he is in error. They are within the territorial limits of the United States. If they were not, the provision would be altogether inapplicable to them. In one sense, therefore, they are a part of the peo­ple of the United States, and independent of the manner in which we have been dealing with them it would seem to follow necessarily that they are subject to the jurisdiction of the Uni­ted States, as is anybody else who may be born within the limits of the United States. But when the United States took possession — Eng­land for us in the beginning, and our limits have been extended since — of the territory which was originally peopled exclusively by the Indians, we found it necessary to recognize some kind of a national existence on the part of the aboriginal settlers of the United States; but we were under no obligation to do so, and we are under no constitutional obligation to do so now, for although we have been in the habit of making treaties with these several tribes, we have also, from time to time, legislated in re­lation to the Indian tribes. We punish mur­der committed within the territorial limits in which the tribes are to be found. I think we punish the crime of murder committed by one Indian upon another Indian. I think my friend from Illinois is wrong in supposing that that is not done.

Mr. TRUMBULL. Not except where it is done under special provision -- not with the wild Indians of the plains.

Mr. JOHNSON. By special provision of legislation. That I understand. I am refer­ring to that.

Mr. THUMBULL. We propose to make citizens of those brought under our jurisdic­tion in that way. Nobody objects to that, I reckon.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, I do. I am not ob­jecting at all to their being citizens now; what I mean to say, is that over all the Indian tribes within the limits of the United States, the Uni­ted States may — that is the test — exercise juris­diction. Whether they exercise it in point of fact is another question; whether they propose to govern them under the treaty-making power is quite another question; but the question as to the authority to legislate is one, I think, about which, if we were to exercise it, the courts would have no doubt; and when, therefore, the courts come to consider the meaning of this provision, that all persons born within the lim­its of the United States and subject to the juris­diction thereof are citizens, and are called upon to decide whether Indians born within the Uni­ted States, with whom we are now making trea­ties are citizens, I think they will decide that they have become citizens by virtue of this amend­ment. But at any rate, without expressing any decided opinion to that effect, as I would not do when the honorable member from Illinois is so decided in the opposite opinion, when the honorable member from Wisconsin, to say nothing of myself, entertains a reasonable doubt that Indians would be embraced within the provision, what possible harm can there be in guarding against it? It does not affect the constitutional amendment in any way. That is not my purpose, and I presume is not the purpose of my friend from Wisconsin.

The honorable member from Illinois says that the terms which the member from Wis-

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consin proposes to insert would leave it very uncertain. I suppose that my friend from Illi­nois agreed to the second section of this con­stitutional amendment, and these terms are used in that section, in apportioning the repre­sentation, as you propose to do by virtue of the second section, you exclude from the basis "Indians not taxed." What does that mean? The honorable member from Illinois says that that is very uncertain. What does it mean? It means, or would mean if inserted in the first section, nothing, according to the honorable member from Illinois. Well, if it means noth­ing inserted in the first section it means noth­ing where it is proposed to insert it in the second section. But I think my friend from Illinois will find that these words are clearly understood and have always been understood; they are now almost technical terms. They are found, I think, in nearly all the statutes upon the subject; and if I am not mistaken, the particular statute upon which my friend from Illinois so much relied as one necessary to the peace of the country, the civil rights bill, has the same provision in it, and that bill I believe was prepared altogether, or certainly principally, by my friend from Illinois. I read now from the civil rights bill as it passed:

"That all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign Power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens."

What did these words mean? They meant something; and their meaning as they are inserted in that act is the same meaning which will be given to them if they are inserted in the first section of this constitutional amendment. But I conclude by saying that when we are trying to settle this, among other questions, for all time, it is advisable — and if my friend will permit me to say so, our clear duty — to put every provision which we adopt in such plain language as not to be capable of two interpreta­tions, if we can.

When Senators upon the floor maintain the opinion that as it now stands it is capable of an interpretation different from that which the committee mean, and the amend­ment proposed gets clear of that interpretation which the committee do not mean, why should we not adopt it?

I hope, therefore, that the friends — and I am the friend of this provision as far as we have gone in it — that the friends of this constitutional amendment will accept the suggestion of the honorable member from Wisconsin.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Senator from Mary­land certainly perceives a distinction between the use of the words "excluding Indians not taxed'' in the second section and in the first. The second section is confined to the States; it does not embrace the Indians of the plains at all. That is a provision in regard to the apportionment of representation among the several States.

Mr. JOHNSON. The honorable member did not understand me. I did not say it meant the same thing.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I understood the Sen­ator, I think. I know he did not say that the clause in the second section was extended all over the country, but he did say that the words "excluding Indians not taxed" were in the second section, and inasmuch as I had said that those words were of uncertain meaning, therefore, having gone for the words in the second section I was guilty of a great incon­sistency. Now, I merely wish to show the Senator from Maryland that the words in the second section may have a very clear and def­inite meaning, "when in the first section they would have a very uncertain meaning, because they are applied under very different circum­stances. The second section refers to no per­sons except those in the States of the Union; but the first section refers to persons every­where, whether in the States or in the Terri­tories or in the District of Columbia. There­fore the criticism upon the language that I had used, it seems to me, is not a just one.

But the Senator wants to insert the words, "excluding Indians not taxed." I am not willing to make citizenship in this country de-

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pend on taxation. I am not willing, if the Sen­ator from Wisconsin is, that the rich Indian residing in the State of New York shall be a citizen and the poor Indian residing in the State of New York shall not be a citizen. If you put in those words in regard to citizenship, what do you do? You make a distinction in that respect, if you put it on the ground of taxation. We had a discussion on the civil rights bill as to the meaning of these words, "excluding Indians not taxed." The Senator from Maryland, [Mr. Johnson,] I think, on that occasion gave this definition to the phrase "excluding Indians not taxed," that it did not allude to the fact of taxation simply but it meant to describe a class of persons; that is, civilized Indians. I was inclined to fall into that view. I was inclined to adopt the sug­gestion of the Senator from Maryland, that the words "excluding Indians not taxed" did not mean literally excluding those upon whom a tax was not assessed and collected, but rather meant to define a class of persons, meaning civilized Indians; and I think I gave that an­swer to the Senator from Indiana, [Mr. Hendricks,] who was disposed to give it the tech­nical meaning that "Indians not taxed" meant simply those upon whom no tax was laid. If it does mean that, then it would be very objec­tionable to insert those words here, because it would make of a wealthy Indian a citizen and would not make a citizen of one not possessed of wealth under the same circumstances. This is the uncertainty in regard to the meaning of those words. The Senator from Maryland and myself, perhaps, would understand them alike as embracing all Indians who were not civil­ized; and yet, if you insert that language, "Indians not taxed," other persons may not understand them that way; and I remember that the Senator from Indiana was disposed to understand them differently when we had the discussion upon the civil rights bill. There­fore I think it better to avoid these words and that the language proposed in this constitu­tional amendment is better than the language in the civil rights bill. The object to be arrived at is the same.

I have already replied to the suggestion as to the Indians being subject to our jurisdic­tion. They are not subject to our jurisdiction in the sense of owing allegiance solely to the United States; and the Senator from Mary­land, if he will look into our statutes, will search in vain for any means of trying these wild Indians. A person can only be tried for a criminal offense in pursuance of laws, and he must be tried in a district which must have been fixed by law before the crime was com­mitted. We have had in this country and have today, a large region of country within the territorial limits of the United States, un­organized, over which we do not pretend to exercise any civil or criminal jurisdiction, where wild tribes of Indians roam at pleasure, subject to their own laws and regulations, and we do not pretend to interfere with them. They would not be embraced by this provision.

For these reasons I think this language is better than the language employed by the civil rights bill.

Mr. HENDRICKS. Will the Senator from Illinois allow me to ask him a question before he sits down?

Mr. TRUMBULL. Certainly.

Mr. HENDRICKS. I wish to know if, in his opinion, it is not a matter of pleasure on the part of the Government of the United States, and especially of Congress, whether the laws of the United States be extended over the Indians or not; if it is not a matter to be decided by Congress alone whether we treat with the Indians by treaty or govern them by direct law; in other words, whether Congress has not the power at its pleasure to extend the laws of the United States over the Indians and to govern them.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I suppose it would have the same power that it has to extend the laws of the United States over Mexico and govern her if in our discretion we thought proper to

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extend the laws of the United States over the republic of Mexico, or the empire of Mexico, if you please so to call it, and had sufficient physical power to enforce it. I suppose you may say in this case we have the power to do it, but it would be a violation of our treaty obligations, a violation of the faith of this na­tion, to extend our laws over these Indian tribes with whom we have made treaties saying we would not do it.

