It is true, that, according to the text of the Constitution, each State may determine the “qualifications” of electors; but this can have no application to an exigency like the present, where, at the close of a prolonged and desperate rebellion, the United States are obliged to guaranty to certain States a republican form of government. In the performance of this guaranty, the United States will look only at the essential elements of such a government, nor more nor less, without regard to State laws. But I am unwilling to rest the argument here. Even assuming that there has been no lapse of State governments, so as to bring the guaranty into operation,--assuming that we are in a condition of assured peace,--then I utterly deny that the power to determine the “qualifications” of electors can give any power to disfranchise actual citizens. It is “qualifications” only which the States can determine,--meaning by this limited term those requirements of personal condition regarded as essential to the security of the franchise. These “qualifications” cannot be in nature permanent or insurmountable. Color cannot be a “qualification,” any more than size, or quality of hair. A permanent or insurmountable “qualification” is equivalent to deprivation of suffrage; in other words, it is the tyranny of taxation without representation, and this tyranny, I insist, is not intrusted to any State. This is the very ground taken by Mr. Madison, when defending the National Constitution in the Virginia Convention. “Some States might regulate the elections on the principles of _Equality_, and others might regulate them otherwise.… Should the people of any State, by any means, be deprived of the right of suffrage, _it was judged proper that it should be remedied by the General Government_.… If the elections be regulated properly by the State Legislatures, the Congressional control will very probably never be exercised. The power appears to me satisfactory, and unlikely to be abused as any part of the Constitution.”[185] With these decisive words from a chief framer of the National Constitution, backed by the reason of the case, I dismiss this objection to the little consideration it deserves. And I dismiss to the same indifference the other objection, that our hands are tied because certain Northern States have done a wrong and mean thing. Pray, Sir, how can the failure of these States affect the power of Congress in a great exigency under the National Constitution? Duty here is identical with power. No matter if the power has been long dormant, it is none the less vital. It is like the slumbering statute which Cicero describes as a sword in the scabbard, _tanquam gladius in vagina_. It only remains that it be drawn forth. * * * * *