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Show REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF MUlAN AFFAIRS. 31 saidTerritory ; but the qoslificetions of voters and of holding office atall subsequent eleotiana shsll be such as shall be prencribed by the legialati,tive assembly: Provided, That the rightof suffrage and of holding office shall be exercised only by citizens. of the United States, including those recognized as oitiaens by tba treaty with the Republic of Mexico conelnded February 2, 1848. If by the foregoing provision of law Congress can be held to have admitted any class of theMexicancitizens within the Territory named to full citizenship in the United States, that class could only have been 1' Mexicans of the European or Spanish blood j" for b j the sectio~! of each organic act immediately preceding the provision above quoted Indians are excepted from the enumeration upon which apportionment of repwentation was to be made, and theright of suffrage and of holding office at the first election in each Territorj was given by Congress only to the f ~ e ew hite male inhabitants of the Territories respectively. I t would seem, therefore, that when it declared that after the first election the qnalifications for voting and for holding office should be such aa the legislature of the Territories respectively should prescribe, and limited those privileges to citizens of the United States (ineluding those recognized as such under the treaty with Mexico), it iutended to give those Territories respectively the power to prescribe the qualifica-tions that should be possessed by the free white citizen of the United States who was an inhabitant of the Territory before such inhabitant should be entitled to the privileges named, and that it intended not to give the territories power to confer the privileges of citizenship on the Indian inhabitants thereof, although such,Inilians were full citi-zens of the Kepnblic of Mexioo nt the time of the treaty. And it is not understood that the Scates or Territories within the section of country under discnssion claim or attempt to exercise such power. . The language adopted by Congress in sectiorl five of the organic act of the Territory of Colorado would seem to sustain the view above Bxpressed as to its intentions with regard to the admission of Mexicans to citizenship in the Uuited Btates. That sectionie as follows: TheG every free white male citizen of the United States above the age of twenty-one yeare, who shall have been a resident of said Terntory at the time of the passage of this act, including those recognieed as citizens by the treaty with the Republic of Mexico oonclrided Febrnmy two, eighteen hundred and forty-eight, and the treaty negotiated with the same country on the thirtieth day of Deeember,.eighteen hun-dred and fifty-three, shall be entitled to vats at the first election andshall be eligible to any office within the said Territory; but the qnalifioations of votera and of hold-ing oMce at a11 subsequent eleotions shell be soch as shdl be preaoribed by the ieg-isiati, tireansembly. It will thus be seen that Congress has by implieafiion accepted the renunciation of their old allegiance in the case of Mexican citizens of the European or Spanish blood but has notaccepted the rennnciation of allegiance toMexico in that of the Mexican citizens of Indian blood, Indians being excepted from the operation of the statutes affecting the question. I |