Mr. FESSENDEN. We could extend it over Mexico in the same way.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I say we could extend it over Mexico just as well; that is, if we have the power to do it. Congress might declare war, or, without declaring war, might extend its laws, or profess to extend them, over Mex­ico, and if we had the power we could enforce that declaration; but I think it would be a breach of good faith on our part to extend the laws of the United States over the Indian tribes with whom we have these treaty stipula­tions, and in which treaties we have agreed that we would not make them subject to the laws of the United States. There are numer­ous treaties of that kind.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. If the Senator will permit me, I wish to remind him of a citation from a decision of the Supreme Court that he himself made here, I think, when the veto of the civil rights bill was under discussion; and if I correctly understood it, as he read it, the Supreme Court decided that these untaxed Indians were subjects, and distinguished be­tween subjects and citizens.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I think there are decis­ions that treat them as subjects in some respects. In some sense they are regarded as within the territorial boundaries of the United States, but I do not think they are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States in any legitimate sense; certainly not in the sense that the language is used here. The language seems to me to be better chosen than it was in the other bill. There is a difficulty about the words, "Indians not taxed." Perhaps one of the reasons why I think so is because of the persistency with which the Senator from Indi­ana himself insisted that the phrase "excluding Indians not taxed," the very words which the Senator from Wisconsin wishes to insert here, would exclude everybody that did not pay a tax; that that was the meaning of it; we must take it literally. The Senator from Maryland did not agree to that, nor did I; but if the Sen­ator from Indiana was right, it would receive a construction which I am sure the Senator from Wisconsin would not be for: for if these Indians come within our limits and within our jurisdiction and are civilized, he would just as soon make a citizen of a poor Indian as of the rich Indian.

Mr. HENDRICKS. I expected the Senator from Illinois, being a very able lawyer, at the head of the Judiciary Committee, to meet the question that I asked him and to answer it as a question of law, and not as a question of military power. I did not ask him the ques­tion whether the Government of the United States had the military power to go into the Indian territory and subjugate the Indians to the political power of the country; nor had he a right to understand the question in that sense. I asked him the question whether, under the Constitution, under the powers of this Govern­ment, we may extend our laws over the Indi­ans and compel obedience, as a matter of legal right, from the Indians. If the Indian is bound to obey the law he is subject to the jurisdiction of the country; and that is the question I desired the Senator to meet as a legal ques­tion, whether the Indian would be bound to obey the law which Congress in express terms extended over him in regard to questions within the jurisdiction of Congress.

Now, sir, this question has once or twice been decided by the Attorney General, so far as he could decide it. In 1855 he was inquired of whether the laws of the United Slates regu­lating the intercourse with the Indian tribes, by the general legislation in regard to Oregon,

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had been extended to Oregon; and he gave it as his opinion that the laws had been extended to Oregon, and regulated the intercourse between the white people and the Indians there. Subsequently, the Attorney General was asked whether Indians were citizens of the United States in such sense as that they could become the owners of the public lands where the right to acquire them was limited to citizens; and in the course of that opinion he says that the Indian is not a citizen of the United States by virtue of his birth, but that he is a subject. He says:

"The simple truth is plain that the Indians are the subjects of the United States, and therefore are not, in mere right of home-birth, citizens of the United States. The two conditions are incompatible. The moment it comes to be seen that the Indians are domestic subjects of this Government, that moment it is clear to the perception that they are not the sovereign constituent ingredients of the Government. This distinction between citizens proper, that is, the constituent members of the political sovereignty, and subjects of that sovereignty, who are not therefore citizens, is recognized in the best authorities of public law."

He then cites some authorities. Again, he says:

Not being citizens of the United States by mere birth, can they become so by naturalization? Undoubtedly.

"But they cannot become citizens by naturalization under existing general acts of Congress. (2 Kent's Commentaries, page 72.)

"Those acts apply only to foreigners, subjects of another allegiance. The Indians are not foreigners, and they are in our allegiance without being citizens of the United States."

Mr. JOHNSON. Whose opinion is that?

Mr. HENDRICKS. That is the opinion of Mr. Gushing, given on the 5th of July, 1856. I did not intend to discuss this question, but I will make one further reply to the Senator from Illinois. When the civil rights bill was under consideration I was of the opinion that the term "not taxed" meant not taxed; and when words are plain in the law I take them in their natural sense. When there is no ambiguity the law says there shall be no construction; and when you say a man is not taxed I presume it means that he is not taxed. I do not know any words that express the meaning more clearly than the words themselves, and therefore I cannot express the meaning in any more apt words than the words used by the Senator from Wisconsin, "Indians not taxed." When I said that that was making citizenship to rest upon property I recollect, or I think I do, the indignant terms in which the Senator from Illinois then replied, conveying the idea that it was a demagogical argument, in this body to speak of a subject like that; and yet today he says to the Senator from Wisconsin that it is not a statesmanlike proposition. He makes the same point upon the Senator from Wisconsin which he undertook to make upon me on the civil rights bill. If it is the pleasure of Congress to make the wild Indians of the desert citizens, and then if three fourths of the States agree to it. I presume we will get along the best way we can; and what shall then be the relations between these people and the United States will be for us and for our descendants to work out. They are not now citizens; they are subjects. For safety, as a matter of policy we regulate our intercourse with them to a large extent by treaties, so as that they shall assent to the regulations that govern them. That is a matter of policy, but we need not treat with an Indian. We can make him obey our laws, and being liable to such obedience he is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. I did not intend to discuss this question, but I got into it by the inquiry I made of the Senator from Illinois.

Mr. HOWARD. I hope, sir, that this amendment will not be adopted. I regard the language of the section as sufficiently certain and definite. If amended according to the suggestion of the honorable Senator from Wisconsin it will read as follows: All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, excluding Indians not taxed, are citizens of the United States, and of the State wherein they reside.

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Suppose we adopt the amendment as suggested by the honorable Senator from Wisconsin, in what condition will it leave us as to the Indian tribes wherever they are found? According to the ideas of the honorable Senator, as I understand them, this consequence would follow: all that would remain to be done on the part of any State would be to impose a tax upon the Indians, whether in their tribal condition or otherwise, in order to make them citizens of the United States. Does the honorable Senator from Wisconsin contemplate that? Does he propose to leave this amendment in such a condition that the State of Wisconsin, which he so ably represents here, will have the right to impose taxes upon the Indian tribes within her limits, and thus make of these Indians constituting the tribes, no matter how numerous, citizens of the United States and of the State of Wisconsin? That would be the direct effect of his amendment if it should be adopted. It would, in short, be a naturalization, whenever the States saw fit to impose a tax upon the Indians, of the whole Indian race within the limits of the States.

Mr. CLARK. The Senator will permit me to suggest a case. Suppose the State of Kansas, for instance, should tax her Indians for five years, they would be citizens.

Mr. HOWARD. Undoubtedly.

Mr. CLARK. But if she refuse to tax them for the next ten years how would they be then? Would they be citizens or not?

Mr. HOWARD. I take it for granted that when a man becomes a citizen of the United States under the Constitution he cannot cease to be a citizen, except by expatriation or the commission of some crime by which his citizenship shall be forfeited.

Mr. CLARK. If it depends upon taxation.

Mr. HOWARD. The continuance of the quality of citizenship would not, I think, depend upon the continuance of taxation.

Mr. CLARK. But still he would be an "Indian not taxed."

Mr. HOWARD. He has been taxed once.

Mr. CLARK. The point I wish to bring the Senator to is this: would not the admission of a provision of that kind make a sort of shifting use of the Indians?

Mr. HOWARD. It might, depending upon the construction which would happen to be given by the courts to the language of the Constitution. The great objection, therefore, to the amendment is, that it is an actual naturalization, whenever the State sees fit to enact a naturalization law in reference to the Indians in the shape of the imposition of a tax, of the whole Indian population within their limits. There is no evading this consequence, but still I cannot impute to the honorable Senator from Wisconsin a purpose like that. I think he has misapprehended the effect of the language which he suggests. I think the language as it stands is sufficiently certain and exact. It is that "all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."

I concur entirely with the honorable Senator from Illinois, in holding that the word "jurisdiction," as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States, coextensive in all respects with the constitutional power of the United States, whether exercised by Congress, by the executive, or by the judicial department; that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now. Certainly, gentlemen cannot contend that an Indian belonging to a tribe, although born within the limits of a State, is subject to this full and complete jurisdiction. That question has long since been adjudicated, so far as the usage of the Government is concerned. The Government of the United States have always regarded and treated the Indian tribes within our limits as foreign Powers, so far as the treaty-making power is concerned, and so far especially as the commercial power is con-

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cerned, for in the very Constitution itself there is a provision that Congress shall have power to regulate commerce, not only with foreign nations and among the States, but also with the Indian tribes. That clause, in my judgment, presents a full and complete recognition of the national character of the Indian tribes, the same character in which they have been recognized ever since the discovery of the continent and its occupation by civilized men; the same light in which the Indians were viewed and treated by Great Britain from the earliest commencement of the settlement of the continent. They have always been regarded, even in our ante-revolutionary history, as being independent nations, with whom the other nations of the earth have held treaties, and in no case, I believe, has either the Government of Great Britain or of the United States recognized the right of an individual Indian to transfer or convey lands.Why? If he was a citizen, in other words, if he was not a subject of a foreign Power, if he did not belong to a tribe whose common law is that land as well as almost every other description of property shall be held in common among the members of the tribe, subject to a chief, why is it that the reservation has been imposed and always observed upon the act of conveyance on the part of the Indian?

A passage has been read from an opinion given by Mr. Attorney General Gushing on this subject, in which, it seems to me, he takes great liberties with the Constitution in speaking of the Indian as being a subject of the United States. Certainly I do not so hold; I cannot so hold, because it has been the habit of the Government from the begiuning to treat with the Indian tribes as sovereign Powers. The Indians are our wards. Such is the language of the courts. They have a national independence. They have an absolute right to the occupancy of the soil upon which they reside; and the only ground of claim which the United States has ever put forth to the proprietorship of the soil of an Indian territory is simply the right of preemption; that is, the right of the United States to be the first purchaser from the Indian tribes. We have always recognized in an Indian tribe the same sovereignty over the soil which it occupied as we recognize in a foreign nation of a power in itself over its national domains. They sell the lands to us by treaty, and they sell the lands as the sovereign Power owning, holding, and occupying the lands.

But it is useless, it seems to me, Mr. President, to enlarge further upon the question of the real political power of Indians or of Indian tribes. Our legislation has always recognized them as sovereign Powers. The Indian who is still connected by his tribal relation with the government of his tribe is subject for crimes committed against the laws or usages of the tribe to the tribe itself, and not to any foreign or other tribunal. I believe that has been the uniform course of decision on that subject. The United States courts have no power to punish an Indian who is connected with a tribe for a crime committed by him upon another member of the same tribe.

Mr. FESSENDEN. Within the territory.

Mr. HOWARD. Yes, sir. Why? Because the jurisdiction of the nation intervenes and ousts what would otherwise be perhaps a right, of jurisdiction of the United States. But the great objection to the amendment to the amendment is that it is an unconscious attempt on the part of my friend from Wisconsin to naturalize all the Indians within the limits of the United States. I do not agree to that. I am not quite so liberal in my views. I am not yet prepared to pass a sweeping act of naturalization by which all the Indian savages, wild or tame, belonging to a tribal relation, are to become my fellow-citizens and go to the polls and vote with me and hold lands and deal in every other way that a citizen of the United States has a right to do.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, the Senator from Michigan declares his purpose to be

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not to include these Indians within this constitutional amendment. In purpose I agree with him. I do not intend to include them. My purpose is to exclude them; and the question between us is whether his language includes them and mine excludes them, or whether his language excludes them and mine includes them. The Senator says, in the first place, if the words which are suggested by me, "Indians not taxed," are to govern, any State has it in its power to naturalize the Indian tribes within its limits and bring them in as citizens. Can a State tax them unless they are subject to the State? Certainly not. My friend from Michigan will not contend that an Indian can be taxed if he is not subject to the State or to the United States; and yet, if they are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States they are declared by the very language of his amendment to be citizens.

Now, sir, the words which I have used are borrowed from the Constitution as it stands — the Constitution adopted by our fathers. We have lived under it for seventy years; and these words, "Indians not taxed," are the very words which were used by our fathers in forming the Constitution as descriptive of a certain class of Indians which should not be enumerated as a part of our population, as distinguished from another class which should be enumerated as a part of our population; and these are words of description used by them under which we have acted for seventy years and more. They have come to have a meaning that is understood as descriptive of a certain class of Indians that may be enumerated within our population as a part, of the citizens of the United States, to constitute a part of the basis of the political power of the United States, and others not included within it are to be excluded from that basis. The courts of the United States have had occasion to speak on this subject, and from time to time they have declared that the Indians are subjects of the United States, not citizens; and that is the very word in your amendment where they are "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States. Why, sir, what does it mean when you say that a people are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States? Subject, first, to its military power; second, subject to its political power; third, subject to its legislative power; and who doubts our legislative power over the reservations upon which these Indians are settled? Speaking upon that subject, I have to say that one of the most distinguished men who ever sat in this body, certainly that have sat in this body since I have been a member of it, the late Senator from Vermont, Judge Collamer, time and again urged upon me, as a member of the Committee on Indian Affairs, to bring forward a scheme of legislation by which we should pass laws and subject all the Indians in all the Territories of the United States to the legislation of Congress direct. The Senator from Ohio not now in his seat [Mr. SHERMAN] has contended for the same thing, and other members of Congress contend that the very best policy of dealing with the Indian tribes is to subject them at once to our legislative power and jurisdiction. "Subjects of the United States!" Why, sir, they are completely our subjects, completely in our power. We hold them as our wards. They are living upon our bounty.

Mr. President, there is one thing that I doubt not Senators must have forgotten. In all those vast territories which we acquired from Mexico, we took the sovereignty and the jurisdiction of the soil and the country from Mexico, just as Mexico herself had held it, just as Spain had held it before the Mexican republic was established; and what was the power that was held by Spain and by Mexico over the Indian tribes? They did not recognize even the possessory title of an Indian in one foot of the jurisdiction of those territories. In reference to the Indians of California, we have never admitted that they had sufficient jurisdiction over any part of its soil to make a treaty with them, The Senate of the United

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States expressly refused to make treaties with the Indians of California, on the ground that they had no title and no jurisdiction whatever in the soil; they were absolutely subject to the authority of the United States, which we derived from our treaty with Mexico.

The opinion of Attorney General Gushing, one of the ablest men who has ever occupied the position of Attorney General, has been read here, in which he states clearly that the Indians, though born upon our soil, owing us allegiance, are not citizens; they are our subjects; and that is the very word which is used in this amendment proposed to the Constitution of the United States, declaring that if they be "subject" to our jurisdiction, born on our soil, they are, ipso facto, citizens of the United States.

Mr. President, the celebrated civil rights bill which has been passed during the present Congress, which was the forerunner of this constitutional amendment, and to give validity to which this constitutional amendment is brought forward, and which without this constitutional amendment to enforce it has no validity so far as this question is concerned, uses the following language:

"That all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign Power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States."

Why should this language be criticised any more now, when it is brought forward here in this constitutional amendment, than when it was in the civil rights bill? Why should the language be more criticised here than it is in the second section of this constitutional amendment, where the same words are used? The second section, in apportioning representation, proposes to count the whole number of persons in each State, "excluding Indians not taxed." Why not insert those words in the first section as well as in the second? Why not insert them in this constitutional amendment as well as in the civil rights bill? The civil rights bill undertook to do this same thing. It undertook to declare that "all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign Power, excluding Indians not taxed", are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States." But, sir, the committee of fifteen, fearing that this declaration by Congress was without validity unless a constitutional amendment should be brought forward to enforce it, have thought proper to report this amendment.

Mr. FESSENDEN. I want to say to the honorable Senator, who has a great regard for truth, that he is drawing entirely upon his imagination. There is not one word of correctness in all that he is saying, not a particle, not a scintilla, not the beginning of truth.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I take a little issue with my friend from Maine on that point as a question of fact.

Mr. FESSENDEN. In the first place, this was not brought forward by the committee of fifteen at all.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. This proposition was first introduced into the House by a gentleman from Ohio by the name of BINGHAM.

Mr. FESSENDEN. I thought the Senator was speaking of this first part of the section, the amendment, not the whole.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. No, sir; that is proposed by the Senator from Michigan. As I understand, a member from Ohio, Mr. BINGHAM, who in a very able speech in the House maintained that the civil rights bill was without any authority in the Constitution, brought forward a proposition in the House of Representatives to amend the Constitution so as to enable Congress to declare the civil rights of all persons, and that constitutional amendment, Mr. BINGHAM being himself one of the committee of fifteen, was referred by the House to that committee, and from the committee it has been reported. I say I have a right to infer that it was because Mr. BINGHAM and others of the House of Representatives and other persons upon the committee had doubts, at least, as to

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the constitutionality of the civil rights bill that this proposition to amend the Constitution now appears to give it validity and force. It is not an imputation upon any one.

Mr. GRIMES. It is an imputation upon every member who voted for the bill, the inference being legitimate and logical that they violated their oaths and knew they did so when they voted for the civil rights bill.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. The Senator goes too far. What I say is that they had doubts.

Mr. FESSENDEN. I will say to the Senator one thing: whatever may have been Mr. BINGHAM'S motives in bringing it forward, he brought it forward some time before the civil rights bill was considered at all and had it referred to the committee, and it was discussed in the committee long before the civil rights bill was passed. Then I will say to him further, that during all the discussion in the committee that I heard nothing was ever said about the civil rights bill in connection with that. It was placed on entirely different grounds.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I will ask the Senator from Maine this question: if Congress, under the Constitution now has the power to declare that "all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign Power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States," what is the necessity of amending the Constitution at all on this subject?

Mr. FESSENDEN. I do not choose that the Senator shall get off from the issue he presented. I meet him right there on the first issue. If he wants my opinion upon other questions, he can ask it afterward. He was saying that the committee of fifteen brought this proposition forward for a specific object.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I said the committee of fifteen brought it forward because they had doubts as to the constitutional power of Congress to pass the civil rights bill.

Mr. FESSENDEN. Exactly; and I say, in reply, that if they had doubts, no such doubts were stated in the committee of fifteen, and the matter was not put on that ground at all. There was no question raised about the civil rights bill.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Then I put the question to the Senator: if there are no doubts, why amend the Constitution on that subject?

Mr. FESSENDEN. That question the Senator may answer to suit himself. It has no reference to the civil rights bill.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. That does not meet the case at all if my friend maintains that at this moment the Constitution of the United States, without amendment, gives all the power you ask, why do you put this new amendment into it on that subject?

