Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1898-03-16
THE COURT
CRITICISED,
Grovernor Leedy Gives His
Opinion of the Decision.
Nobody hut n Slave or q Knave VIII
Yield To Harlan's Distortion OF the
Fourteenth Amendment.


Governor Leedy has given out his
promised interview with reference TO
the decision of the Supreme Court of
the United States in the Nebraska
Maximum rate case. The Nebraska
law is very similar to that proposed by
the governor to be submitted to a
special session of the legislature, and
the decision is significant in the face
of the governors recent expressions
with reference to the adoption of the
law proposed by him.
After calling attention to the fact
that special effort has been made
through the Associated Press for a
year past to prepare the people for
this decision, the governor says:
"Strong color is given to the suspi-
cion that the news given to the Asso-
ciated Press emanated from some per-
son in touch with the court, and was
for the purpose of feeling the pulse of
the public and preparing them for the
decision which goes much farther in
the direction of usurpiug power than
any that has yet been made. Section
4 of article II of the Constitution of
1875 of the state of Nebraska contains
this statement: And the legislature
may from time to time pass laws es-
tablishing rea asonable maximum rates
of charges for the transportation of
passengers and freight on the differ
eut railroads in the state. The 1iabil-
ity of railroad corporations as common
carriers shall never be limited Most
of the railroads in Nebraska have been
built since that time, and in the face
of that constitutional provision, there
by agreeing in advance to submit to
its provisions. Despite all this, the
court has deliberately set aside the
constitution of the state, though they
avoid mentioning the fact in their de-
cision. There is large line of deci-
sions following the Dartmouth college
case to the effect that corporations
could not plead the same privileges
and rights as citizens, from the fact
that their creation was a voluntary
act, yet the supreme court of the Unit
ed States in its decision distinctly sets
up the the doctrine as having been
settled by the courts that the four
teenth amendment refers to corpora
tions. Justice Harlan says that a
railway corporation is person with
in the meaning of that word as there
used, and upon that assumption he
builds up his theory that railways are
within the protection of its terms.
deny it, and so will everybody but a
corporation lawyer or subservient iu-
What is the fourteenth amendment? I
want to quote it for the benefit of the
clackers and lick spittles who have
never read it, but who will neverthe-
less now shout their approval of this
monstrous perversion of its meaning
Its opening sentence is: All persons
born or natura1ized in the United
States and subject to the jurisdiction
thereof, are citizens of the United
States and of the state wherein they
reside How in the name of God can
this apply to corporations? Corpora
tions are not born; they are created
made by law. They cannot be natu.
ra1ized; they can take no oath of al
legiance; only human beings born
elsewhere and removing here can do
that. This amendment next declares:
NO state shall make or enforce any
law which shall abridge the privileges
or immuuities of citizens of the United
States Who are the citizens thus
spoken of whose privileges or immuni-
ties shall not be abridged? Evidently
those who in the preceding sentence
were declared to be citizens, because
of their being also born or naturalized
in the United States. Who are the
persons who shall not, according to
these provisions be deprived of life,
liberty, or property, nor be denied
equal legal protection? Everybody
outside the asylum and off the federal
judicial bench knows them to be-and
to only be-natural persons. They
are those, who besides the capacity to
hold property and enjoy legal protec.
ton, also have life, and can enjoy lib
erty, and that means human being s.
"The fourteenth amendment was
born of the war and had for its obiec,
the protection of the recently emanci
pated negroes and the white people o1
| the south who had remained loyal tc
the union. All the lawyers, excepting
those engaged in the business of max
ing law for corporations, say this Mr.
Hare in his work on American Consti
tutioual Law, says:
1.-THE main object of this amend
ment is clear. 1t is to render all per
sons born or natura1ized in the Unitet
States and especially the recent,
emancipated negroes, citizens of tn
united States aud of the state where
in they reside, and also to afford tn
possessors of such citizenship an e1
fectual guarantee against arbitrar
and unequal legislation on the part O
1.-THE several states Mr.. Justice Wood