They resisted adroit Spanish efforts for special privileges and guaranties for their established church, and pledged the United States to absolute freedom in the exercise of their religion for all these recent Spanish subjects--pagan, Mohammedan, Confucian, or Christian.
Reid discusses the commitment to religious freedom for inhabitants of newly acquired territories, regardless of their faith.
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Our national experience has demonstrated that public order reposes most securely on the broad base of universal suffrage.
May it not prove, moreover, in that work of reorganization, which now engages the thoughts of all patriotic men, that universal suffrage is the best reconciler of the most comprehensive lenity with the most perfect public security and the…
And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.
They should strive for distinction by economy, by industry, by sobriety, by patient perseverance in well-doing, by constant improvement of religious instruction, and by the constant practice of Christian virtues.