Mr. HOWARD. If the Senator from Wisconsin wishes an answer, I will give him one such as I am able to give.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I was asking the Senator from Maine.

Mr. HOWARD. I was a member of the same committee, and the Senator's observations apply to me equally with the Senator from Maine. We desired to put this question of citizenship and the rights of citizens and freedmen under the civil rights bill beyond the legislative power of such gentlemen as the Senator from Wisconsin, who would pull the whole system up by the roots and destroy it, and expose the freedmen again to the oppressions of their old masters.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. The Senator has made his answer, I suppose.

Mr. HOWARD. Yes, sir.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, when the Senator undertakes to say that I have any disposition to subject the freedmen to the despotism of their old masters, he says that which there is not a particle of foundation or excuse for saying. I say to that Senator —

Mr. HOWARD. I beg the Senator to allow me one word. I made no personal imputation against the Senator from Wisconsin.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I desire to finish my sentence before being interrupted.

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Mr. HOWARD. I will not be forced by the Senator into a false position.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I do not desire to be interrupted until I finish one sentence. I say to that Senator that so far as the rights of the freedmen are concerned, I am willing to compare my course of action in this body or elsewhere with his. I say to that Senator that I labored as hard as he has labored to secure the rights and liberties of the freedmen, to emancipate the slaves of the South, and to put an end forever not only to slavery, but to the aristocracy that was founded upon it; and I have never, by word or deed, said or done anything, as a member of this body or elsewhere, tending to build up any oppression against the freedmen, tending to destroy any of their rights. I say to that honorable Senator, and I am ready at any time to meet him in argument upon it although it is drawing me now from the question in dispute, that I myself prepared and introduced here and urged a bill whose provisions defended every right of the freedmen just as much as the bill to which we have now made reference, and I am prepared to do so and to defend their rights with the whole power of the Government.

But, sir, the Senator has drawn me off from the immediate question before the Senate. The immediate question is, whether the language which he uses, "all persons subject to the jurisdiction of the United States," includes these Indians. I maintain that it does; and, therefore, for the purpose of relieving it from any doubt, for the purpose of excluding this class of persons, as they are, in my judgment, utterly unfit to be citizens of the United States, I have proposed this amendment, which I borrow from the Constitution as it stands, which our fathers adopted more than seventy years ago, which I find also in the civil rights bill which passed this present Congress, and which I find also in the second section of this constitutional amendment when applied to the enumeration of the inhabitants of the States. I insist that it is just, proper in every way, but reasonable, that we exclude the wild Indians from being regarded or held as citizens of the United States.

Mr. WILLIAMS. I would not agree to this proposed constitutional amendment if I supposed it made Indians not taxed citizens of the United States. But I am satisfied that, giving to the amendment a fair and reasonable construction, it does not include Indians not taxed. The first and second sections of this proposed amendment are to be taken together, are to be construed together, and the meaning of the word "citizens," as employed in both sections, is to be determined from the manner in which that word is used in both of those sections. Section one provides that —

All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

If there be any doubt about the meaning of that paragraph, I think that doubt is entirely removed by the second section, for by the second section of this constitutional amendment Indians not taxed are not counted at all in the basis of representation. The words in the second section are as follows:

Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within the Union, according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed.

They are not to be regarded as persons to be counted under any circumstances. Indians not taxed are not even entitled to be counted as persons in the basis of representation under any circumstances; and then the section provides —

But whenever, in any State, the elective franchise shall be denied to any portion of its male inhabitants, being citizens of the United States, &c.

Now, can any reasonable man conclude that the word "citizens" there applies to Indians not taxed, or includes Indians not taxed, when they are expressly excluded from the basis of representation and cannot even be taken into the enumeration of persons upon

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whom representation is to be based? I think it is perfectly clear, when you put the first and second sections together, that Indians not taxed are excluded from the term "citizens;" because it cannot be supposed for one moment that the term "citizens," as employed in these two sections, is intended to apply to Indians who are not even counted under any circumstances as a part of the basis of representation. I therefore think that the amendment of the Senator from Wisconsin is clearly unnecessary. I do not believe that ''Indians not taxed" are included, and I understand that to be a description of Indians who maintain their tribal relations and who are not in all respects subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

In one sense, all persons born within the geographical limits of the United States are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, but they are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States in every sense. Take the child of an ambassador. In one sense, that child born in the United States is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, because if that child commits the crime of murder, or commits any other crime against the laws of the country, to a certain extent he is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, but not in every respect; and so with these Indians. All persons living within a judicial district may be said, in one sense, to be subject to the jurisdiction of the court in that district, but they are not in every sense subject to the jurisdiction of the court until they are brought, by proper process, within the reach of the power of the court. I understand the words here, "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States," to mean fully and completely subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. If there was any doubt as to the meaning of those words, I think that doubt is entirely removed and explained by the words in the subsequent section; and believing that, in any court or by any intelligent person, these two sections would be construed not to include Indians not taxed, I do not think the amendment is necessary.

Mr. SAULSBURY. I do not presume that any one will pretend to disguise the fact that the object of this first section is simply to declare that negroes shall be citizens of the United States. There can be no other object in it, I presume, than a further extension of the legislative kindness and beneficence of Congress toward that class of people. "The poor Indian, whose untutored mind, sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind," was not thought of. I say this not meaning it to be any reflection upon the honorable committee who reported the amendment, because for all the gentlemen composing it I have a high respect personally; but that is evidently the object. I have no doubt myself of the correctness of the position, as a question of law, taken by the honorable Senator from Wisconsin; but, sir, I feel disposed to vote against his amendment, because if these negroes are to be made citizens of the United States, I can see no reason in justice or in right why the Indians should not be made citizens. If our citizens are to be increased in this wholesale manner, I cannot turn my back upon that persecuted race, among whom are many intelligent, educated men, and embrace as fellow-citizens the negro race. I therefore, as at present advised, for the reasons I have given, shall vote against the proposition of my friend from Wisconsin, although I believe, as a matter of law, that his statements are correct.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Wisconsin to the amendment proposed by the Senator from Michigan.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I ask for the yeas and nays on that question.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I desire to have the amendment to the amendment read. The Secretary read the amendment to the amendment, which was to insert after the word

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"thereof" in the amendment the words "excluding Indians not taxed;" so that the amendment, if amended, would read :

All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, excluding Indians not taxed, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

The question being taken by yeas and nays, resulted-yeas 10, nays 30; as follows:

YEAS — Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Doolittle, Guthvie, Hcndricks, Johnson, McDougall, Norton, and Riddle —10.

NAYS — Messrs. Anthony, Clark, Conn ess, Cragin, Creswell, Edmunds, Fessonden, Foster, Grimes, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Kirkwqod, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Stewart, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Willey. Williams, and Wilson — 30.

ABSENT — Messrs. Brown, Chandler, Dixon, Lane of Indiana, Nesmith, Saulsbury, Sprague, Wright, and Yates — 9.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question now is on the amendment of the Senator from Michigan.

The amendment was agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The next amendment proposed by the Senator from Michigan [Mr. HOWARD] will be read.

The Secretary read the amendment, which was in section two, line twenty-two, after the word "male,"to strike out the word "citizens" and insert "inhabitants, being citizens of the United States;" so as to make the section read:

SEC. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within the Union, according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But whenever, in any State, the elective franchise shall be denied to any portion of its male inhabitants, being citizens of the United States, not less than twenty-one years pf age, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation in such State shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens not less than twenty-one years of age.

Mr. JOHNSON. Is it supposed that that amendment changes the section as it was before? It appears to me to be the same as it was before, because, although the word "inhabitants" is used, it is in connection with the other words that they are to be citizens of the United States. As it originally stood it read:

But whenever, in any State, the elective franchise shall be denied to any portion of its male citizens.

Mr. FESSENDEN. The object is the same as in the amendment already made, to prevent a State from saying that although a person is a citizen of the United States he is not a citizen of the State.

Mr. HOWARD. The object is to make section two conform to section one, to make them harmonize.

Mr. JOHNSON. I am satisfied.

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. SAULSBURY. Is it in order now to offer an amendment to the first section?

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. There are several more amendments before the Senate, offered by the Senator from Michigan, [Mr. HOWARD], not yet acted upon. The next amendment offered by him will be read.

The Secretary read the amendment, which was to add at the end of section two the words "in such State."

The amendment was agreed to.

The next amendment was to insert as section three the following:

SEC. 8. That no person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State Legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Mr. HENDRICKS. I move to amend the amendment by inserting after the word "shall" in the thirty-seventh line the words "during the term of his office." I presume I understand

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the idea upon which this section rests. It is, I suppose, that men who held office, and upon assuming the office took the oath prescribed by the Constitution, became obligated by that oath to stand by the Constitution and the oath, and that going into the rebellion was not only a breach of their alleigance, but a breach of their oath. I presume that is the theory of it; and that persons who have violated the oath to support the Constitution of the United States ought not to be allowed to hold any office. If it does not rest upon that proposition,then I am not able to;see why these men should be excluded more than others who have violated their allegiance. Now, sir, what is the obligation prescribed in the sixth article of the Constitution?

"The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Constitution."

