Under that section a State could exclude the negro from the right of suffrage, if willing to accept the penalty of the proportional loss of representation in Congress, which the exclusion of the colored population from the basis of apportionment would entail.
Blaine explains the consequences for states that exclude Black citizens from voting under the Fourteenth Amendment's provisions.
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It is to the eminent credit of the Republican members of Congress that they stood in a crisis of this magnitude true to principle, firm against all the power and all the patronage of the Administration.
I am in no boastful mood: I shall not do more than I can, but I shall do all I can to save the Government, which is my sworn duty as well as my personal inclination.
Crises often arise in the conduct of National affairs when cherished opinions must be sacrificed and new departures taken.
The Northern people shrank from the responsibility of transferring the government of States to the control of men who had already shown themselves capable of desperate deeds.
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