an that which is inflicted on a white
man for the same offense. Is that a discrimination in favor of the
negro and against the foreigner--a bill the only effect of which is to
preserve equality of rights?

"But perhaps it may be replied to this that the bill proposes to make
a citizen of every person born in the United States, and, therefore,
it discriminates in that respect against the foreigner. Not so;
foreigners are all upon the same footing, whether black or white. The
white child who is born in the United States a citizen is not to be
presumed at its birth to be the equal intellectually with the worthy,
intelligent, and patriotic foreigner who emigrates to this country.
And, as is suggested by a Senator behind me, even the infant child of
a foreigner born in this land is a citizen of the United States long
before his father. Is this, therefore, a discrimination against
foreigners?

"The President also has an objection to the making citizens of Chinese
and Gypsies. I am told that but few Chinese are born in this country,
and where the Gypsies are born, I never knew. [Laughter.] Like Topsy,
it is questionable, whether they were born at all, but 'just come.'
[Laughter.]

"But, sir, perhaps the best answer to this objection that the bill
proposes to make citizens of Chinese and Gypsies, and this reference
to the foreigners, is to be found in a speech delivered in this body
by a Senator occupying, I think, the seat now occupied across the
chamber by my friend from Oregon, [Mr. Williams,] less than six years
ago, in reply to a message sent to this body by Mr. Buchanan, the then
President of the United States, returning, with his objections, what
was known as the Homestead Bill. On that occasion the Senator to whom
I allude said:

"'But this idea about "poor foreigners," somehow or other,
bewilders and haunts the imagination of a great many. * * * * *

"'I am constrained to say that I look upon this objection to
the bill as a mere quibble on the part of the President, and
as being hard-pressed for some excuse in withholding his
approval of the measure; and his allusion to foreigners in
this connection looks to me more like the _ad captandum_ of
the mere politician or demagogue, than a grave and sound
reason to be offered by the President of the United States
in a veto message upon so important a measure as the
Homestead Bill.'

"That was the language of Sena