I presume that that oath means that in the discharge of the duties of the office the party will support the Constitution of the United States. I have not examined any authorities upon this subject, and have seen no opinion expressed upon it, but I presume that is the meaning and force of the oath. When a Senator of the United States takes the oath to support the Constitution of the United States, it means that, as a Senator, in the discharge of his official duty, he will obey the Constitution, and in no respect violate its provisions. If a member of a State Legislature takes that oath, I presume it means that as a legislator for the State he will respect and obey the Constitution, and when his term of office has expired I suppose the oath ceases to be obligatory upon him, or, rather, that the oath has done its work. If he has obeyed the oath while he held the office. I presume his obedience to it is no longer required by virtue of the oath itself. Everybody, by virtue of his allegiance, is bound to obey the Constitution of the United States, to stand by the Union. But this oath of itself is an oath of office binding upon him as an officer, else why is it that if a Senator taking this oath, serves six years and is reflected, he is sworn again? For the simple reason that he is entering upon another term of service, and for that term of service he must take this official oath to obey the Constitution of the United States. I presume this oath means as if it read, "Senators and Representatives and all other officers in the United States and in the States shall be bound by an oath or affirmation to support the Constitution of the United States in their offices." I know of no other purpose that there can be to require a special oath from an officer.

If this be the proper construction of the oath — and I do not express an opinion upon the subject with a great deal of confidence — then the amendment which I propose to this section ought to be adopted, because after the term of service has expired in any particular office the official oath is satisfied, and the party becomes one of the mass of the community, and if he went into the rebellion he went into it violating his allegiance, like any and all other citizens who with him went into the rebellion. It is for that reason that I propose the amendment.

Mr. HOWARD. I hope this amendment will not be adopted. I do not regard the constitutional oath referred to by the Senator from Indiana precisely in the same light in which he presents it. If I understand him rightly, he holds that although a person may have taken that constitutional oath, if he has not committed insurrection during the continuance of his term of office, but commits that act after the expiration of that term, the previous taking of the oath by him adds to the act no additional moral guilt. I do not concur with him in that view. It seems to me that where a person has taken a solemn oath to support the Constitution of the United States there is a fair moral implication that he cannot afterward commit an act which in its effect would destroy the

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Constitution of the United States without incurring the guilt of at least moral perjury. I desire to see such a comment made upon this violation of the oath of office by insurgents as will stigmatize that act for all time to come, and I think the loyal people of the United States are of the same opinion.

Mr. SAULSBURY. I had supposed that the Senate would adopt this amendment without any discussion. The proposition of the Senator from Indiana, in my judgment, is so plain that I did not suppose it could have been questioned, that the oath a person takes when he enters upon the exercise of an office, or as preparatory to the discharge of the duties of an office, relates simply and solely to that office and does not extend beyond it. I never heard the interpretation of the oath of office as given by the Senator from Indiana questioned before. I shall therefore vote for his amendment.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. If I understand the language and effect of this amendment, it is intended to debar those who were under that oath of office at the time they went into rebellion from hereafter holding office either under the State or national Government. I certainly concur with the Senator from Indiana, that the binding force of an official oath only continues as long as the term of the office. If it is the intention to exclude from these privileges any one who has ever held an office under the national Government or the State governments, then the language of the section is correct as it is; but if it is jntended to confine it to those who were at the moment of separating themselves from the Government and going over to the rebellion under the obligation of an oath to support the Constitution, then I think the amendment offered by the Senator from Indiana should be adopted. We all admit that the obligation to support the Constitution is as binding on every citizen of the United States as an oath can make it, and that in fact oaths in most cases are of no effect except to have a most solemn acknowledgment of the duty that the oath seems to many to impose; but it does add something to the guilt of the party that at the time he engaged in rebellion he was actually under the obligation of an oath to support the Constitution. I shall favor the amendment if the object is to exclude those who were in the actual exercise of these offices, and therefore under the binding force of their official oaths, at the moment that they embarked in the rebellion. Whatever view the majority have of it of course should govern the language employed; but understanding that the word "oath" is here introduced to designate that class of persons, I shall vote with the Senator from Indiana for his amendment. It would have been sufficient, if the other view was to prevail, to have said that no one who had ever held office under the General or State government should have these privileges, and then there would be no necessity of course for introducing this amendment. I hope that it will prevail, because, while it will exclude a very great many it will still leave some to hold office in the southern States, especially in those States where they will have very few qualified persons, and where many, we may infer, have a less degree of guilt at least than those whom this amendment will exclude.

Mr. JOHNSON. I am opposed to the amendment as proposed by the committee, and shall vote, therefore, for the amendment suggested by the member from Indiana, because the former excludes too many persons from eligibility to office. All history shows, as I think, that on the conclusion of a civil war, the more mild, consistently with the safety of the country, the measures are which are adopted the better for the restoration of entire peace and harmony.

The effect of the amendment of the committee will be to embrace nine tenths, perhaps, of the gentlemen of the South, to disfranchise them until Congress shall think proper by a majority of two thirds of each branch to remove the restriction. I have no idea that with

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a provision like this, the constitutional amendment will receive the sanction of any southern State, for if the suggestion of the member from Indiana is not adopted then all who have at any time held any office under the United States or who have been in any branch of the Legislature of a State, which they could not be without taking the oath required by the Constitution of the United States, are to be excluded from holding the office of Senator or Representative or that of an elector for President, or any office, civil or military, under the United States; and not satisfied with that, all who have held office under any State, military or civil, legislative or judicial, are to fall within the inhibition.

Mr. FESSENDEN. Those who have been members of a State Legislature.

Mr. JOHNSON. And all that have held judicial office. They are all obliged to take the oath.

Mr. FESSENDEN. The Senator will observe it is following the constitutional provision.

Mr. JOHNSON. I know it is. But all the members of the State Legislature, all the judicial officers of the State, are compelled to take the oath prescribed by the Constitution of the United States; and I suppose it is fair to estimate that persons will be excluded who held office twenty and thirty years ago, as well as those who held office at the time the rebellion broke out. Now, I put it to Senators to say whether they think that these southern States will, with such a restriction as that, accept this constitutional amendment. If the amendment was in separate articles, so that each article might be acted upon separately by the States, the rejection of some of the articles would not be so fatal, perhaps, as will be a rejection ofthe whole. Suppose the whole is rejected, and it must be if any part is, where are we? Just where we are now. Where are we now? As far as arms are concerned, peace has returned; as far as harmony is concerned, peace is apparently as far off as ever; and what is to be the effect upon the prosperity of the States which are to be kept in this condition of thrall-dom? Who will go as immigrants into the southern States? Who will invest their capital, who will engage in the cultivation of cotton and of rice and of sugar? And just in proportion as these products are lessened, just so in proportion is the prosperity of the whole country delayed.

I have had occasion to say more than once, and the idea is so fully impressed upon my mind that I hope the Senate will excuse me for reiterating it, that we ought to consider, it is due to justice to consider, it is due to generosity and magnanimity to consider, that many of the men who will be excluded by this constitutional amendment from sharing in the honors of the country believed that the Constitution as it stood gave them the right to secede. Illegal as the notion was in my judgment, yet some of the brightest intellects in the country, North as well as South, maintained the same doctrine; and the war, therefore, in which we have been engaged was not a war like the civil wars which have existed in other countries. It was a war growing out of a difference of constitutional opinion, to say nothing of anything else. The opinion entertained by the South was as honest as was the opinion entertained by the North -- wrong, dangerous, unconstitutional, inconsistent as I think it is with the continuance of any Union to be formed out of the States of the United States, but still honestly entertained. Now they have become satisfied by the result of the conflict that their doctrine was one which could not be maintained and never will be suffered to exist as long as the people of the United States are true to the interest and the prosperity and renown of the country.

Why, then, should we exclude the numerous class that will be excluded by this provision? Do you not want to act upon the public opinion of the masses of the South? Do you not want to win them back to loyalty? And if you do,

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why strike at the men who, of all others, are most influential and can bring about the end which we all have at heart? That my friend from Indiana properly construes the obligation of that oath I have no doubt. I think every lawyer in the Senate would say, every statesman within the sound of my voice would say, that for no act done after the termination of the official term of the officer, inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States, by him who had been the incumbent of the office, could he be indicted for perjury; and if he could not be indicted for perjury, it could only be because the legal obligation of the path — I am not speaking now of the moral obligation — expired at the termination of the term of office to which the party had been elected or appointed.

Then as to the moral obligation, what does it add to the force of that moral obligation which allegiance as between the Government and the party owing the allegiance creates? Treason has been committed against the United States, according to the letter of the law and according to our understanding of the law; but it is neither more nor less treason, it is not a milder or more aggravated type of treason, because the parties who may have committed it may at some time or other have taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States. If any man was indicted who had not taken that oath, he could not be permitted to urge in his defense or in extenuation of his crime that he had never taken an oath to support the Constitution.

But this amendment does not go far enough. I suppose the framers of the amendment thought it was necessary to provide for such an exigency. I do not see but that any one of these gentlemen may be elected President or Vice President of the United States, and why did you omit to exclude them? I do not understand them to be excluded from the privilege of holding the two highest offices in the gift of the nation. No man is to be a Senator or Representative or an elector for President or Vice President —

Mr. MORRILL. Let me call the Senator's attention to the words "or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States."

