The Fifteenth The Fifteenth Amendment declares that "the LECTURE XII. right of citizens of the United States to vote Amendment. shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." These provisions of the amendments to the Constitution, adopted immediately after the close of the civil war as part of the system of reconstruction made necessary by that war, have been the subject of much discussion in the public prints, in both Houses of Congress, and of decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. A moment's glance at them will show that they are too important to be considered at the close of a lecture already sufficiently long. NOTES UPON LECTURE XII. LECTURE XII. THIS lecture closes with a reference to the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, but without discussing them. They are treated in the Supplementary Paper, No. XIII, which is devoted to the consideration of subjects not discussed elsewhere. In previous lectures, Mr. Justice Miller has referred to a class of powers which States may not exercise, because exclusively conferred upon Congress. The most prominent among these is the power to regulate commerce, which the Supreme Court, after considerable fluctuation, held, in a case in which the opinion was written by Mr. Justice Miller, to be so exclusively vested in Congress that a State could not legislate upon the subject. In the headnote, which was also prepared by him, the proposition is laid down that "a statute of a State, intended to regulate, or to tax, or to impose any other restriction upon the transmission of persons or property or telegraphic messages from one State to another, is not within that class of legislation which the States may enact in the absence of legislation by Congress; and such statutes are void, even as to that part of such transaction which may LECTURE XII. be within the State."1 While the Constitution, by the tenth section of the First Article, took away from the States the power of passing bills of attainder and ex post facto laws, by the second paragraph in the third section of the Third Article it conferred upon Congress the "power to declare the punishment of treason," but added: "but no attainder shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted." As pertinent to the general subject of attainder, though not to the limitation of the powers of States, I will briefly notice the action of Congress and of the Supreme Court in respect of this power. In 1861 Congress passed an act for the confiscation of property used in aid of the rebellion.2 This was followed the next year by "an act to suppress insurrection, to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate the property of rebels, and for other purposes," "3 which made provision for the seizure, judicial confiscation, and sale of the property of persons giving aid and comfort to the rebellion. The latter act was accompanied by a joint resolution of Congress, also approved by the President, in which, after referring to that act, it was said: "Nor shall any punishment or proceedings under said act be 1 Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway Co. v. Illinois, 118 U. S. 557. 2 Act of August 6, 1861, 12 Stat. 319 c. 60. 3 Act of July 17, 1862, 12 Stat. 589 c. 195. Notes. LECTURE XII. so construed as to work a forfeiture of the real estate of the offender beyond his natural life."1 The court held that the joint resolution was intended to protect the interest of the heirs only; and that the interest of the offender in the real estate could be seized and confiscated, leaving him without further interest or ownership in it.2 But in a later case it held that if the offender was pardoned, a remainder was left in him after the confiscated life estate which he could dispose of.3 1 Joint Resolution of July 17, 1862, 12 Stat. 627, No. 63. 2 Wallach v. Van Riswick, 92 U. S. 202. 8 Illinois Central Railroad Co. v. Bosworth, 133 U. S. 92. XIII. SUPPLEMENTARY: SUBJECTS NOT DIS CUSSED ELSEWHERE. CONSTITUTION, ARTICLE I, SECTION 1. All legisla- LECTURE XIII. tive Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Con- Supplementary. gress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives. ARTICLE I, SECTION 2, PARAGRAPHS 1, 2, and 3. The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature. No Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained to the Age of twenty-five Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen. [Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be in cluded within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other Persons.]1 The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have 1 The portion of this clause within brackets has been amended by the Fourteenth Amendment. |