Amendment of the Constitution from legislative aggression. That clause of the amendment which declares that no State shall deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law,' was intended to protect every valuable right which a man has. The words 'life, liberty and property are constitutional terms, and are to be taken in their broadest sense. They indicate the three great subdivisions of all civil right. The term 'property,' in this clause, embraces all valuable interests which a man may possess outside of himself, that is to say, outside of his life and liberty. It is not confined to mere tangible property, but extends to every species of vested right. In my judgment, it would be a very narrow and technical construction to hold otherwise. In an advanced civilization like ours, a very large proportion of the property of individuals is not visible and tangible, but consists in rights and claims against others, or against the government itself.

"Now, an exemption from a demand, or an immunity from prosecution in a suit, is as valuable to the one party as the right to the demand or to prosecute the suit is to the other. The two things are correlative, and to say that the one is protected by constitutional guaranties and that the other is not, seems to me almost an absurdity. One right is as valuable as the other. My property is as much imperilled by an action against me for money, as it is by an action against me for my land or my goods. It may involve and sweep away all that I have in the world. Is not a right of defence to such an action of the greatest value to me? If it is not property in the sense of the Constitution, then we need another amendment to that instrument. But it seems to me that there can hardly be a doubt that it is property.

§ 754. "The immunity from suit which arises by operation of the statute of limitations is as valuable a right as the right to bring the suit itself. It is a right founded upon a wise and just policy. Statutes of limitation are not only calculated for the repose and peace of society, but to provide against the evils that arise from loss of evidence and the fail

ing memory of witnesses. It is true that a man may plead the statute when he justly owes the debt for which he is sued; and this has led the Courts to adopt strict rules of pleading and proof to be observed when the defence of the statute is interposed. But it is, nevertheless, a right given by a just and politic law, and when vested is as much to be protected as any other right that a man has."

§ 755. The right to sell liquor is not one of the privileges and immunities of a citizen which a State may not abridge.

Query: If a person owning liquor or other property when the law was passed should be forbidden to sell the same, would not the statute conflict with the clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which declares that a State shall not "deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law." (Bartemeyer v. Iowa, 18 Wall. 129.)

§ 756. A State law of prohibition of the sale of intoxicating liquors which is designed in fairness, to protect the public against the evils resulting from the excessive use of such liquors, is a police regulation and not in conflict with the Fourteenth Amendment. (Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U. S. 623.)

§ 757. The Supreme Court of the State of Illinois having -refused to grant a license to a woman to practise law in that Court, the Supreme Court of the United States refused to sustain the plea that the refusal was a violation of the clause in the amendment which inhibits a State from abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.

§ 758. The right to practise law in a State is not a privilege or immunity of a citizen as a citizen of the United States, and is therefore a right that is subject to State laws and regulations. (Bradwell v. The State, 16 Wall. 130.)

§ 759. In 1875 a statute was passed by Congress (St. v. 18, p. 335), which provided in substance that all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States should be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the accommodations, advantages, facilities and privileges of inns, public conveyances on land or water, theatres and other places of public amusement.

§ 760. This enactment was supplemented by penalties for any violation of its provisions.

The Court held the statute unconstitutional and upon the ground that the authority granted to Congress to enforce the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment was limited to what is called corrective legislation; that is, legislation designed to control State legislation in violation of any of the rights guaranteed to citizens of the United States by that amendment.

§ 761. The law of Congress was designed to prevent discriminations by private persons, as the owners of theatres and other places of amusement.

The Court held that the amendment operated only upon States and their duly authorized officers and agents, and contained no guaranty against discriminations that might be made by private persons acting without authority from the State.

§ 762. In the opinion, Mr. Justice Bradley uses this language:

"It is State action of a particular character that is prohibited. Individual invasion of individual rights is not the subject-matter of the amendment. It has a deeper and broader scope. It nullifies and makes void all State legislation, and State action of every kind, which impairs the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States, or which injures them in life, liberty or property without due process of law, or which denies to any of them the equal protection of the laws. . .

§ 763. "It does not authorize Congress to create a code of municipal law for the regulation of private rights; but to provide modes of redress against the operation of State laws and the action of State officers, executive or judicial, when these are subversive of the fundamental rights specified in the amendment." (Civil Rights Cases, 109 U. S. 3.)

CHAPTER LXIV.

AS TO THE ELECTIVE FRANCHISE.

ART. 15.

"Section 1. The right of 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 servitude.

"Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

§ 764. The Fifteenth Amendment does not confer the right of suffrage on any one, but it protects citizens from any discrimination in the exercise of the elective franchise on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.

§ 765. As in the case of the Fourteenth Amendment, the power of Congress is limited to corrective legislation as distinguished from direct legislation, in the form of a declaration of rights, privileges and immunities to be enjoyed by any class of citizens. (United States v. Reese et al., 92 U. S. 214.)

§ 766. In the case of the United States against Cruikshank (92 U. S. 542), the Court said: "The right to vote in the States comes from the States; but the right of exemption from the prohibited discrimination comes from the United States. The first has not been granted or secured by the Constitution of the United States; but the last has been."

§ 767. This doctrine was enlarged upon in the case Ex parte Yarborough (110 U. S. 651).

"While it is quite true, as was said by this Court in United States v. Reese, 92 U. S. 214, that this article gives no affirmative right to the colored man to vote, and is designed primarily to prevent discrimination against him whenever the right to vote may be granted to others, it is easy to see that,

under some circumstances, it may operate as the immediate source of a right to vote.

§ 768. "In all cases where the former slave-holding States had not removed from their Constitution the words 'white man,' as a qualification for voting, this provision did, in effect, confer on him the right to vote, because, being paramount to the State law, it annulled the discriminating word 'white,' and thus left him in the enjoyment of the same right as white persons. And such would be the effect of any future constitutional provision of a State which should give the right of voting exclusively to white people, whether they be men or women. In such cases the Fifteenth Amendment does, proprio vigore, substantially confer on the negro the right to vote, and Congress has the power to protect and enforce that right."