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Rh three classes of petitioners, all phrases which were regarded by any of them as objectionable. The amendment as now presented is therefore the combined wish of the women of the country, viz., that citizenship in the United States shall mean suffrage, and that no one shall be deprived of the right to vote for reasons not equally applicable to all citizens.

said: It is necessary to refer to a remarkable decision of the Supreme Court. The case of Virginia L. Minor, claiming the right to vote under the fourteenth amendment, was argued before the Supreme Court of the United States, October term, 1874; decision rendered adversely by Chief-Justice Waite, March, 1875, upon the ground that "the United States had no voters in the States of its own creation." This was a most amazing decision to emanate from the highest judicial authority of the nation, and is but another proof how fully that body is under the influence of the dominant political party.

Contrary to this decision, I unhesitatingly affirm that the United States has possessed voters in States of its own creation from the very date of the constitution. In Article I, Sec. 2, the constitution provides that

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.

The persons so designated are voters under State laws; but by this section of the national constitution they are made United States voters. It is directed under what conditions of State qualification they may cast votes in their respective States for members of the lower house of congress. The constitution here created a class of United States voters by adoption of an already voting class. Did but this single instance exist, it would be sufficient to nullify Chief-Justice Waite's decision, as Article VI, Sec. 2, declares

The constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof *** shall be the supreme law of the land.

This supreme law at its very inception created a class of United States voters. If in the Minor case alone, the premises of the Supreme Court and Chief-Justice Waite were wrong, the decision possesses no legal value; but in addition to this class, the United States, by special laws and amendments has from time to time created other classes of United States voters.

Under the naturalization laws citizenship is recognized as the basis of suffrage. No State can admit a foreigner to the right of the ballot, even under United States laws, unless he is already a citizen, or has formally declared his intention of becoming a citizen of the United States. The creation of the right here is national; its regulation, local.

Men who commit crimes against the civil laws of the United States forfeit their rights of citizenship. State law cannot re-habilitate them, but within the last five years 2,500 such men have been pardoned by congressional enactment, and thus again been made voters in States by United States law. Is it not strange that with a knowledge of these facts before him Chief-Justice Waite could base his decision against the right of a