Four millions of them have just emerged
from slavery into freedom. Can it be reasonably supposed that they
possess the requisite qualifications to entitle them to all the
privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States? Have the
people of the several States expressed such a conviction? It may also be
asked whether it is necessary that they should be declared citizens in
order that they may be secured in the enjoyment of the civil rights
proposed to be conferred by the bill. Those rights are, by Federal as
well as State laws, secured to all domiciled aliens and foreigners, even
before the completion of the process of naturalization; and it may
safely be assumed that the same enactments are sufficient to give like
protection and benefits to those for whom this bill provides special
legislation. Besides, the policy of the Government from its origin to
the present time seems to have been that persons who are strangers to
and unfamiliar with our institutions and our laws should pass through
a certain probation, at the end of which, before attaining the coveted
prize, they must give evidence of their fitness to receive and to
exercise the rights of citizens as contemplated by the Constitution of
the United States.
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