Courts of equity have jurisdiction to grant relief against the threatened deprivation of rights guaranteed under the 14th and 15th amendments.

Holt v. Indiana Mfg. Co. 176 U. S. 68, 44 L. ed. 374, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 272.

This is not a suit brought to enforce a political right, but a civil right guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States. Nor is it sought in this action to control the exercise of any political functions of the state of Alabama, since no state has the right, nor have its officers the right, to deprive any person of the equal protection of the law or of his right to vote, on account of his race and color or previous condition of servitude.

United States v. Reese, 92 U. S. 214, 23 L. ed. 563; Green v. Mills, 30 L. R. A. 90, 16 C. C. A. 516, 25 U. S. App. 383, 69 Fed. 852; United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 23 L. ed. 588.

Equity alone has the power to anticipate and prevent a threatened injury, where damages would be insufficient or the wrong irreparable.

Re Lennon, 166 U. S. 548, 41 L. ed. 1110, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 658; Vicksburg Waterworks Co. v. Vicksburg, 185 U. S. 65, 46 L. ed. 808, 22 Sup. Ct. Rep. 585.

The question of the constitutionality of a state Constitution was the principal matter presented to the circuit court for decision, and the bill of complaint being dismissed on demurrer, an appeal from that ruling brings the whole case before this court for decision, notwithstanding the certification of the question of jurisdiction by the circuit court.

McLish v. Roff, 141 U. S. 661, 35 L. ed. 893, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 118; Horner v. United States, 143 U. S. 578, 36 L. ed. 269, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 522; Holder v. Aultman, M. & Co. 169 U. S. 81, 42 L. ed. 669, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 269; Scott v. Donald, 165 U. S. 58, 41 L. ed. 632, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 265; Penn Mut L. Ins. Co. v. Austin, 168 U. S. 685, 42 L. ed. 626, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 223; Whitten v. Tomlinson, 160 U. S. 231, 40 L. ed. 406, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 297.

Mr. W. A. Gunter submitted the cause for appellees:

The right to be admitted to registration as an elector, which is sought to be enforced in this case, is purely political, and therefore beyond the jurisdiction of a court of equity. Green v. Mills, 30 L. R. A. 90, 16 C. C. A. 516, 25 U. S. App. 383, 69 Fed. 852; Fletcher v. Tuttle, 151 İlì. 41, 25 L. R. A. 143, 37 N. E. 683.

The appeal should be dismissed because it is impossible for the appellate court, if it should decide the case in favor of the plaintiff, to grant him any effectual relief.

Mills v. Green, 159 U. S. 651, 40 L. ed. 293, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 132.

[4821 *Mr. Justice Holmes delivered the opinion

of the court:

This is a bill in equity brought by a colored man, on behalf of himself "and on

The allegations of the bill may be summed up as follows: The plaintiff is subject to none of the disqualifications set forth in the Constitution of Alabama and is entitled to vote,- entitled, as the bill plainly means, under the Constitution as it is. He applied in March, 1902, for registration as a voter, and was refused arbitrarily on the ground of his color, together with large numbers of other duly qualified negroes, while all white men were registered. The same thing was done all over the state. Under § 187 of article 8 of the Alabama Constitution, persons reg istered before January 1, 1903, remain electors for life unless they become disqualified by certain crimes, etc., while after that date severer tests come into play which would exclude, perhaps, a large part of the black race. Therefore by the refusal the plaintiff and the other negroes excluded were deprived, not only of their vote at an election which has taken place since the bill was filed, but of the permanent advantage incident to registration before 1903. The white men generally are registered for good under the easy test, and the black men are likely to be kept out in the future as in the past. This refusal to register the blacks was part of a general scheme to disfranchise them, to which the defendants and the state itself, according to the bill, were parties. The defendants accepted their office for the purpose of carrying out the scheme. The *part taken by the state, that is, by the [483] white population which framed the Constitution, consisted in shaping that instrument so as to give opportunity and elect to the wholesale fraud which has been practised.

The bill sets forth the maerial sections of the state Constitution, the general plan of which, leaving out details, is as follows: By § 178 of article 8, to entitle a person to vote he must have resided in the state at least two years, in the county one year, and in the precinct or ward three months, immediately preceding the election, have paid his poll taxes, and have been duly registered as an elector. By § 182 idiots, insane persons, and those convicted of certain crimes are disqualified. Subject to the foregoing, by 180, before 1903 the following male citizens of the state, who are citizens of the United States, were entitled to register, viz.: First. All who had served honorably in the enumerated wars of the United States, including those on either side in the "war

are not prepared to say that an action at law could not be maintained on the facts al leged in the bill. Therefore, we are not pre pared to say that the decree should be af [486]firmed on the ground that the subject-matter is wholly beyond the jurisdiction of the circuit court. Smith v. McKay, 161 U. S. 355, 358, 359, 40 L. ed. 731, 732, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 490.

