Missouri's second Constitution, ratified in 1865, called for a system to register potential voters and required persons who wished to qualify as voters to take an Oath of Loyalty to the United States Government and to the State of Missouri. Although couched in terms to exclude as voters anyone who had ever been "disloyal", the Oath was very obviously aimed at those who had participated in the recent war on the side of the Confederacy or who were sympathetic to that cause:

"...no person shall be deemed a qualified voter who has ever been in armed hostility to the United States ... or to the Government of this State ... or has ever given aid, comfort, countenance, or support ... or has adhered to the enemies ... either by contributing to them, or by unlawfully sending within their lines money, goods, letters, or information ... or has ever disloyally held communication ... or has advised or aided any person to enter the service of such enemies ... manifested his adherence to the cause of such enemies, or his desire for their triumph ... or his sympathy ... or has ever, except under overpowering compulsion, submitted to the authority, or been in the service of the so-called "Confederate States of America" ... or has ever been a member of ... any organization inimical to the Government of the United States ... or has ever been engaged in guerrilla warfare against loyal inhabitants ... or in that description of marauding commonly known as "bushwhacking" ... or has ever knowingly and willingly harbored, aided or countenanced any person so engaged ... or [h]as ever come into or left this State for the purpose of avoiding enrollment for or draft into the military ... or to escape the performance of duty therein ... or has enrolled himself as disloyal or as a Southern sympathizer; or in any other terms indicating his disaffection to the Government of the United States ..." (Article II, Section 3)

The Oath:

"I, [name], do solemnly swear that I am well acquainted with the terms of the third section of the second article of the Constitution of the State of Missouri, adopted in the year eighteen hundred and sixty-five, and have carefully considered the same; that I have never, directly or indirectly, done any of the acts in said section specified; that I have always been truly and loyally on the side of the United States against all enemies thereof, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the United States, and will support the Constitution and laws thereof as the supreme law of the land, any law or ordinance of any State to the contrary notwithstanding; that I will, to the best of my ability, protect and defend the Union of the United States, and not allow the same to be broken up and dissolved, or the government thereof to be destroyed or overthrown, under any circumstances, if in my power to prevent it; that I will support the Constitution of the State of Missouri; and that I make this oath without any mental reservation or evasion, and hold it to be binding on me." (Article II, Section 6)

Before taking the Oath, the potential voter was examined and a questionnaire regarding the points in Section 3 was completed by the Registrar and signed by the deponent. Personal information and questions about family members who may have been "Rebels" were also included. Occasionally, follow-up questions instigated by responses to the prepared questions were asked and recorded at the end of the form.

This register remained in Wasson's possession and was apparently used as scratch paper by family members. Some of the comments sections contain business financial records which seem to have no relation to the person whose oath appears on that page and, in later years, the Wasson children used the register for penmanship practice and their own amusement.