Mr. JOHNSON. Perhaps I am wrong as to the exclusion from the Presidency; no doubt I am; but I was misled by noticing the specific exclusion in the case of Senators and Representatives. But I submit to the Senate whether it is advisable, whether it is politic, looking to the end which we all seek to accomplish, the true restoration of the Union, a union of hearts as well as a union of hands, that you should exclude the large mass of people from participating in the honors of the Government who will be excluded by this provision.

Mr. GUTHRIE. I am inclined to vote for this amendment without going into a criticism upon the legal effect of the oath. I am against the section altogether on account of its proscriptive nature. I will vote for the amendment, because if it be adopted it will reduce the number to whom the section will apply. I should be glad if now, after having been so many months in session, we had agreed among ourselves as to the conciliation of the South, because conciliation at last is our only true policy; for unless we come to agree with each other; unless we are able again to meet and unite in these Halls as citizens and representatives of a common country, to shape the destinies of that country in Congress, to direct it against embattled nations, if it shall become necessary, we are not a united people.

This third section is not an act of conciliation, it is an act of proscription. It is true it is not as extensive as the third section sent to us from the other House was. I think we have gained an advantage in that respect. That measure was intended to proscribe all the active population of the rebel States, because they all stood by the southern movement. This section as it now stands certainly proscribes the representative men of the South, the men who had influence, and who still have influence in their localities, and who can do more in the

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work of conciliation here and elsewhere than all the men that you leave out of it. They are the representative men of the South, they have the confidence of the people of that section of the country. I think they have given abundant evidence that they are satisfied that they have tried the game of secession and given it up honestly and entirely, and are willing to come back to join in the Government heart and hand, and carry forward its flag, looking to the bright destiny of this nation in the future. The amendment will make the section less prescriptive, diminish the number which fall victims under its rule, and for that reason I shall vote for it. Now is the hour for conciliation, now is the time to trust in the South.

Mr. HENDRICKS. It is proper, perhaps, I should say that I do not expect to vote for the third section whether the amendment which I propose be adopted or not; but I suppose that I understood the purpose of the caucus, from which this amendment came, to be to exclude the men who violated their oath of office when they went into the rebellion, who added moral perjury to the crime of violating their allegiance. I thought the language went further than the caucus intended, and therefore I moved this amendment with a view of confining the section to the very case which I had a right to presume was intended to be met. If my amendment be adopted, it will leave the section to exclude all persons who at the time they went into the rebellion were under the obligation of an official oath to support the Constitution of the United States.

Mr. SHERMAN. I would ask my friend, the Senator from Indiana, whether it excludes those who resigned an office in the United States Army, for instance, for the purpose of going into the rebellion. Does not his amendment exclude from the operation of the section those who held office under the United States, resigned it, and then went into the insurrection, as in the case of General Lee?

Mr. HENDRICKS. I think not. If the Senator will observe the language he will see that it has not the effect which he fears. I use the words "during the term of his office." A man's term does not expire because he resigns his office. If a man holds an office the term of which the law fixes at four years, the term is four years. If he holds an office during good behavior, the term is thus fixed; the resignation of an officer does not put an end to the term; that is judicially settled. In some of the States, for political purposes, it is provided in the constitution that a man elected to a judicial office shall not, during the term of the office for which he was elected, be eligible to any other office. Judicial officers holding office under a constitution like that have resigned during the term and been elected to other offices, executive, perhaps, in their character, and the courts have always held that they could not take the office to which they were elected when the term of the previous office was fixed by law. That is clear law, I presume, so that I think the word "term" excludes all men who, at the time they went into the rebellion, were under the obligation of an official oath to support the United States Constitution.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I hope the Senator will make that point clear.

Mr. HENDRICKS. If these words will make it any more conclusive, I am willing to say, "during the term of office for which he was elected or appointed;" but I think the expression "during the term of the office" is equally comprehensive.

Mr. SHERMAN. I do not know that it is worth while to discuss the precise effect of the amendment, because I think the Senator from Indiana is satisfied that his amendment will not prevail; but the objection which occurred to me the moment it was offered was, that it would relieve from the operation of the third section the very men who ought to be excluded from ever hereafter holding office under the United States. Take the case of Senators holding seats as members of this body who resigned

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their seats here and went directly to the South and took up arms. The term of their office in some cases expired by limitation on the 4th of March after they retired from here, and before they actually took up arms; and yet, on leaving this Senate Chamber, they proceeded to the South and organized rebellion, and they would be relieved from the operation of this section by the amendment of the Senator from Indiana.

So in the case of officers of the Army and Navy, all of whom had sufficient respect for the oath which they had taken to resign their offices and to see carefully that their resignations were accepted, so that the termination of their office was authenticated in the records of the War Department and the Navy Department. Then, having put an end to their offices under the United States, they proceeded to the South and organized rebellion against the Government of the United States. They would, in my judgment, be relieved from the operation of the third section..

But I take it all of us understand the meaning of the third section. It is that, for a time at least, all who have violated not only the letter but the spirit of the oath of office they took when they became officers of the United States, and took the oath to support the Constitution of the United States, shall not hold office until a state of affairs shall come when two thirds of both Houses may, by a general amnesty, wipe out all these disabilities: and it seems to me that this is a reasonable stipulation, one that the United States may exact. After the attempted revolution in England in 1745, the English Government was considered extremely liberal when, two years after the Pretender had been overthrown by force of arms, all the pains and penalties imposed by Great Britain on his adherents were removed, except the power to hold office; and I believe all who took part in that rebellion were forever disfranchised from holding an office of honor, trust, or profit in the kingdom of Great Britain. It was considered extremely liberal that all the other penalties of treason were removed.

The effect of this section is simply to remove all the penalties that rest on these men for treason except the power to hold office; and if a new generation of men should hold all the offices in the southern States; if the young men who are now growing up should hold all the offices of honor, trust, and profit there, I think no harm would result. If those men who have once taken an oath of office to support the Constitution of the United States and have violated that oath in spirit by taking up arms against the Government of the United States are to be deprived for a time at least of holding office, it is not a very severe stipulation.

Mr. HENDRICKS. I ask for the yeas and nays on my amendment.

The yeas and nays were ordered; and being taken, resulted — yeas 8, nays 34; as follows:

YEAS — Messrs. Buckalew, Davis, Guthrie, Hendricks, Johnson, Riddle, Saulsbury, and Van Winkle — 8.

NAYS - Messrs. Anthony, Chandler, Clark, Cowan, Conness, Crasin, Creswell. Doolittle, Edmunds, Fessenden, Foster, Grimes, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Kirkwood, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Norton, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sumner, Stewart, Trumbull, Wade, Willey, Willliams, and Wilson — 34.

ABSENT. Messrs. Brown, Dixon, McDougall, Nesraith, Sprague, Wright, and Yates — 7.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

Mr. JOHNSON. I move now to amend the amendment by striking out all after "States" in line thirty-five down to the word "State" in line thirty-six. The words which I propose to strike out are "or as a member of any State Legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State." I ask for the yeas and nays on this.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. COWAN. I am opposed to this section in toto. I am opposed to the infliction of punishment of any kind upon anybody unless by fair trial where the party himself is summoned and heard in due course of law. I am

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as much opposed to a bill of pains and penalties, or to the exercise of judicial power by Congress through the medium of an amendment to the Constitution, as I am opposed to it in an act of Congress where it is expressly forbidden, and in any vote which I give upon propositions to modify this section I do not wish to be understood as being willing to vote for that principle in any event. The question being taken by yeas and nays, resulted - yeas 10, nays 32; as follows:

YEAS — Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Doolittle, Guthrie, Hendrieks, Johnson, Norton, Kiddle, and Saulsbury — 10.

NAYS — Messrs. Anthony, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Cragin, Creswell, Edmunds, Fessenden, Foster, Grimes, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Kirkwood, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Stewart, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Willey, Williams, and Wilson — 32.

ABSENT — Messrs. Brown, Bixon, McDougall, Nesmith, Sprague, Wright, and Yates — 7.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

Mr. JOHNSON. I now move to amend the amendment by striking out in line thirty-three the words "having previously taken" and inserting "at any time within ten years preceding the 1st of January, 1861, had taken;" so as to make it read: No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who at any time within ten yoars preceding the 1st of January, 1861, had taken an oath as a member of Congress, &c.

I ask for the yeas and nays on this proposition.

The yeas and nays were ordered; and being taken, resulted — yeas 10, nays 32; as follows:

YEAS — Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Doolittle, Guthrie, Hendrieks, Johnson, Norton, Riddle, and Saulsbury — 10.

NAYS — Messrs. Anthony, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Cragin, Creswell, Edmunds, Fessenden, Foster, Grimes, Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe. Kirkwood, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Stewart, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Willey. Williams, and Wilson — 32.

