Richmond planet. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1883-1938, 1928-04-28

Negroes vote be eliminated. A law,
statute or constitutional provision
with a penalty Is live piece Of
Legislation.
All the Negro wants is all of the
rights of any other citizen. The
law provides that the Negro and in
fact no other citizen shall be dis
franchised on account of his race
or his color and any provision for
Acknowledgement must apply to the
white man as much so as it applies
to the Negro. To. argue otherwise,
in common parlance is splitting
hairs" Mr.. Sutherland recognizes
this for he remarks:
And, while o. the Fourteenth
Amendment provides punishment
for it's violation, Senator Glass is
partly right when he says that the
Constitution provides no penalty for
the Northumberland by the South
of its colored inhabitants. Yet this
statement is only a half-truth, be-
cause the Revised Statutes of 1870
las we shall see) do purport to set
up a penalty for such evasion of
the plain intent of Congress and of
the nation-that the recently enan-
eipated slave and his descendants
should enjoy equal ballot privileges
with his erstwhile master.
The decision by which the IVA
tons highest court specifically ex-
cludes the Negro from the polling
booth, as far as It's effect is con.
cerned Gas l read aloud to Senator
GLASS;, was succinctly worded by
Supreme Court Justice Rufus w.
Packham in Pope VS.. Williams (193
U. S. 62l) when he said, on April
d, 1904, what had been said in
other ways as far back as 1876.
A Maryland election official had de-
liberately refused the ballot of a
colored, man, and Justice Peckham
responded: Pc
"The privilege to vote in any
State. is not given by the Federal
Constitution or by any of it's
amendments. 1t may not be re-
fused on account of race, color, or
previous condition of servitude, but
It does not follow from mere
citizenship. In other words, the
privilege to vote in a State is with
in the jurisdiction of the State it.
self, to be exercised as the State
may direct, and upon such terms as
to it may seem proper-provided,
of course, no discrimination is made
hetweea individuals in violation of
the Federal Constitution"
The multiplicity and illegal sound
ness" of loopholes to deprive the
Negro Of the franchise are mani
fest. But, long before this de-
cision distinctly interpreted the
meaning of the Fifteenth Amend
ment, the same object had been
achieved by other decisions.
Little did these legislators and
jurists realize that these decisions,
evasisns and violations of the laws
would return to plague the in
ventors" as it is doing in these pro-
hibition laws, constitutional and
otherwise.
The Southern nullifiers of the
Carter Glass type have taught the
prohibition law nullifers just how
to eyade the law, even when nearly
forty million dollars per annum are
being expended to bring about its
rigid enforcement.
There are fundamental principles
governing this universe. Ethics and
the rsligion de Jesus Christ tell the
story. Hon. Carter Glass is here
today, this year. God knows where
he will be the year that is to come.
Certain it is that the time to square
himself with eternal principles and
accept self-evident truths is at hand.
His petty desires and underlying
prejudices should be laid aside and
he should step out CARRIED in the
spiritual robes of righteousness,
without which he cannot enter the
Kingdom of Heaven. What pity
he had that infected foot that day.
Amongst the sons of men how few
are known
WAC dare be just to merit mot
their own.
rg = SOD --Churchill.