Page:Justice and Jurisprudence - 1889.pdf/143

92 Civil War, which, as you will hereafter see, was a bloody arbitrament of this right reason, resulting in the restoration to the law's protection of those who, according to the decision of the Supreme Court in Scott v. Sandford, were situated so low as not to be within the reach of its protecting arm. The States, by the adoption of these Constitutional Amendments, incorporated into the Constitution, as part of the organic law, the sound proposition that no man is so humble as to be denied the law's protection; and that the civil rights which any citizen enjoys shall be possessed by all, freely and without price; this, however, not as a re-enactment of the common law, but as the assertion of an eternal and immutable rule of right for a free people."

If then, by the common law, civil liberty and civil rights were the inheritance of mankind, the student wondered how any lawyer of sound judgment, even though he might sneer at the lofty ethics of universal civil rights, could, without incurring the guilt of warring against conscience, argue with gravity the abstract legal proposition, that, although the Rebellion, the Constitution, and the Amendments thereto had firmly established the common-law doctrine of the equality of all men, yet wherever and whenever the interests of public servants might be prejudiced by conforming to that doctrine, eo instanti it ceased to act; that, as the artisans and public servants were a superior order of the State, the doctrine of civil rights did not apply to them; that they might plead their privilege to disregard the constitutional as well as the common- and statute-law provisions for the enforcement of the civil rights of any citizen, in case their business interests were favorably affected by depriving those citizens of their civil rights, privileges, and immunities; and that such act was no violation either of the Constitution or of the common law, but, on the contrary, was privileged and licensed upon the express ground that such action, in the judgment of the artisan and public servant, tended to promote the general welfare of the public, and private emolument in the public service. But he concluded at that time to give no voice to these reflections. After a momentary pause in the conversation, he observed, that unless he altogether misunderstood the Chief Justice, the Supreme Court and