Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 9.djvu/347

319 A NEW NATION, 319 the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, we come now in conchision to a consideration of the magnitude and extent of the changes effected by those Amendments. "The revolution worked by these Amendments is a momentous one, and must be judged by consequences which time alone can disclose." ^ It is to be noticed in the first place that the language of the Fourteenth Amendment is sufficiently broad and comprehensive to embrace all the rights of the individual citizens, and place them under the shelter and protection of the National power. The words " privileges and immunities," and '' life, liberty, and property," had been long in use when the Fourteenth Amendment was framed. The words ** liberties and immunities," as we have seen, were used in the Charter of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. The same words, and the words *' life, liberty, and property," were used in the Declaration of Rights adopted by the Continental Congress, October 10, 1774.^ The words " life, liberty, or property " were used in the Fifth Amendment, framed in 1789, and the words *' privileges and immunities " were used in the Constitution itself, Article IV. § 2. The words "privileges and immunities" were defined by Mr. Justice Washington, sitting in the Circuit Court of the United States for Pennsylvania in 1825, in the case of Corfield v. Coryell, 4 Wash. C. C. 371. He says : — "The inquiry is, what are the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States? We feel no hesitation in confining these expressions to those privileges and immunities which are in their nature fundamental, which belong of right to the citizens of all free governments ; and which have at all times been enjoyed by the citizens of the several States which compose this Union, from the time of their becoming free, independent, and sovereign. What these fundamental principles are, it would perhaps be more tedious than difficult to enumerate. They may however be all comprehended under the following general heads : protection by the government ; the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the right to acquire and possess property of every kind and to pursue and obtain happiness and safety ; subject nevertheless to such restraints as the government may justly prescribe for the general good of the whole. The right of a citizen of one State to pass through or to reside in any other State, for purposes of trade, agriculture, professional pursuits, or otherwise ; to claim the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus ; to institute and main- 1 Hare's American Constitutional Law, Vol. II. p. 748 (1889). 2 All these words were used in many of the State Constitutions. See Cooley's Con- stitutional Limitations, 6th ed. (1890), pp. 429, 430.