Whitelaw Reid: “A similar demand concerning the Philippines neither could nor ought to have been acquiesced in by the civilized world.”

Our national experience has demonstrated that public order reposes most securely on the broad base of universal suffrage.

And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.

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.

It has proved, also, that universal suffrage is the surest guarantee and most powerful stimulus of individual, social and political progress.