Although the certificate relates only to the jurisdiction of that court as a court of the United States, yet, as the ground of the bill is that the Constitution of Alabama is in contravention of the Constitution of the United States, the appeal opens the whole case under the act of 1891, chap. 517, § 5 (26 Stat. at L. 827, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 549). The plaintiff had the right to ap peal directly to this court. The certificate was unnecessary to found the jurisdiction of this court, and could not narrow it. As the case properly is here, we proceed to consider the substance of the complaint.

It seems to us impossible to grant the equitable relief which is asked. It will be observed, in the first place, that the language of 1979 does not extend the sphere of equitable jurisdiction in respect of what shall be held an appropriate subject-matter for that kind of relief. The words are, "shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress." They allow a suit in equity only when that is the proper proceeding for redress, and they refer to existing standards to determine what is a proper proceeding. The traditional limits of proceedings in equity have not embraced a remedy for political wrongs. Green v. Mills, 30 L. R. A. 90, 16 C. C. A. 516, 25 U. S. App. 383, 69 Fed. 852. But we cannot forget that we are dealing with a new and extraordinary situation, and we are unwilling to stop short of the final considerations which seem to us to dispose of the case.

The difficulties which we cannot overcome are two, and the first is this: The plaintiff alleges that the whole registration scheme of the Alabama Constitution is a fraud upon the Constitution of the United States, and asks us to declare it void. But, of course, he could not maintain a bill for a mere declaration in the air. He does not try to do so, but asks to be registered as a party qualified under the void instrument. If, then, we accept the conclusion which it is the chief purpose of the bill to maintain, how can we make the court a party to the unlawful scheme by accepting it and adding another voter to its fraudulent lists? If a white man came here on the same general [487]*allegations, admitting his sympathy with the plan, but alleging some special prejudice that had kept him off the list, we hardly should think it necessary to meet him with a reasoned answer. But the relief cannot be varied because we think that in the future the particular plaintiff is likely to try to overthrow the scheme. If we accept the plaintiff's allegations for the purposes of his case, he cannot complain. We must accept or reject them. It is impossible simply to

shut our eyes, put the plaintiff on the lists, be they honest or fraudulent, and leave the determination of the fundamental question for the future. If we have an opinion that the bill is right on its face, or if we are undecided, we are not at liberty to assume it to be wrong for the purposes of decision. It seems to us that unless we are prepared to say that it is wrong, that all its principal allegations are immaterial, and that the registration plan of the Alabama Constitution is valid, we cannot order the plaintiff's name to be registered. It is not an answer to say that if all the blacks who are qualified according to the letter of the instrument were registered, the fraud would be cured. In the first place, there is no probability that any way now is open by which more than a few could be registered; but, if all could be, the difficulty would not be overcome. If the sections of the Constitution concerning registration were illegal in their inception, it would be a new doctrine in constitutional law that the original invalidity could be cured by an administration which defeated their intent. We express no opinion as to the alleged fact of their unconstitutionality beyond saying that we are not willing to assume that they are valid, in the face of the allegations and main object of the bill, for the purpose of granting the relief which it was necessary to pray in order that that object should be secured.

The other difficulty is of a different sort, and strikingly reinforces the argument that equity cannot undertake now, any more than it has in the past, to enforce political rights, and also the suggestion that state constitutions were not left unmentioned in § 1979 by accident. In determining whether a court of equity can take jurisdiction, one of the first questions is what it can do to enforce any order that it may make. This is alleged to be the conspiracy of a state, al-[488] though the state is not and could not be made a party to the bill. Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U. S. 1, 33 L. ed. 842, 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 504. The circuit court has no constitutional power to control its action by any direct means. And if we leave the state out of consideration, the court has as little practical power to deal with the people of the state in a body. The bill imports that the great mass of the white population intends to keep the blacks from voting. To meet such an intent something more than ordering the plaintiff's name to be inscribed upon the lists of 1902 will be needed. If the conspiracy and the intent exist, a name on a piece of paper will not defeat them. Unless we are prepared to supervise the voting in that state by officers of the court, it seems to us that all that the plaintiff could get an empty form. from equity would be Apart from damages to the individual, relief from a great political wrong, if done, as alleged, by the people of a state and the state itself, must be given by them or by the legislative and political department of the government of the United States. Decrec affirmed.

is a constitutional question shown in the pleadings, the certificate may be ignored and the entire case presented to this court for consideration. In other words, although the plaintiff, by his method of appeal, following the provisions of the statute, limited the inquiry to the matter of jurisdiction, this court will ignore such limit and treat the case as coming here on a general appeal, which he did not take. This conclusion seems to me to practically destroy the statute and overrule the prior decisions, for the jurisdiction of Federal courts primarily rests on the Constitution of the United States, and the extent of their jurisdiction is determined by its provisions. Hence, every case coming up on a certificate of jurisdiction may be held to present a constitutional question, and be open for full inquiry in respect to all matters involved.

