[162] authorize the people of Kansas to form a Constitution and come into the Union. On that day Mr. Toombs offered an amendment which he intended to propose to the bill which was ordered to be printed, and, with the original bill and other amendments, recommended to the Committee on Territories, of which Mr. Douglas was Chairman. This amendment of Mr. Toombs, printed by order of the Senate, and a copy of which I have here present, provided for the appointment of commissioners who were to take a census of Kansas, divide the Territory into election districts, and superintend the election of delegates to form a Constitution, and contains a clause in the 18th section which I will read to you, requiring the Constitution which should be formed to be submitted to the people for adoption. It reads as follows:
That the following propositions be and the same are hereby offered to the said Convention of the people of Kansas, when formed, for their free acceptance or rejection, which, if accepted by the Convention, and ratified by the people at the election for the adoption of the Constitution, shall be obligatory on the United States, and upon the said State of Kansas, etc.It has been contended by some of the newspaper press, that this section did not require the Constitution which should be formed to be submitted to the people for approval, and that it was only the land propositions which were to be submitted. You will observe the language is that the propositions are to be “ratified by the people at the election for the adoption of the Constitution.” Would it have been possible to ratify the land propositions “at the election for the adoption of the Constitution,” unless such an election was to be held? When one thing is required by a contract or law to be done, the doing of which is made dependent upon and cannot be performed without the doing of some other thing, is not that other thing just as much required by the contract or law as the first? It matters not in what part of the act, nor in what phraseology the intention of the Legislature is expressed so you can clearly ascertain what it is ; and whenever that intention is ascertained from an examination of the language used, such intention is part of and a requirement of the law. Can any candid, fair-minded man, read the section I have quoted, and say that the intention to have the Constitution which should be formed submitted to the people for their adoption, is not clearly expressed? In my judgment there can be no controversy among honest men upon a proposition so plain as this. Mr. Douglas has never pretended to deny, so far as I am aware, that the Toombs amendment, as originally introduced, did require a submission of the Constitution to the people. This amendment of Mr. Toombs was referred to the committee of which Mr. Douglas was Chairman, and report back by him on the 30th of June, with the words, “And ratified by the people at the election for the adoption of the Constitution” stricken out. I have here a copy of the bill as reported back by Mr. Douglas to substantiate the statement I make. Various other alterations were also made in the bill to which I shall presently have occasion to call attention. There was no other clause in the original Toombs bill requiring a submission of the Constitution to the people than the one I have read, and there was no clause whatever, after that was struck out, in the bill, as reported back by Judge Douglas, requiring a submission. I will now introduce a witness whose testimony cannot be impeached, he acknowledging himself to have been one of the conspirators and privy to the fact about which he testifies. Senator Bigler alluding to the Toombs bill, as it was called, and which, after sundry amendments, passed the Senate, and to the propriety of submitting the Constitution which should be formed to a vote of the people, made the following statement in his place in the Senate, December 9th, 1857. I read from part 1, Congressional Globe of last session, paragraph 21:
I was present when that subject was discussed by Senators, before the bill was introduced, and the question was raised and discussed whether the Constitution, when formed, should be submitted to a vote of the people. It was held by the most intelligent on the subject, that in view of all the difficulties surrounding that Territory, the danger of any experiment at that time of a popular vote, it would be better that
