brings me to the next remark, and it is this: that these
subjects, not owing any foreign allegiance, no individual act of
theirs is required in order to their naturalization, because they owe
no foreign allegiance to be renounced by their individual acts, and
because, moreover, being domiciled in our own country, and continuing
here to reside, it is the individual election of each member of the
tribe, or race, or class, to accept our nationality; therefore, no
additional individual act is required in order to his citizenship.

"That being proved, it is competent for the nationality, or for the
government, wherever that subject may reside, to naturalize that class
of persons by treaty or by general law, as is proposed by the
amendment of the gentleman from New York [Mr. Raymond]. It is the act
of the sovereign alone that is requisite to the naturalization of that
class of persons, and it may be done either by a single act
naturalizing entire races of men, or by adopting the heads of families
out of those races, or it may be done to any extent, greater or less,
that may please the sovereign. For this proposition, I refer gentlemen
who desire to examine this subject to the authorities that may be
found collected in any judicious work on public law, and they will
find them very fully collected, certainly, in the notes to Wheaton.

"Now, then, what power may do that act of naturalization, and how may
it be exercised? That is also answered by these same authorities. It
may be done in this country either by an act of Congress, or it may be
done by treaty. It has been done again and again and again in both
ways in this country. It was done once in the case of the Choctaw
Indians, as you will find in the Statutes-at-Large, where, in case the
heads of families desired to remain and not to remove to the West, it
was provided by the treaty of September 27, 1830, that those families
should be naturalized as a class.

"Then, again, it was done in the other way, by an act of Congress, in
the case cited by my learned friend from Iowa [Mr. Wilson], in the
case of the Stockbridge Indians.

"It was done again, as you may remember, in the case of the Cherokees,
in December, 1835. There again a class was naturalized by treaty."

Some amendments having been proposed, the bill was recommitted to the
Committee on the Judiciary, with the understanding that it should be
returned for consideration on Thursday of the following week.

Accordi