withhold those privileges from foreigners? Nobody alleges it. But they
say that the ballot-box must be protected from foreign votes. Has
Congress the right to say that foreigners shall not vote within the
limits of your State? Are you willing to leave that to Congress?
[Cries of " No, no, no," and applause.] In some of the States, by
State legislation, foreigners are permitted to vote before they can
become citizens under the naturalization laws. The naturalization laws
are not, therefore, controlling over the question of suffrage. The
power of Congress is limited to the establishment of a uniform rule of
naturalization throughout the States. But what further do they couple
with these demands which they make for congressional legislation? They
proclaim their purpose to be to exclude paupers and criminals from
abroad.--Do paupers and criminals come for the right of suffrage? They
come here for bread, or to fly from the laws which they have violated.
Whether they shall be entitled to vote or not, would neither increase
nor diminish the number of that class by a single individual. But, my
friends, who is a pauper, or who is a criminal? Is a man a pauper
merely because he comes here without property, without money in his
purse? Go, look along your lines of internal improvements, where every
mile has mingled with it the bones of some foreigner who labored to
create it. Go to your battle fields, where your flag has been borne
triumphantly, and where fresh laurels have been added to the brow of
your country, and there you will find the sod dyed as deep by the
blood of the foreign born as by that of the native citizen.
[Applause.] Is the able-bodied man, who comes here to contribute to
your national interests by building up your public works, or aiding in
the erection of your architectural constructions, or who bears your
flag in the hour of danger, and who bleeds and dies for your country,
is he the pauper you desire to exclude? And who is the criminal? Is it
he who, flying from the persecution of despotic governments, seeks our