Every statute and all legislation, whether National or State, must be in complete conformity with the two title-deeds.

Strange indeed, if an odious discrimination, without support in the original Common Law or the Constitution, and openly condemned by the Declaration of Independence, can escape judgment by skulking within State lines!

That this should continue to flaunt, now that Slavery is condemned, increases the inconsistency.

Ceasing to be a slave, the former victim has become not only a man, but a Citizen, admitted alike within the pale of humanity and within the pale of citizenship.

As man he is entitled to all the rights of man, and as citizen he becomes a member of our common household, with Equality as the prevailing law.

No longer an African, he is an American; no longer a slave, he is a common part of the Republic, owing to it patriotic allegiance in return for the protection of equal laws.

By incorporation with the body-politic he becomes a partner in that transcendent unity, so that there can be no injury to him without injury to all.

Insult to him is insult to an American citizen.

Dishonor to him is dishonor to the Republic itself.

Whatever he may have been, he is now the same as ourselves.

Our rights are his rights; our equality is his equality; our privileges and immunities are his great freehold.

There is no office in the Republic, from lowest to highest, executive, judicial, or representative, which is closed against him.

The doors of this Chamber swing open, and he sits here the coëqual of any Senator.

Nay, Sir, he may be Vice-President, he may be President; but he cannot enter a hotel or public conveyance, or offer his child at the common school, without insult on account of color.

Nothing can make this terrible inconsistency more conspicuous.

An American citizen, with every office wide open to his honorable ambition, in whom are all the great possibilities of our Republic, who may be anything according to merit, is exposed to a scourge which descends upon the soul as the…

In ancient times the cry, “I am a Roman citizen,” stayed the scourge of the Lictor; and this cry, with its lesson of immunity, has resounded through the ages, testifying to Roman greatness.

Will not our “Chief Captain,” will not Senators, take heed what they do, that the scourge may not continue to fall upon a whole race, each one of whom is an American and uncondemned?

Is our citizenship a feebler safeguard than that of Rome?

Shall the cry, “I am an American citizen,” be raised in vain against perpetual outrage?

There is no person among us now, whatever his birth or complexion, who may not claim the great name of Citizen, to be protected not less at home than abroad,--but always, whether at home or abroad, by the National Government, which is the…

I regretted, at the time, that the President signalized by his favor the removal of disabilities imposed upon a few thousand Rebels who had struck at the life of the Republic, while he said nothing of cruel disabilities inflicted upon…

Believing that duty to these millions is foremost, and that until they are secured in equal rights we cannot expect the tranquillity which all desire,--nay, Sir, we cannot expect the blessing of Almighty God upon our labors,--I bring…

Such a measure can never be out of order or out of season, being of urgent necessity and unquestionable charity.

Nobody sincerely favoring generosity to Rebels should hesitate in justice to the colored race.