The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1875-03-26


the privileges and immupities of the citizens
of the United States" 1t would be as use
less as it would be improper, in view OF the
authoritative judgment of the court of last
resort, to do more than to explain just what
it announces. In what are known as the
slaughter.house cases 16th Wallace) two
points were established: First, that this
clause prohibited the action of the State
alone, and gave Congress no power to legis-
late against the wrongs and personal violence
of the citizen; second. that the privileges and
immunlties which a State could not abridge
were only that limited class which depended
Immediately upon the Constitution of the
United States. They are few In number,
and of little importance to the great mass OF
the colored race in their present condition.
The right to pass from State to State
and to the national capital, to protection
upon the high seas and in foreign countries,
and few others, were stated as illustrations.
The great body of our civil and political
rirhts-that of acquiring and enjoying pro-
perfy. real and personal to exercise trades,
attend schools and churches, to be protected
against personal violence, and enjoy the free.
dom of opinion-were declared to rest en-
tirely under State protection, and were not
included in this amendment.
The first proposition that the power Of
Congress was not called into action under
this clause until the State, through its poiti-
cal power, had violated it's provisions by
passing or attempting TO enforce some law
obtained the unanimous consent Of every
member of the court. We do not under
stand that this is anywhere questioned.
This legislation, therefore, when no such
exieency has occurred, is without authority,
and it Is our duty for this reason to advise
YOU not TO find an indictment for violation
of its provisions.
Tue second proposition, affirmed by ma
jority of the court, just as conclusively estao-
fishes the invalidity Of this law. The cha
racter of the wrong done that of exclud-
ing citizen from hotel and theatre-is
not such as Congress has any right to pun
ish. They, say the Supreme Court, are yio-
lations of such rights as attach to citizens OF
a State, and do not belong to those which he
erioys as a citizen of the United States. 1t
is this latter limited class Of rights only which
the fourteenth amendment protects. With
in this Judgment, therefore, there is no
power of Federal legislation to provide PEN
alties for the violation Of any privilege save
the few which are enjoyed peculiarly under
the Federal Constitution. The right 10 go
from State to State; to visit the capital, aud
other national privileges, Congress may pro-
tect. All others, among which are the rights
claimed to have been infringed in the present
instance, are beyond Its control. For this
additional reason the law which attempts to
protect them is void for the want of power
10 the body which passed 1t.
The slaughter-house cases were well calcu-
lated to have elected different judgment if
the court bad not felt constrained upon
principle to decide it as it did. A State law
had substantially interfered with the trade
and calling of large class of citizens. Every
butcher and dealer 10 meats over wide
spread territory were compelled to pay an
onerous tribute to single corporation. But
their right to carry on trade, to acquire and
dispose of property, was held not to come
within the protection OF the fourteenth
amendment. There was no middle ground
for the court; they must hold either that 1t
completely revolutioniZed the whole theory
of our Government and transferred to Fedc-
raj control all those rights hitherto alone pro-
tected by State laws, or hold, upon the other
hand, that it referred only to the few priv
leres secured BY the National Constitution.
That court, in the same volume, applied the
same principle where woman in Illinois
was rejected as an applicant for admission TO
the bar. It again decided that such right
was not one of the immunities protected by
the amendment. In 18th Wallace, State
law having deprived a citizen of the rightto
saIl what he owned and possessed, it held
that the selling of property was privilege
and immunity protected by State laws and
constitutions only, and was not protected by
this clause.
With the fact that this Interpretation was
equivalent to eXpuneipS it from the amend
ments altogether, We have nothing to 10. IL
is true unquestionably that any violation OF
any privilege or immunity protected by the
Federal Constitution, 10y the State, could be
punished and redressed by congressional
Ia before the adoption of this amendment.
AS now judicially read by the court OF last
re sort, it leaves the organic law IN this regard
Or cisely where it was before. 1t Is one OF
those constructions often resorted to to pre-.
vent consequences serious and revolutionary,
which courts believe were not contem plated
by Legislatures, who pass laws, and by the
people, who adopt constitutions.
We do not deem it indicate to express
our sympathy with that large and resp"cta-
BILE class of our fellow'citiZens, including
beyond question majority OF the more con-
servative Christian gentlemen OF the South,
who regret that there exists nowhere, ID either
government, State or national, the power OF
Furnishing those mean and cowardIy murders
which are so frequently disgrncing our civil
iZation before the world. Although We
have carried the doctrine OF local govern
ment in township and county organizations
to a great extreme, we lind IN all us Ordinary
administrations most beneficial effects. To
lion inn II
statesmen now agree that there should be
some exceptions. ln no country OUT our
own is the discreditable fact true that
where murder, cruel and shocking
outrages, are perpetrated by dominant
party in a narrow region of country,
there Is no power of punishment
save through the impractlcable instru-
mentality of those who have either commit
ted or sympatbized with the crime. When
coaspiracies and combinations against the
property, well.beng, and life of classes or
persons in the small civil divisions Of eur
country include large portions of the con-
stabulary, the maglstracy, and the jurors,
grand and traverse, the inevitable conse-
uuence must be that the offences they com.
NIT, or with which they sympathizs, will be
perpetrated with impunity. Unless our
statesmen, State and national, create some
Jurisdiction Of wider scope, aud which will
authorize indictments and trial beyond the
narrow imits,a majority of whose citizens
abet the crime to be punished, the nation
must still submit to the disgrace OF yearly
additions of mean and courage-wanting
murderers of the innocent and the help.
less without the slightest iutiic,ion
of any legal penalty upon the offend.
ers. 1t has been our painful duty in
| pnos IA rharup iurjeq that the