Whitelaw Reid: “Free them all to-morrow, and it would make no difference.”

It is my firm conviction, that suffrage is not only the best security for freedom, but the most potent agent of amelioration and civilization.

In this way they will surely overcome unjust hostility, and convince even the most prejudiced that the denial to them of any right which citizens may properly exercise is equally unwise and wrong.

Let me repeat, that I think it best for all men—white men, black men, and brown men, if you make that distinction, that all men of proper age and unconvicted of crime, should have the right of suffrage.

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.