CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



granted thnt it will be admitted by every 

 in. -miter of the House that the powers of Con- 

 are specific as well as limited, and that 

 all the powers which Congress can, legislative- 

 ly in- otherwise, rightfully exercise are held by 

 itii'ii rV.'in the people of the several States 

 nf the I'nifM. \V here, then, in the Constitu- 

 tion is to be found the power which authorizes 

 tlu- passage of this measure? The power un- 

 der which it is claimed, as I understand it, is 

 derived chiefly from the first and fifth sections 

 of the fourteenth article of amendment. It is 

 true, in this connection, I have frequently seen 

 reference made, also, to the fifteenth article of 

 amendment. To see how far the power is sus- 

 tained by the claim, we must therefore look 

 into the purport and meaning of both these ar- 

 ticles of amendment as they stand, without 

 any consideration at this time as to their his- 

 tory, or how they became incorporated into 

 the organic law of the Union. 



" The two sections of the fourteenth article 

 referred to are in the following words : 



ARTICLE XIV. Section 1. All persons born or nat- 

 uralized in the United States, and subject to the ju- 

 risdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States 

 and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall 

 make or enforce any luw 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. * * * 



Sec. 5. The Congress shall have power to en- 

 force, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of 

 this article. 



" Sections 2, 3, and 4 of this article embrace 

 a number of different subjects, not at all ger- 

 mane to the one under consideration. 



"The fifteenth article is in the following 

 words : 



ARTICLE XV. Section 1. The right of the citizens 

 of the United States to vote shall not be denied or 

 abridged by the United States, or by any State, on 

 account of race, color, or previous condition of servi- 

 tude. 



Sec. 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce 

 this article by appropriate legislation. 



" The reading of the fifteenth amendment 

 shows it has no application whatever to the 

 subject. Its main object was to deny to both 

 Congress and the States the exercise of a cer- 

 tain power. 



" And as to the first section of the fourteenth, 

 all I have to say here is that it very clearly 

 appears from its words that it has but two ob- 

 jects. These were, first, to declare the col- 

 ored race to be citizens of the United States, 

 and of the States, respectively, in which they 

 reside ; and, secondly, to prohibit the States, 

 severally, from denying to the class of citizens, 

 so declared, the same privileges, immunities, 

 and civil rights which were secured to the citi- 

 zens of the several States, respectively, and of 

 the United States, by the Constitution as it 

 stood before citizenship to the colored race 

 was declared by this amendment. 



" As to the fifth section of the fourteenth 



amendment and the second section of the fif- 

 teenth, so far aa they relate to the >. 

 matter of the body of each amendment, re- 

 spectively, their clear meaning and import are 

 to provide security to the colored me e in thu 

 enjoyment of the privileges, immunities, and 

 rights so declared, in the same way and in like 

 manner aa was provided for the security of like 

 privileges, immunities, and rights of the citi- 

 zens of the several States, respectively, by the 

 Constitution before this amendment, and that 

 no other remedy for a violation of the prohibi- 

 tions on State action in either of these amend- 

 ments was contemplated than such as existed 

 for like violations of like prohibitions anterior 

 to the amendments. The exercise of no new 

 power was conferred by either of these new 

 amendments. The denial of the exercise of 

 any number of powers by the Unit-id States, 

 severally, does not, most certainly, confer its 

 exercise upon the Congress of the States. 

 Neither of these amendments confers, bestows, 

 or even declares, any rights at all to citizens of 

 the United . States, or to any class whatever. 

 Upon the colored race they neither confer, be- 

 stow, nor declare civil rights of any character ; 

 not even the right of franchise. They only 

 forbid the States from discriminating in their 

 laws against the colored race in the bestow- 

 ment of such rights as they may severally 

 deem best to bestow upon their own citizens. 

 Whatever rights they grant to other citizens 

 eh all not be denied to the colored race as a 

 class. This is the whole of the matter. The 

 question then is, how can Congress enforce a 

 prohibition of the exercise of these powers by 

 a State? Most assuredly in the same way 

 they enforced or provided for violations of 

 like prohibitions anterior to these amend- 

 ments. 



"The proper remedies before were, and 

 now are, nothing but the judgments of courts, 

 to be rendered in such way as Congress 

 might provide, declaring any State acts in 

 violation of the prohibitions to be null and of 

 no effect, because of their being in violation 

 of this covenant between the States as set 

 forth in the Constitution of the United States. 

 No new power over this matter of a different 

 nature or character from that previously dele- 

 gated over like subjects was intended to be con- 

 ferred by the concluding sections of either the 

 fourteenth or fifteenth article of amendment. 

 No such thing as the tremendous power of ex- 

 ercising general municipal as well as criminal 

 legislation over the people of the several States 

 could have been dreamed of by the proposers 

 of these amendments. Such a construction 

 would entirely upset the whole fabric of the 

 Government, the maintenance of which in its 

 integrity was the avowed object of the war. 

 If the construction upon which this bill rests 

 be a true construction, then you have power 

 to prosecute and punish all those in Georgia 

 and other States, numbering not only thou- 

 sands but hundreds of thousands, who are 



