The avowed and confessed object of the convention was to eliminate the ignorant vote whether white or black. Every thoughtful man in the convention knew the terrible results of placing political power in ignorant, incompetent hands. Universal suffrage could not succeed where there was an electorate of sixty per cent. who were illiterate. The experiment had been tried with terrible results in other nations. In 1793 France founded a Republic based on universal manhood suffrage. It went down in a sea of blood and became a military despotism in 1800. The experiment was tried again in 1848. In 1852 they returned to a despotism of military power. There could be no other result when more than one-half the voters could not read their ballots. Spain has passed through the same experience. The Republic of Castellar, built on an ignorant white rabble, passed away in a few months to give place to the old ruinous rule of the Bourbons. South America is full of little republics resting on an ignorant suffrage. They are in a perpetual state of revolution, and such conditions will continue until they have an intelligent ballot. The franchise section of the Mississippi Constitution of 1890 provides an educational qualification and requires payment of all taxes for two years before the election, and it eliminates all ignorant votes regardless of color, who cannot measure up to the test. The educational test is not exacting and only involves the power to read. It places the right to vote as a reward in the reach of the negro, which may be gained by effort. The negroes are slowly qualifying themselves to become voters, and there is no disposition anywhere to prevent them from doing so. If the negro is made to earn his full citizenship by his own efforts it will teach him to take pride in it. Under the Mississippi system the disfranchisement of a few whites was unavoidable, but it was thought that they should pay the penalty of ignorance rather than endanger the safety of the State. The whites who were disfranchised accepted the situation without a murmur. Five other Southern states have followed the lead of Mississippi in framing a new organic law for the purpose of disfranchising the ignorant voter. These states are South Carolina, North Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana and Virginia. These states adopted the Mississippi plan of an educational qualification, and in addition incorporated in their constitutions the famous "grandfather clause," which prevents the disfranchisement of any whites whatever. That clause of these constitutions provides that all male descendants of those who were voters before 1868, shall continue to exercise the right to vote regardless of the required educational qualifications. Here are the franchise sections of the Mississippi Constitution of 1890: