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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



Mr. Drake : " There is a source of power to 

 enforce all that is written in that amendment." 



Mr. Sumner : " That is, to enforce the im- 

 munities and privileges of citizens. Congress 

 has plenary power to enforce those immunities 

 and privileges. What more can it have ? What 

 amendment can you invent ROW that will give 

 Congress so much as it has there? " 



Mr. Drake: "Mr. President, there is the 

 very assumption again that the word * privi- 

 leges ' embraces the right to vote; and that is 

 the very thing I am disputing. I say again, 

 and I call upon any Senator here who can do 

 it, to show me where in the United States a 

 man can vote merely because he is a citizen of 

 the United States. I say, fearlessly, nowhere 

 within the limits of the territory of the whole 

 United States. There is, wherever he may be, 

 a local constitution or a local law which pre- 

 scribes something more than to be a citizen of 

 the United States in order that he shall vote. 

 Every Senator here knows that fact as existing 

 in his own State, and therefore it is that it is 

 impossible that the word 'privileges' as con- 

 tained in this section of the Constitution can 

 embrace the right to vote because a man is a 

 citizen of the United States." 



Mr. Patterson, of New Hampshire : " I should 

 like to call the attention of the gentleman to 

 one point, as I do not wish to speak myself on 

 this subject. If the construction which the 

 Senator from Vermont puts upon this first sec- 

 tion of the fourteenth amendment is true, will 

 it not abrogate the educational provision with 

 regard to the right of suffrage in Massachusetts ? 

 Will it not abrogate the religious test which is 

 in the letter of the constitution of New Hamp- 

 shire for officeholding, and the requirement of 

 residence also ? " 



Mr. Drake : " I would say, with regard to 

 that, that there is just one conclusion to which 

 the constitutional lawyer must come if the con- 

 struction claimed by the Senator from Ver- 

 mont is correct ; and that is, that every single 

 provision contained in every constitution of 

 every State of this Union is wiped out by that 

 single sentence, except the mere requirement 

 that the man shall be a citizen of the United 

 States, and that it imposes that requirement 

 upon every man in every State, notwithstand- 

 ing the constitution of the State may admit 

 men to vote who are not citizens of the United 

 States. I do not think that that is a correct 

 construction of this sentence. I think we have 

 more to do. I think that sentence referred 

 only to the privileges and immunities which 

 attach to men as citizens of the United States." 



Mr. Edmunds : " What are those ? " 

 < Mr. Drake : "Personal, sir; the right to life, 

 liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness." 



Mr. Edmunds : " Do you think, then, that 

 a citizen of the United States would have a 

 right to acquire real estate in your State except 

 he took it by or in conformity to your law ? " 



Mr. Drake : " No, sir ; that is a mere matter 

 of local form." 



Mr. Edmunds : "A mere regulation." 



Mr. Drake : "A mere regulation as matter 

 of local form." 



Mr. Edmunds : " So is the residence of the 

 voter." 



Mr. Drake : *' But this does not have the 

 effect of wiping out that regulation." 



Mr. Edmunds : " It does if it is construed in 

 that way." 



Mr. Drake : " If it is to be construed as 

 giving the right to vote, then, as I said before, 

 it does wipe out every thing else, and we stand 

 here then before the whole country claiming 

 that a constitutional amendment, which was 

 adopted without any man in the nation ever 

 saying that it meant that thing, does sweep out 

 from the constitutions of all the States all the 

 requirements of age, of residence, of property, 

 of education. Every thing of that kind is swept 

 away by that one clause, and all men who are 

 citizens of the United States are entitled to vote 

 wherever they may happen to be at the time 

 of the election." 



Mr. Edmunds : " I hope the Senate will not 

 be frightened out of any fair construction of 

 the fourteenth article, or any other article, by 

 the tremendous consequences which my friend 

 from Missouri has painted. I do not think it 

 would be very frightful if it should happen 

 that the clause in the constitution of New 

 Hampshire which requires a certain religious 

 test I do not know whether it is Mohamme- 

 dan or Christian or what it may be for hold- 

 ing office, or the clause in any other State con- 

 stitution which limits the right to vote to per- 

 sons of a particular race, were swept away. 

 The question is, after all, what is the fair, legal 

 construction that can be fairly put upon lan- 

 guage which is to be interpreted favorably and 

 beneficially for the enlargement of the rights 

 of men. The argument that the Senator from 

 Missouri has addressed to us is based purely 

 upon consequences that he supposes to be ab- 

 surd or inconvenient which are to flow from 

 that construction. 



" Now, sir, to condense ; the key to this whole 

 question between my friend and me is here : 

 if it is one of the essential privileges of citizen- 

 ship, as my friend knows that it is to him and 

 to me, to vote, to exercise political power, then 

 the Constitution says that the privileges which 

 belong to him and me shall not be denied or 

 abridged by any State. 



"The Constitution does not say that the 

 privileges and immunities of a particular class, 

 a chosen few, shall not be denied or abridged. 

 It does not declare that in the State of New 

 Hampshire the privileges and the immunities 

 of Protestants shall not be abridged or denied. 

 It does not say that in Massachusetts the privi- 

 leges and immunities of those who can read 

 and write and know how to defend themselves 

 shall not be denied ; but it is a comprehensive 

 term as well in the objects over which it rests 

 as in the subject of which it speaks ; and the 

 difficulty which my friend has suggested, that 



