Speech #870172908

I wish to address my remarks principally to three bills. which are designated respectively as S. 480. S. 2750. and S. 2979. These bills undertake to do two things: First. they undertake to abolish or nullify the statutes of about 21 States which prescribe literacy tests. second. they propose to substitute for the abolished or nullified statutes a Federal standard or a Federal literacy test. I wish to say something rather drastic about these bills. but I want to do so in the gentlest and sweetest fashion possible. The bills contain many remarkable provisions. The most remarkable thing about them. however. is this: They offer the Senate the very finest opportunity it has ever had to act in an exceedingly foolish manner. Let me explain why I make this drastic assertion as gently and as sweetly as possible. When one reads the statutes of the 21 States which have established literacy tests. in the light of the Constitution and of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States construing the Constitution on this point. it is as clear as the noonday sun that all of the statutes establishing the literacy tests conform strictly to section 2 of article I of the 17th amendment. These constitutional provisions declare in as simple words as can be found in the English language that the only persons eligible to vote for Senators and Representatives are those persons in a State who have the qualifications requisite for voting for the electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislature. These three bills undertake to nullify the statutes of the 21 States which prescribe literacy tests. and they seek to do it on a peculiar ground. They say that those statutes are arbitrary. unreasonable. and unconstitutional. even though the statutes comply strictly with the Constitution. That being true. these bills assert. in the final analysis. something which has never before been asserted. so far as I know. in any bill presented to Congress. namely. that the Constitution is unconstitutional.