setts -- Obscuration of the sun -- More Radical
remedy desired -- A Kentuckian gratified -- Citations from
the Census -- Premium for Treason -- White Slaves -- Power
to amend well-nigh exhausted -- Objections to the Suffrage
Basis -- "Race" and "Color" ambiguous -- Condition of the
Question -- Recommitted -- Final passage.

Although the Joint Committee of Fifteen were assiduous in their
attention to the work assigned them, it was not until the 22d of
January, 1866, that they were ready to make a partial report and
recommend a practical measure for the consideration of Congress.

On that day Mr. Fessenden, of the Senate, and Mr. Stevens, of the
House of Representatives, brought before those bodies respectively a
partial report from the committee, recommending the passage of the
following joint resolution:

_Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled_, (two-thirds
of both houses concurring,) That the following article be
proposed to the Legislatures of the several States as an
amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which,
when ratified by three-fourths of the said Legislatures,
shall be valid as part of said Constitution, namely:

ARTICLE--. Representatives and direct taxes shall be
apportioned among the several States which may be included
within this Union according to their respective numbers,
counting the whole number of persons in each State,
excluding Indians not taxed: _Provided_, That whenever the
elective franchise shall be denied or abridged in any State
on account of race or color, all persons of such race or
color shall be excluded from the basis of representation.

In the Senate this subject was laid over, and was not reached for
several days, as the Freedmen's Bureau Bill was then under discussion.

The subject was pressed upon the attention of the House for immediate
action. Mr. Stevens had no intention to make a speech, since the
question had been under consideration by every member for the last six
weeks. He remarked, however: "There are twenty-two States whose
Legislatures are now in session, some of which will adjourn within two
or three weeks. It is very desirable, if this amendment is to be
adopted, that it should go forth to be acted upon by the Legislatures
now in session. It proposes to change the present basis of
r