ABSENT — Messrs. Brown, Dixon, McDougall, Nesmith, Sprague, Wright, and Yates — 7.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from Michigan, [Mr. HOWARD] to insert the words which have been read as the third section of the proposed article of amendment to the Constitution.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I am induced, by a remark made by the Senator from Ohio, to make an inquiry. I understood him to say that the meaning of the last clause of this section, which clause tends to reconcile me to the whole section, is that there can only be a general removal of the disability by a general amnesty; and although he did not say distinctly that there could not be a removal of the disability in an individual case, I should like to know what is the understanding, at least of the mover of this proposition, in reference to that point. This is to go into our Constitution and to stand to govern future insurrection as well as the present; and I should like to have that point definitely understood. I would suggest, although I do not make the motion, that instead of "two thirds of each House" we should insert "a majority of all the members elected to each House." It strikes me that it is very difficult to get a two-thirds majority unless under very peculiar circumstances on anything, and that a majority of all the members elected to each House, which is being substituted for the two-thirds vote in many of our State Legislatures, would be sufficient in the present case.

Mr. HOWARD. If I understood the inquiry put by the honorable Senator from West Virginia, it was whether the latter clause in section three would not require a general act to be passed by Congress removing the disabilities in all cases. I do not so understand the clause. I understand that the clause gives to Congress full discretionary power to grant an amnesty in an individual case, when applied

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for, or a part of the whole. Any portion of persons here proscribed may be pardoned, or rather this disability may be removed as to any portion of them in detail or in gross. In short, I regard it as a discretionary authority given to Congress, to be exercised by Congress in individual instances, or in any other form that Congress may see fit to exercise the power. I entertain no doubt whatever that such will be the construction that will be put upon it.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I am entirely satisfied with the explanation; but I was induced to make the inquiry by a remark of the Senator from Ohio, who, I supposed, spoke with knowledge, that it only applied to a general amnesty. The language certainly would cover the removal of the disability in individual cases.

Mr. SHERMAN. I did not hear the Senator from West Virginia, and I beg him to repeat his statement.

Mr. VAN WINKLE. I say I am satisfied with the explanation made by the Senator from Michigan; but I had understood the Senator from Ohio while up a few moments ago to give the last clause of this amendment the interpretation that it would not be in the power of Congress to remove the disability in individual cases. I understood the Senator from Ohio to say that Congress would have the power by a general amnesty to remove this disability. The Senator spoke generally. He may not have intended to contradict the other power; and I made the inquiry to be certain on that point.

Mr. SHERMAN. I have no doubt that the larger power includes the other. The power to make a general amnesty would include the power to make an amnesty as to classes or particular individuals. I do not think there is any doubt about that.

Mr. SAULSBURY. I move to amend the amendment by inserting after the word "House'' in the fortieth line, the words "and the President may by the exercising of the pardoning power;" so as to make the clause read :

Congress may by a vote of two thirds of each House, and the President may by the exercise of the pardoning power, remove such disability.

Mr. HOWARD. I hope that amendment will not be adopted.

Mr. SAULSBURY. I call for the yeas and nays upon it.

The yeas and nays were ordered; and being taken, resulted — yeas 10, nays 32; as follows:

YEAS — Messrs. Buckalew, Cowan, Davis, Doolittle, Guthrie, Hendricks, Johnson, Norton, Riddle, and Saulsbury — 10.

NAYS — Messrs. Anthony, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Crasnn, Creswell, Edmunds, Fessenden, Foster, Grimes. Harris, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Kirkwood, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Nye, Poland, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Stewart, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Wade, Willey, Williams, and Wilson — 32.

ABSENT — Messrs. Brown, Dixon, McDougall, Nesmith, Sprague, Wright, and Yates — 7.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question recurs on the amendment offered by the Senator from Michigan to insert certain words as the third section.

Mr. HOWARD. I ask for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I will state briefly why I cannot vote for this amendment as a substitute for the third section of the resolution which has been stricken out. My first reason is that by a law of Congress now all persons mentioned in this section are excluded from holding any of these offices. The oath that is required by a law of Congress to be taken by every person holding an office under the United States

Mr. TRUMBULL. Does that prevent their holding a State office?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. No; it does not prevent the holding of a State office, but it prevents them from holding any office under the Government of the United States, and that is as far as I think we ought to go. No person can be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or an elector of President and Vice President,

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or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, under the law as it now stands, who does not take an path that he has not participated in the rebellion. The oath which we require at their hands prevents any such persons from holding any such offices. That law is upon our statute-book. That law will remain upon the statute-book just as long as Congress in its judgment shall think best to retain it. And, sir, there is, in my judgment, no danger whatever, no apprehension, that that law will be taken from our statute-book so long as the public interests require that it should there remain. Therefore, in my judgment, it is not necessary to adopt any such constitutional amendment, because this amendment contains a clause putting it in the power of Congress to put an end to the effect of this provision. It is true that it requires two thirds of Congress in order to do it, whereas under the law as it now stands a majority of Congress could change the existing law on that subject. What I maintain is this: Congress is the representative of the American people; Congress speaks the will of the American people, and I do not think that it is in accordance with our system of government, which presumes that Congress speaks for the people, to suppose that a majority of Congress will repeal this oath until a majority of the people of the United States are in favor of doing so; and when a majority of the people are in favor of universal amnesty they have a right to express that opinion and to have universal amnesty.

I undertake to say that upon no principle of statesmanship or Christianity, whether you derive your conclusions from the experience of history, the teachings of Christianity, or the teachings of a wise statesmanship, can you desire to retain in this country any considerable portion of its people who shall be under the ban of eternal proscription. What, Mr. President, is the duty of the Government, having suppressed the rebellion? It is to punish the guilty leaders under the law of the land; it is to bring them to punishment; and the duty of Congress is, if there is anything which stands in the way and which Congress can remove, to pass such laws as may expedite the trials of the great offenders. The great offenders should be tried and punished, and those that you do not try and do not punish should not be held under proscription, the unrelenting, eternal enemies of the Republic. Again, Mr. President, this provision, if it passes, will have the effect of putting a new punishment, not prescribed by the laws, upon all those persons who are embraced within its provisions. Nobody can doubt that. It is in the nature of a bill of pains and penalties, imposed by constitutional enactment it is true, but it is a punishment different from the punishment now prescribed by law. What is the effect of adopting it? What is the legal effect of adopting a new punishment for an offense which has already been committed? It repeals the old punishment, and that cannot be inflicted. If today the punishment for the crime of murder is death, and tomorrow you change your punishment to imprisonment for life, the old penalty is repealed; it cannot be inflicted upon a culprit who has been guilty previous to the passage of the law. Such has been decided by the courts many times to be the law; and if by a constitutional amendment you impose a new punishment upon a class of offenders who are guilty of crime already, you wipe out the old punishment as to them, not as to those who are not embraced within this. This only embraces a particular class of individuals who have taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States. Now, I do not propose to wipe out the penalties that these men have incurred by their treason against the Government; but I would punish a sufficient number of them to make treason odious. I would punish the leaders, those who were instrumental in bringing on this rebellion; but to the masses I would give amnesty.

Mr. NYE. How many would you like to hang?

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Mr. DOOLITTLE. The Senator himself stated the other day that five or six would be enough to hang.

Mr. NYE. Do you acquiesce in that?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I think I ought to be satisfied if the Senator from Nevada is satisfied with five or six. But, Mr. President, I have another objection which weighs, perhaps, still more upon my mind than those I have stated. The insertion of this section into this constitutional amendment, if these provisions are not to be submitted separately, tends to prevent the adoption of the amendment by a sufficient number of States to ratify it. You say every day that you cannot get a jury under the laws of several of the States, Virginia and others; that today the state of public opinion is such that you cannot get a jury who would convict a person of crime, and yet you propose to submit this constitutional amendment to be passed upon by the people of those States to determine the question whether they will adopt a constitutional amendment upon a popular vote, which constitutional amendment on its face declares that all of those men who have ever taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States are forever to be excluded from holding office under the United States or within the State unless two thirds of Congress will consent to give them the privilege. Sir, what States will adopt it? It is possible that some one, two, perhaps three, of those States to be affected by this amendment may adopt it.

Mr. LANE; of Kansas. Four will accept that part of it.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. What four?

Mr. LANE, of Kansas. Virginia, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Louisiana. I saw some gentlemen on Monday from Tennessee, and talked with them about this particular clause, and they told me it would be the most popular thing that could be tendered. And the very men that you want to hang ought to accept it joyfully in lieu of their hanging. [Laughter.]

Mr. DOOLITTLE. The Senator from Kansas, perhaps, has information on this subject that other Senators do not possess.

Mr. LANE, of Kansas. I saw those gentlemen on Monday.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I do not know who those particular gentlemen were. Were they the gentlemen that deserved hanging or not? [Laughter.]

Mr. LANE, of Kansas. They were conservatives from Tennessee.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President

Mr. SHERMAN. If it will not interrupt my friend from Wisconsin I should like to ask him a question, whether there is in history an example of an insurrection of the most ordinary character terminating with no punishment to any man, no deprivation of property, no deprivation of franchise, no deprivation of any right whatever except the right to hold office; whether ever more generous terms were held out to persons who had been engaged in insurrection than are here proposed?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I understand, then, my friend, the Senator from Ohio, to admit that adopting this section does away with all further punishment.

Mr. SHERMAN. No; I do not think this will prevent your hanging four or five.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I understood the Senator by his question to admit that adopting this repeals all other penalties as against the men included within the section.

