93. 267. 220-223. 188. 85. 89. 195. power is vested exclusively in Congress. (Collet v. Collet, 2 Dall. 294; United States v. Velati, 2 Dall. 370; Golden v. Prince, 3 Wash. C. C. 313; Chirac v. Chirac, 2 Wheat. 259; Houston v. Moore, 2 Wheat. 49; Federalist, No. 32.) United States v. Rhodes. Id. An alien naturalized is "to all intents and purposes a natural born subject." (Co. Litt. 129.) Id. "Naturalization takes effect from birth; denization from the date of the patent." (Vin. Ab. Tit. Alien, D.) Id. The form under the English act of Parliament appears in Godfrey v. Dickson, Cro. Jac. 539, c. 7. Under the late act, a resident alien may accomplish the object by a petition to the Secretary of State for the Home Department Id. The power is applicable only to those of foreign birth. Alienage is an indispensable element in the process. To make one of domestic birth a citizen, is not naturalization, and cannot be brought within the exercise of that power. There is an universal agreement of opinion upon this subject. (Scott v. Sandford, 19 How. p. 578; 2 Story's Const. 44.) Id. It was well remarked by one of the dissenting judges, in Scott v. Sandford, 19 Howard, 586, in regard to the African race: "The Constitution has not excluded them, and since that has conferred on Congress the power to naturalize colored aliens, it certainly shows that color is not a necessary qualification for citizenship under the Constitution of the United States." Id. The Constitution, 10th amendment, and clause 2 of Sec. 2, Art. IV., and generally the notes thereon (ante, notes 220, 221), quoted. Id. What the several States under the original Constitution only could have done, the nation has done by the thirteenth amendment. An occasion for the exercise of this power by the States may not, perhaps cannot, hereafter arise. United States v. Rhodes. 66 66 The thirteenth amendment quoted, and the same rules of interpretation applied to APPROPRIATE LEGISLATION." That is, "appropriate" is equivalent to necessary and proper." (McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 421-423.) Id. The rule in the United States v. Coombs, 12 Pet. 72; United States v. Holliday, 3 Wall. 407; United States v. Beavan, 3 Wheat. 390; Prigg v. Pennsylvania, 16 Pet. 60; quoted and applied as to the general power. Id. [Out of its place it may be noted, that under the power to regulate commerce, it has recently been ruled, that the power extends to commerce on land, carried on by railroads which are parts of lines of inter-State communication, as well as to commerce carried on by vessels, and such railroads may be regulated by Congress as well as steamboats. By Associate Justice Miller, in Gray v. Clinton Bridge, American Law Register (January, 1868), pp. 149154. The power to regulate commerce is the power to regulate the instruments of commerce. (Cooley v. The Board of Wardens, 12 How. 316.) Id. And it extends to railroads as well as steamboats. Id.] Since the organization of the Supreme Court, but three acts of Congress have been pronounced by that body void for unconstitutionality. (Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cr. 137; Scott v. Sandford, 19 How. 393; Ex parte Garland, 4 Wall. 334.) United States v. Rhodes. The present effect of the amendment was to abolish slavery wherever it existed within the jurisdiction of the United States. In the future it throws its protection over every one, of every race, color, and condition, within that jurisdiction, and guards them against the recurrence of the evil. Id. The history of slavery, and the State legislation which followed its destruction given. The Civil Rights law is an "appropriate means of carrying out the object of the first section of the amendment. Id. It would be a remarkable anomaly if the national government, without this amendment, could confer citizenship on aliens of every race or color, and citizenship, with civil and political rights, on the 18, 220. "inhabitants" of Louisiana and Florida, without reference to race or color, and cannot, with the help of the amendment, confer on those of the African race, who have been born and always lived within the United States, all that this law seeks to give them. It was passed by the Congress succeeding the one which proposed the amendment. Many of the members of both Houses were the same. This fact is not without weight and significance. (McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 401.) Id. The amendment reversed and annulled the original policy of the Constitution, which left it to each State to decide exclusively for itself whether slavery should or should not exist as a local institution, and what disabilities should attach to those of the servile race within its limits. The whites needed no relief nor protection, and they are practically unaffected by the amendment. The emancipation which it wrought was an act of great national grace, and was doubtless intended to reach further in its effects, as to every one within its scope, than the consequences of manumission by a private individual. We entertain no doubt of the constitutionality of the act in all its provisions. It gives only certain civil rights. We are not unmindful of the opinion of the Court of Appeals of Kentucky, in the case of Brown v. The Commonwealth. With all our respect for the eminent tribunal from which it proceeded, we have found ourselves unable to concur in its conclusions. The constitutionality of the act is sustained by the Supreme Court of Indiana and the Chief-Justice of the Court of Appeals of Maryland, in able and well-considered opinions. (Smith v. Moody, 26 Ind. 307; In re A. H. Somers.) United States v. Rhodes. Id. The nisi prius courts of several of the Southern States have decided against the constitutionality of the Civil Rights law on various grounds; but the editor regrets that he has not preserved the newspaper reports of their decisions. Where an obligation was given to pay £7,800 sterling for a trans- What effect fer of the vendor's claim to the services of 153 apprentices (who had such a law upon had been