proposed to the constitution of the United States as a condition
precedent to representation in Congress; that all such acts of
ratification are null and void, and the votes so obtained ought not
to be counted to affect the rights of the people and the States of
the whole Union, and that the State of Indiana protests and
solemnly declares that the so-called fifteenth amendment is not
this day, nor never has been in law, a part of the constitution of
the United States."

It is not necessary to go to neighboring States for Democratic
authorities, to show how far the new departure is from modern
Democracy.

When this question was last debated before the people of Ohio, the
Democratic position on the principle of the fifteenth amendment,
and on its constitutional validity, if _declared_ adopted, was thus
stated:

Speaking of the principle of the amendment, Judge Thurman said: "I
tell you it is only the entering wedge that will destroy all
intelligent suffrage in this country, and turn our country from an
intelligent white man's government into one of the most corrupt
mongrel governments in the world."

On its validity, if declared adopted, General Ward said:
"Fellow-citizens of Ohio, I boldly assert that the States of this
Union have always had, both before and since the adoption of the
constitution of the United States, entire sovereignty over the
whole subject of suffrage in all its relations and bearings. Ohio
has that sovereignty now, and it can not be taken from her without
her consent, even by all the other States combined, except by
revolutionary usurpation. The right to regulate suffrage as to the
organization of its own government, and the election of officers
under it, is an inalienable attribute of sovereignty, which the
State could not surrender without surrendering its sovereign
existence as a State. To take from Ohio the power of determining
who shall exercise the right of suffrage is not an amendment of the
constitution, but a revolutionary usurpation by the other States,
in no wise constitutionally binding upon her sovereignty as a
State."

These opinions are still largely prevalent in the Democratic party.
When a new departure was announced at Dayton, the leading organ of
the party in this State said:

"T