Mr. SHERMAN. Not at all. If the Senator wants to take the blood of four or five I am perfectly willing.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, I deem this entirely unnecessary, as I stated at the beginning. I deem it as the adoption of a new punishmeut as to the persons who are embraced within its provisions, and therefore the abolition of the existing punishment; and I deem it as tending to prevent the adoption of the amendment by a sufficient number of States to secure the ratification of the other

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part of the constitutional amendment. If this is to be inserted as a part of the amendment, to be submitted as a part and parcel of the whole, so that the whole must be taken together and the different sections shall not be acted upon separately, it will tend to prevent its adoption, and preventing its adoption has no other tendency or effect than to keep open this difficulty for years to come.

Mr. TRUMBULL. I do not suppose we shall get any vote on this matter tonight. If I thought so I should not take up any time; but I can hardly forbear saying a word or two in reply to the Senator from Wisconsin, [Mr. DOOLITTLE.] They seem to have peculiar notions in Wisconsin in regard to offices, and the Senator who has just taken his seat regards it as a punishment that a man cannot hold an office. Why, sir, how many suffering people there must be in this land! He says this is a bill of pains and penalties because certain persons cannot hold office; and he even seems to think it would be preferable in some instances to be hanged. He wants to know of the Senator from Ohio if such persons are to be excepted. This clause, I suppose, will not embrace those who are to be hanged. When hung they will cease to suffer the pains and penalties of being kept out of office. I recollect having seen in the newspapers - I do not know whether it is true or not; I very seldom allude to newspaper articles - but I saw in some of the newspapers that an officer of this Government, who was supposed to control some patronage in the minor offices of the country, spoke of the officers as "eating the bread and butter of the President?" I recollect the Senator from Wisconsin himself, in a speech some days ago, spoke of the President's officers. The President has got no officers.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. I never stated that.

Mr. TRUMBULL. The Senator spoke of their being responsible to the President.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. So I did, and that is a fact.

Mr. TRUMBULL. How so?

Mr. DOOLITTLE. They are responsible to the President.

Mr. TRUMBULL. They are responsible to the law of the land and not to the President.

Mr. DOOLITTLE rose.

Mr. TRUMBULL. Let the Senator keep cool. I undertake to say that a person holding office, who does not acknowledge his responsibility to the law and his oath of office, but to a President, is not fit to be an officer. No officer is responsible to the President, but his responsibility is to the law under which he acts. The President is not omnipotent in this country. He does not create offices; he cannot appoint an individual to the humblest office in the land except in pursuance of the Constitution and the law. He himself is responsible to the Constitution and the law, and so is the most inferior postmaster in the land. This idea that the offices of this country belong to the President, that men eat his bread and butter, is very erroneous. Why, sir, the President feeds nobody. It is derogatory to the position of any man who holds an office to talk of his eating the bread and butter of the President and being responsible to the President and not to his oath of office, to the law and the Constitution.

Why, sir, who ever heard of such a proposition as that laid down by the Senator from Wisconsin, that a bill excluding men from office is a bill of pains and penalties and punishment? The Constitution of the United States declares that no one but a native-born citizen of the United States shall be President of the United States. Does, then, every person living in this land who does not happen to have been born within its jurisdiction undergo pains and penalties and punishment all his life, because by the Constitution he is ineligible to the Presidency? This is the Senator's position. But he tells us that there is no necessity for this clause; and why? Oh, we have a law that excludes from office every one of these individuals. Have we? How long is it since the

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Senator from Wisconsin stood up in this body and with loud voice proclaimed to the Senate and the nation that each House should judge for itself whether members should be admitted into the body, and that Congress had no right to decide upon it? Now he tells us that we have a law which excludes all these persons from office, and he does not want it in the Constitution. How long is it since he argued and urged here that the Senate should decide for itself whether the rebellious States were fit to be represented or not? Today he tells us we have a law which prevents each House from admitting disloyal persons. I am glad the Senator is disposed to obey the law; and I trust we shall hear no more of his saying that it is for the Senate exclusively to decide, irrespective of law, whether persons are to be admitted to seats.

I know that each House is the judge of the elections, the qualifications, and the returns of its own members under the Constitution; but each House is not made the judge of whether there is a constituency authorized to representation or not. That is a question proper to be decided by the joint action of both Houses. Each House may have the physical power to decide it, but Senators have no right to vote that the representatives of Maximilian in Mexico, of Napoleon in France, or of the people of Canada, shall be admitted to seats here; and they have just as little right to admit the representatives of any other people not recognized by law as entitled to representation, as they have to admit representatives from Mexico, or France, or Canada. But the Senator says that this provision excluding leading rebels from office will not be accepted in the South. Sir, has it come to this, that the leaders of the infamous rebellion who undertook to overthrow the Government, who marshaled armies and maintained a war against it for four or five years, when put down by force of arms cannot be deprived of the privilege of holding offices? The Senator says the South will not accept it; but, sir, they have gone further than this in Maryland, in Tennessee, in West Virginia, in Missouri. Everywhere in the South where loyal men have the control they not only exclude the leading traitors from office, but also from the right of suffrage.

Mr. LANE, of Kansas. And so in Arkansas.

Mr. TRUMBULL. In Arkansas also, I am reminded by the Senator from Kansas. Sir, the object of this provision is to place these rebellious States in the hands of loyal men. Is the Senator from Wisconsin opposed to it? Does he want to put the control of these States in the hands of disloyal men? If he does not, then vote for this provision. That is all there is to it, and if the time ever comes, as I trust it will, when these leaders shall be cured of their malignity toward the Union, when they shall be willing to treat loyal men and Union men fairly and justly, it will be in the power of Congress to remove the disability; and if the people of these localities are then willing to trust the repentant rebels they can elect them to office. Sir, it is intended to put some sort of stigma, some sort of odium, upon the leaders of this rebellion, and no other way is left to do it but by some provision of this kind. The Senator wants it in a law. Sir, what would it be good for in a law? So far as the members of this body and of the other House are concerned, the Constitution of the United States has provided the qualifications for a Senator and for a Representative, and it has been held more than once that it is incompetent to add to those qualifications by law. You may do it by a change of the Constitution, and hence the propriety of putting it here. The test oath is I a different thing. The oath does not go to the qualification, but to the discharge of the duties subsequently, and the requirement of the oath may be constitutional when a direct disqualification imposed by law would not be constitutional. That is a proposition, however, which I do not propose to argue at this time. I rose merely to repel the idea that it was imposing

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pains and penalties to deprive a man from holding office. I rose to repel the idea that the offices of this country belonged to the President, and that men who held them were living upon his bounty; to show that the oath was not a sufficient protection; and that to have the proper protection against leading rebels being elevated to office, not by Union men but by the rebels, it was necessary to insert a clause of this kind. We find that every southern State which is in the hands of loyal men, although it may have been formerly engaged in this rebellion, has not only excluded from office, but from the right of suffrage also, all the leading traitors; and, sir, I apprehend that this proposition will be a popular provision with loyal men, and how the disloyal regard it is not a matter of so much consequence.

Mr. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President

Mr. HENDRICKS. If the Senator will yield I will move an adjournment.

Mr. GRIMES. Let us go into executive session.

Several SENATORS. It is too late.

Mr. HENDRICKS. If there is any business in executive session desirable to be done, I will give way.

Mr. GRIMES. I move that the Senate proceed to the consideration of executive business. ["No, no; it is too late."]

The PRESIDING OFFICER, (Mr. POMEROY in the chair.) The Senator from Iowa moves that the Senate proceed to the consideration of executive business.

Several SENATORS. Let us adjourn.

The question being put on Mr. GRIMES's motion, a division was called for.

Mr. SHERMAN. If there is any controversy about it, I move that the Senate adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; and the Senate adjourned.

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[Mears]

TMI

……..

[RideForever]

Do you understand what it means to be subject to a country's jurisdiction?

In short, it's the country that issues my passport. It used to be a country that wouldn't leave a citizen stranded in a foreign country.

Do you believe the US can just make passports for all the illegal aliens?
Do you know whether the illegal aliens have revoked their previous country's jurisdiction to come here?
How do you trust electing them to an office if they turn their back on their birth country?
You expect a person like that to assimilate in a civil society?

Are you sane?

[Ultra Sonic 007]

So basically, you don’t know.

See post 27 for a clarification as to what being subject to a nation’s jurisdiction means.

Needless to say, if you travelled to another country, you would be subject to THEIR jurisdiction, not the United States’, because their laws would take precedence over ours.

/exception being if you were representing the USA in an official capacity, which comes with a degree of immunity
//such as being a diplomat

[RideForever]

Needless to say, if you traveled to another country, you would be subject to THEIR jurisdiction

So any country you visit changes your citizenship in that jurisdiction, regardless of any treaties, until you travel to another jurisdiction? Sounds like you're mentally deficient about birthright citizenship and 'jurisdiction', and how treaties affect your rights when traveling. You can't seem to distinguish a country's sovereign birthright jurisdiction from its laws.

Traveling in another country does not change your citizenship, and you are still at a loss to explain why aliens traveling here are entitled to birthright US citizenship just because they are obeying our laws.