Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-303_6khn.pdf
Page Number: 17.0

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

9 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

In  response,  Congress  enacted  the  Civil  Rights  Act  of 
1866 to both repudiate Dred Scott and eradicate the Black 
Codes.  The 1866 Act contained a citizenship clause similar 
to the Fourteenth Amendment’s: “[A]ll persons born in the 
United States and not subject to any foreign power, exclud-
ing Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of 
the United States.”  Act of Apr. 9, 1866, 14 Stat. 27.  The 
provision immediately succeeding that citizenship guaran-
tee  clarified  that  “such  citizens,  of  every  race  and  color”
were entitled to 

“the  same  right,  in  every  State  and  Territory  in  the
United  States,  to  make  and  enforce  contracts,  to  sue, 
be  parties,  and  give  evidence,  to  inherit,  purchase,
lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property,
and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings 
for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by 
white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishment, 
pains, and penalties, and to none other.”  Ibid. 

Fleshing out the implications of the citizenship declaration,
this clause suggests that the right to be free of racial dis-
crimination with respect to the enjoyment of certain rights
is a constituent part of citizenship.

Moreover,  as  Congress  debated  the  1866  Act,  “the  view
that the status of citizenship conferred upon its recipients
at  least  some  minimal  level  of  equality  rights  was  widely
shared  among  both  supporters  and  opponents.”    Williams 
535.  For instance, Representative Samuel Shellabarger ar-
gued that “the right of all citizens to be secured in the en-
joyment of whatever privileges their citizenship does confer
upon them is in its very nature equal . . . .”  Cong. Globe, 
39th Cong., 1st Sess., 1293 (1866).  Representative Henry 
Jarvis  Raymond,  meanwhile,  wanted  Congress  to  declare 
that  free  blacks  were  citizens,  “and  thus  secure  to  them 
whatever rights, immunities, privileges, and powers belong
as of right to all citizens of the United States.”  Id., at 1266;