The civil rights of the Negroes constituted the general theme of the remarks made by Alonzo J. Ransier, a representative from South Carolina in the Forty-third Congress. In the first instance he spoke in refutation of the allegements of certain members of the opposition to the effect that the mass of Negroes did not want civil rights. Ransier sought mainly to show, by the presentation[55] of data in form of resolutions from Negro bodies and conventions, the intense desire of the race for civil rights. During the course of these remarks, Ransier served notice of his intention to offer to the civil rights bill an amendment to prevent the disqualification of competent citizens for service as jurors in any court in the nation because of "race, color, or previous condition of servitude." The amendment would provide also for the repeal of all laws, statutes, and ordinances, national or State, which were devised to discriminate against any citizen on account of color by the use of the word "white."[56] The civil rights of the Negro found nowhere a more ardent champion than James T. Rapier, a representative from Alabama in the Forty-third Congress. In a speech on the measure supplementary to the civil rights bill, Rapier made a lucid analysis of the anomalous position then occupied by the Negro in the United States. Pointing out that Negroes were accorded political rights without the civil, he deplored the whole situation and challenged the truth of the statement that America is the asylum for the oppressed. Averring that the problem was national in scope, he asserted the constitutional authority of Congress to solve it. Denying the contentions of Alexander H. Stephens, of Georgia, Rapier deplored the apparent inability of that gentleman to comprehend the new order ushered in since the formerly sat in Congress. Stephens, he said, maintained the ideals of the old South. Thus, despite the decision of the war that national rights are paramount to those of the States, Stephens urged that it is the prerogative of the States to confer civil rights upon the Negro, and contended that such action should be left to the States. He thereby offered no constitutional objection to the bestowal of civil rights upon the Negro, but advanced a principle, the acceptance of which would forever preclude his enjoying them. To this proposition Rapier could not assent. That the Negro was considered to possess no rights under the Constitution, he maintained, was fully demonstrated by Kentucky and other Southern States, in which they were denied the privilege of testifying in court against a white man, were refused the right to education by the destruction of their schools and the visitation of violence upon their teachers, and were prevented by the Ku Klux Klan from exercising their right of suffrage. Such actions, he insisted, were in conflict with the contention that the States would eventually confer upon Negroes civil rights. In conclusion he declared