slaves), but before the installments fell due, the slaves contracts? were declared free and obtained their freedom, under an ordinance of Berbice, in British Guiana, in pursuance of the act of 3 and 4 W. IV., c. 73, S. 10, whereby the defendant lost the services, so that the covenant of warranty of title failed; held, that the plaintiff was entitled to the last two installments, though the legislature had determined the apprenticeship before they became due. Mittelhozezer v. Fullarton, 6 Adolph. & Ellis, 989,990. Who are citizens of the Lord Denman: "My brother Wightman asked what would havẹ been the result if, at the end of the year, the services had been determined by the act of God. And to this no sufficient answer was given." Id. 1018. The plaintiff's right vested when the bargain was made; the subsequent interference of the colonial legislature does not prevent his recovering what was then stipulated. Id. The whole question is, who shall bear the losses occasioned by a vis major. And that depends upon the question, who was the proprietor when that loss was occasioned. Id. The question was whether the defendants were liable for the value of slaves purchased in Texas in September, 1863. "I have always regarded the proclamation of the President, issued on the 1st January, 1863, declaring the negroes free, as a war measure. The President did not base his right to issue that proclamation upon any clause of the Constitution, or even any act of Congress. It was justified by the necessities of the war, and, as commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States, he resorted to it, as he himself declared, as a war measure. Its operation and effect depended wholly upon the success of the national arms. The negroes were set free, not by the mere declaration of the President that they were so, but by force of arms. Hence, I have always sup posed that slaves who occupied certain sections of the country, say in Virginia and Tennessee, and who first fell under the armed control of the Union, were free sooner than those in Texas or the extreme South. If the proclamation of the President, of itself, made slaves free persons, then every negro held in bondage after the 1st January, 1863, is now entitled to sue not only for the value of his services subsequent to that time, and for damages on account of being unlawfully deprived of his liberty, but could also subject their former owners to criminal prosecutions for false imprisonment. Not believing that such an effect should be, or was intended to be given to the Proclamation, I must sustain the demurrer of the plaintiff." Connett v. Williams, United States Circuit Court (Texas), Jan. T., 1866, by Judge Thomas H. Duval. There have been State decisions to the effect that contracts made for the purchase of negroes, even before the war, but which matured after their emancipation, cannot be enforced; but the editor has not preserved the newspaper reports of them. He supposes the correct principle to be, as stated by the English bench, Who owned the negroes when they obtained their freedom?" If they were property when sold, the purchaser must sustain the loss. [CONCURRENT RESOLUTION, RECEIVED AT DEPARTMENT OF STATE JOINT RESOLUTION PROPOSING AN AMENDMENT TO Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress States? assembled (two-thirds of both Houses concurring) United That the following article be proposed to the legis- 6, 18, 220. latures of the several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by three-fourths of said legislatures, shall be valid as part of the Constitution, namely: ARTICLE XIV. SEC. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. representa tioned? SEC. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among How are the several States according to their respective tives appor numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each 21-24. State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis How is the of representation therein shall be reduced in the pro- reduced? portion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State. basis qualified SEC. 3. No person shall be a senator or repre- Who are dissentative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice- from holdPresident, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having ing office? How re stored? How is the public debt guaranteed? The rebel debt, how previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as any officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. SEC. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor repudiated? any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations, and claims shall be held illegal and void. 236. SEC. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. 275. This amendment was never submitted to the President for his approval or veto. In a message to Congress, he said, that the sending it to the States was not to be construed into an approval of its provisions. Nevertheless, it was sent by the Secretary of State to all the States. In a letter of transmission to the editor, on the 29th October, 1867, the Secretary of State remarks: "I also send an accurate copy (of the fourteenth amendment) as proposed by Congress; but as this amendment has not yet been ratified by a sufficient number of the States, through their legislatures, agreeably to the requirements of the Constitution, it is not deemed expedient in this case to promulgate any official data in relation thereto." Application was then made to the clerk of the House of Representatives who politely furnished the following:: Dates of the ratification of the XIVth constitutional amendment. 1866 Connecticut, June 30; New Hampshire, July 7; Tennessee, July 19; New Jersey, September 11; Oregon, September 19; Vermont, November 7. 1867: New York, January 10; Ohio, January 11 (withdrawn Jan. 1868); Nevada, January 11 and 22; Illinois, January 15; West Virginia, January 16; Kansas, January 18; Missouri, January 26; Indiana, January 29; Minnesota, February 1; Rhode Island, February 7; Pennsylvania, February 13; |