Neither can I assent to the proposition that the case presented by the plaintiff's bill is not strictly a legal one and entitling a party to a judicial hearing and decision. He alleges that he is a citizen of Alabama, entitled to vote; that he desired to vote at an election for representative in Congress; that without registration he could not vote, and that registration was wrongfully denied him by the defendants. That many others were similarly treated does not destroy his rights or deprive him of relief in the courts. That such relief will be given has been again and again affirmed in both national and state

courts.

That the United States circuit court has jurisdiction of an action like this seems to me to result inevitably from prior decisions of this court. Without stopping to notice in detail the cases of Ex parte Siebold, 100 U. S. 371, 25 L. ed. 717; Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 651, 28 L. ed. 274, 4 Sup. Ct. Rep. 152, and Re Coy, 127 U. S. 731, 32 L. ed. 274, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1263, in which the general jurisdiction of Federal courts over matters involved in the election of national officers is affirmed, I refer to two recent cases which bear directly upon the present question: Wiley v. Sinkler, 179 U. S. 58, 45 L. ed. 84, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 17, was an action brought in the circuit court of the United States by the plaintiff to recover damages of an election board for wilfully rejecting his vote for a member of the House of Representatives. We held that the court had jurisdiction, and said (p. 64, L. ed. p. SS. Sup. Ct. Rep. p. 20): [492] *"This action is brought against election officers to recover damages for their rejection of the plaintiff's vote for a member of the House of Representatives of the United States. The complaint, by alleging that the plaintiff was at the time, under the Constitution and laws of the state of South Carolina and the Constitution and laws of the United States, a duly qualified elector of the state, shows that the action is brought under the Constitution and laws of the United States. The damages are laid at the sum of $2.500. What amount of damages the plaintiff shall recover in such an action is peculiarly appropriate for the determination of a

jury, and no opinion of the court upon that subject can justify it in holding that the amount in controversy was insufficient to support the jurisdiction of the circuit court. Barry v. Edmunds, 116 U. S. 550, 29 L. ed. 729, 6 Sup. Ct. Rep. 501; Scott v. Donald, 165 U. S. 58, 89, 41 L. ed. 632, 638, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 265; Vance v. W. A. Vandercook Co. 170 U. S. 468, 472, 42 L. ed. 1111, 1113, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 645; North American Transp. & Trading Co. v. Morrison, 178 U. S. 262, 267, 44 L. ed. 1061, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 869. The circuit court, therefore, clearly had jurisdiction of this action, and we are brought to the consideration of the other objections presented by the demurrer to the complaint.'

Again, in Swafford v. Templeton, 185 U. S. 487, 46 L. ed. 1005, 22 Sup. Ct. Rep. 783, which, like the former case, was one brought in the circuit court of the United States to recover damages for the alleged wrongful refusal by the defendants, as election officers, to permit the plaintiff to vote at a national election for a member of the House of Representatives, it was held that the court had jurisdiction. Here, too, we said, after referring to Wiley v. Sinkler (p. 492, L. ed. p. 1007, Sup. Ct. Rep. p. 785):

"It is manifest from the context of the opinion in the case just referred to that the conclusion that the cause was one arising under the Constitution of the United States was predicated on the conception that the action sought the vindication or protection of the right to vote for a member of Congress, a right, as declared in Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 655, 664, 28 L. ed. 275, 278, 4 Sup. Ct. Rep. 152, 'fundamentally based upon the Constitution of the United States, which created the office of member of Congress, and declared that it should be elective, and pointed out the means of ascertaining who should be electors.' That is to say, the ruling was that the case was equally one arising under the Constitution or laws of the United States, whether the illegal act complained of arose from a charged viola-[493] tion of some specific provision of the Constitution or laws of the United States, or from the violation of a state law which affected the exercise of the right to vote for a member of Congress, since the Constitution of the United States had adopted, as the qualifications of electors for members of Congress, those prescribed by the state for electors of the most numerous branch of the legislature of the state. It results from what has just been said that the court erred in dismissing the action for want of jurisdiction, since the right which it was claimed had been unlawfully invaded was one in the very nature of things arising under the Constitution and laws of the United States, and that this inhered in the very substance of the claim. It is obvious from an inspection of the certificate that the court, in dismissing for want of jurisdiction, was controlled by what it deemed to be the want of merit in the averments which were made in the complaint as to the violation of the Federal right. But, as the very nature of the con