Mr. Clay to Mr. Seward

No. 91.]

Sir: You will allow me once more, in the dearth of local news from this court, to make a suggestion in reference to the right of suffrage and naturalization in the United States. Amend the national Constitution before the revolted States are readmitted, by clauses of the following import:

1. Hereafter the right of naturalization shall belong exclusively to the federal government, and the Congress shall pass, from time to time, uniform naturalization laws, or deny such right.

2. The right of determining who shall be voters in the States and nation shall belong exclusively to Congress; and hereafter all male persons (or female as well) above the age of twenty-one years, without distinction of color or nationality, who can read and write, and no others, shall be entitled to vote for all officers, State and national, &c.

Clauses similar to those would save us from many evils, from disastrous and continual agitation, and perhaps from another civil war.

I beg you to lay this despatch before President Johnson.

I am, sir, truly, your obedient servant,

C. M. CLAY.

Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.