The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1883-12-22


The decision rendered by the Supreme
Court 81 the United States that the Civil
Rights act is Unconstitutional is one of
the most important that has been deliv-
cred in many years. The decision was
rendered in a number of cases from diff
ferent parts of the country which were
a year ago submitted to the Court on
written arguments. These cases were
practically test cases of the law of 1875,
and the decision, which lacks but one
vote of being unanimous, is correspond
ingly important. The law In question
provided "that all persons within the
Jurisdiction of the United States shall
be entitled to the full and equal enjoy
ment of the accommodations, advan-
tages, facilities and privileges of inns,
public conveyances on land and water,
theaters and other places of public
amusement. subject only to the condi-
tions and limitations established by law,
and applicable alike to citizens of every
race and color, regardless of any pre-
vious condition of servitude. (" Penal
ties were provided for the violation OF
the act and provisions made for their
enforcement in the Federal Courts. In
fact ezclusiUe jurisdiction was provided
for the Federal District and Circuit
Courts in cases arising under the law.
The rights and privileges claimed by and
denied to the colered persons in these
cases BY which this decision was occa-
stoned were full and equal accomm0da-
tons in hotels, in ladies' cars on railway
trains and in the dress circles in theaters.
The decision OF the Court holds ~that
Congress had no constitutional authori-
ty to pass the sections in question
under either the Thirteenth or Four
teenth Amendment of the Constitu-
tion." The Fourteenth Amendment
is prohibitory upon the States only, and
that the legislation authorized to be
adopted by Congress for enforcing the
Amendment is not direct legislation ON
the matters respecting which the States
are prohibited from making or enforc-
ing certain laws or doing certain acts,
but is corrective legislation necessary
or proper for ccunteracting and re-
dressing the effects of such laws or
acts; that in forbidding the States, for
example, to deprive any person of life.
liberty or property without due process
of law, and giving Congress power to
enforce the prohibition. it was not in
tended to give Congress power to pro-
vide due process of law for the protec-
ton of life, liberty and property (Which
would embrace almost all subjects of
legislation), but to provide modes of re-
dress for counteracting the operation
and effect of State laws obnoxious to
the prohibition.
Congress, then, when it passed the
Civil Rights bill in 1875, assumed that
it had the power to secure for colored
persons by direct legislation full and
equal enjoyment Of the accommodations
and privileges" accorded to
others on railroad trains, on steamboats,,
in theaters, or, in fact, wherever they
happened to be. The Amendment, it
now appears, could not be so construed
except SO far as it might be necessary
to counterfeit the prohibited legislation
of the State. In these test cases before
the Court it did Lot appear that any
State had made the discrimination COM
planned of by prohibited Legislation, and
consequently the unconstitutionality Of
the Civil Rights act was apparent.
There is no doubt that a prejudice
exists in many quarters against the col
ored people, and that they are deprived
of some of the advantages enjoyed by
their white brethren; and, furthermore,
there is no doubt that they have . right
to full enjoyment of the same privi-
leges, but it is question of grave doubt
if the question of social privileges can
he settled satisfactorily bv le0islation.