MR. SUMNER. The Senator does not seem to see that any rule excluding a man on account of color is an indignity, an insult, and a wrong; and he makes himself on this floor the representative of indignity, of insult, and of wrong to the colored race. Why, Sir, his State has a large colored population, and he denies their rights. MR. HILL. If the Senator will allow me, I will say to him that it will take him and others, if there should be any others who so believe, a good while to convince the colored people of the State of Georgia, who know me, that I would deprive them of any right to which they are entitled, though it were only technical; but in matters of pure taste I cannot get away from the idea that I do them no injustice, if I separate them on some occasions from the other race.… MR. SUMNER. The Senator makes a mistake which has been made for a generation in this Chamber, confounding what belongs to society with what belongs to rights. There is no question of society. The Senator may choose his associates as he pleases. They may be white or black, or between the two. That is simply a social question, and nobody would interfere with it. The taste which the Senator announces he will have free liberty to exercise, selecting always his companions; but when it comes to rights, there the Senator must obey the law, and I insist that by the law of the land all persons without distinction of color shall be equal in rights. Show me, therefore, a legal institution, anything created or regulated by law, and I show you what must be opened equally to all without distinction of color. Notoriously, the hotel is a legal institution, originally established by the Common Law, subject to minute provisions and regulations; notoriously, public conveyances are common carriers subject to a law of their own; notoriously, schools are public institutions created and maintained by law; and now I simply insist that in the enjoyment of these institutions there shall be no exclusion on account of color. … MR. HILL. I must confess, Sir, that I cannot see the magnitude of this subject. I object to this great Government descending to the business of regulating the hotels and the common taverns of this country, and the street railroads, stage-coaches, and everything of that sort. It looks to me to be a petty business.…