The age-herald., 1901-04-14
BY PEYroN HERNpoN MOORE.

them up sept ately and show how the conditions ab0 indicated are affected by them.
 The twelfth amendment, section 2, pro- vides that if any State shall deny or in any way abridge the right to vote of any 4sf the male inhabitants being twenty-one years of age and citizens of the United States, except for specified reasons, that its representation in Congress should be cut down in the proportion which the number of citizens so disfranchised bear to the whole number of male adult cit izens This provision went into effect in 1868, time when all the States except three had constructionary constitutions, under which the negro had the right to vote. The white people of the South were just beginning to reassume control of the State governments and Congress feared that they would deprive the negro of the right to vote which at that time actually vested in him.
 I shall, in this article, attempt to show that this amendment and also the fif- teenth was intended a restriction on the much abused power of investment of the right of suffrage when once con ferred. and not on the power of invest ment of that right
 We have previously observed that the fourteenth amendment provides that if i the right to vote Is denied or abridged to any male inhabitant who is CD a cit izen of the United States and @ twenty one years of age, for any cause except those mentioned, the basis of repre- senta- tion shall be reduced. Judge Tourgee very tersely sums up this provision when he says: Now, whatever else this pro- vision may eect, it is evident Q) that 1t does not confer the right to vote upon any one @ and that 1t distinctly recog- nizes the power of a State to deny or abridge the right to vote"
 In, raI, anl ha forT1 when applied to a right, means wholly to refuse to recognize that right or to per- init it's exercise and the term 'abridge" means to restrict or disadvantageously to condition the exercise of this right. (Buervier).
 This brings us to a consideration of the phrase right to vote" It is not such a right as attaches to citizenship-as such for women and minors, both of whom are citizens do not possess it. It Is poit- ical right or franchise, and must, like any other right, vest before 1t can be denied or abridged. or receive legal recognition. We must distinguish here between the right to vote and the expectancy of be- coming a voter. To illustrate a man over twenty-one years of age, under the ex- isting laws, has an actually vested right to vote. On arriving at ty nty-one he has complied with the conditions of the law and the right of suffrage vests Now, how is 1t in the case of minor of six teen? Has he any right of suffrage vest ed In him which the State Is bound to recognize? Has he not rather contin- gency. a possibility. that if he-live he shall be allowed to become voter?
 An analogous case to this in law is found in the respective rights of heir presumptive and an heir. While the person from whom the inheritance is to come lives the heir presumptive has no rights in the estate in law and no title or interest vests in him. The law of de- scent may be changed and his expectancy taken from him, but he has no recourse. Immediately on the death of the intestate, 1 the heir presumptive becomes the heir. l The title to the estate at once vests in him and he cannot be deprived of his rights thereto without compensation. 1 If our new constitution should substi- 1 tute the age of thirty for that of twenty 1 one as suffrage requirement.. whose right to vote would be denied thereby, l evidently every male citizen who would l be between the ages of twenty-one and thirty when the change went into effect would be divested of an actually vested right. But would a male citizen under the age of twenty-one have lost any right | to vote? What did he have to lose? 1 Nothing but a mere expectancy. But the fourteenth amendment does not speak of i expectancies. It says the right to vote of male citizen being twenty-one years l of age. (Note the use of the word "being') Is it a denial of the right of male citizen twenty-one years of age