“I have seen and experienced much of the disabilities which rest upon my race and people from the mere accident of color. Grateful to God and the Republicans of this country for our emancipation and the recognition of our citizenship, I am nevertheless deeply impressed with the necessity of further legislation for the perfection of our rights as American citizens.” This colored citizen is impressed, as the Senator is not, with the necessity of further legislation for the perfection of his rights as an American citizen. He goes on:-- “I am also thoroughly persuaded that this needed legislation should come from the National Congress.” So he replies to my friend. “Local or State legislation will necessarily be partial and vacillating. Besides, our experience is to the effect that the local State governments are unreliable for the enforcement or execution of laws for this purpose. “In Arkansas, for example, a statute was enacted by the General Assembly of 1868 for the purpose of securing the equal rights of colored persons upon steamboats, railroads, and public thoroughfares generally. The provisions of the statute were deemed good, if not entirely sufficient; yet to the present time gross indignities continue to be perpetrated upon colored travellers, men and women, while those charged under oath to see the laws faithfully executed look on with seeming heartless indifference while the law remains a dead letter on the statute-book. “With a care and anxiety which one vitally interested alone can feel I have examined and weighed this subject.” Here, Sir, he replies again to my friend. I should like the Senator to notice the sentence:-- “With a care and anxiety which one vitally interested alone can feel”-- as, of course, my friend cannot feel, since he has not that vital interest-- “I have examined and weighed this subject.” What does he conclude? “I am fully persuaded that nothing short of national legislation, and national authority for its enforcement, will be found sufficient for the maintenance of our God-given rights as men and women, citizens of this great and free country.” * * * * * MR. MORRILL. As my honorable friend emphasizes that particular point, will he be kind enough to say whether he reads that letter as an authority showing that Congress has the power to do what he asks, or whether it is simply an individual opinion that some such legislation is necessary? MR. SUMNER. I think my friend must know that I do not read the letter as an authority, according to his use of the term. By-and-by I shall come to the authority. I read it as the opinion of a colored citizen-- MR. MORRILL. As to the necessity of legislation?