g more than carrying a ballot to the place where they are directed
to deposit it. I need not remind you that the exercise of the elective
franchise is the highest attribute of an American citizen, and that when
guided by virtue, intelligence, patriotism, and a proper appreciation of
our free institutions it constitutes the true basis of a democratic form
of government, in which the sovereign power is lodged in the body of the
people. A trust artificially created, not for its own sake, but solely
as a means of promoting the general welfare, its influence for good must
necessarily depend upon the elevated character and true allegiance of
the elector. It ought, therefore, to be reposed in none except those who
are fitted morally and mentally to administer it well; for if conferred
upon persons who do not justly estimate its value and who are
indifferent as to its results, it will only serve as a means of placing
power in the hands of the unprincipled and ambitious, and must eventuate
in the complete destruction of that liberty of which it should be the
most powerful conservator. I have therefore heretofore urged upon your
attention the great danger--

to be apprehended from an untimely extension of the elective franchise
to any new class in our country, especially when the large majority of
that class, in wielding the power thus placed in their hands, can not be
expected correctly to comprehend the duties and responsibilities which
pertain to suffrage. Yesterday, as it were, 4,000,000 persons were held
in a condition of slavery that had existed for generations; to-day they
are freemen and are assumed by law to be citizens. It can not be
presumed, from their previous condition of servitude, that as a class
they are as well informed as to the nature of our Government as the
intelligent foreigner who makes our land the home of his choice. In the
case of the latter neither a residence of five years and the knowledge
of our institutions which it gives nor attachment to the principles of
the Constitution are the only conditions upon which he can be admitted
to citizenship; he must prove in addition a good moral character, and
thus give reasonable ground for the belief that he will be faithful to
the obligations which he assumes as a citizen of the Republic. Where
a people--the source of all political power--speak by their suffrages
through the instrumentality of the ballot box, it must be carefu