Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 2.djvu/494

468 government of England has been for hundreds of years, for there is in this country a large class of citizens of adult age, and owners in their own right of large amounts of property, and who pay a large proportion of the taxes to support the Government, who are denied any representation whatever, either for themselves or their property—unmarried women, of whom it can not be said that their interests are represented by their husbands. In their case, neither the English nor the American theory of representation is carried out, and this utter denial of representation is justified upon the ground alone that this class of citizens are women. Surely we can not be so much less liberal than our English ancestors! Surely the Constitution of this Republic does not sanction an injustice so indefensible as that!

By the XIV. Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, what constitutes citizenship of the United States, is for the first time declared, and who are included by the term citizen. Upon this question, before that time, there had been much discussion judicial, political, and general, and no distinct and definite definition of qualification had been settled. The people of the United States determined this question by the XIV. Amendment to the Constitution, which declares that—

This amendment, after declaring who are citizens of the United States, and thus fixing but one grade of citizenship, which insures to all citizens alike all the privileges, immunities and rights which accrue to that condition, goes on in the same section and prohibits these privileges and immunities from abridgment by the States. Whatever these "privileges and immunities" are, they attach to the female citizen equally with the male. It is implied by this amendment that they are inherent, that they belong to citizenship as such, for they are not therein specified or enumerated.

The majority of the committee hold that the privileges guaranteed by the XIV. Amendment do not refer to any other than the privilege embraced in section 2, of article 4, of the original text. The committee certainly did not duly consider this unjustified statement. Section 2, of article 4, provides for the privileges of "citizens of the States," while the first section of the XIV. Amendment protects the privileges of "citizens of the United States." The term citizens of the States and citizens of the United States are by no means convertible.

A circuit court of the United States seems to hold a different view of this question from that stated by the committee. In the case of The Live Stock Association vs. Crescent City (1st Abbott, 396), Justice Bradley, of the Supreme Court of the United States, delivering the opinion, uses the following language in relation to the first clause of the XIV. Amendment:

The new prohibition that 'no State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States" is not identical with the clause in the Constitution which declared that "the citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States." It embraces much more. It is possible that those who framed the article were not themselves aware of the