It was only intended to give the freedmen the same rights that were secured to all other classes of citizens in the State, and that if the other male inhabitants of the State over the age of twenty-one years enjoyed the right of suffrage, so should the males among the freedmen over the age of twenty-one years enjoy the same right; it was not intended that females, or persons under the age of twenty-one years, should have the right of suffrage conferred on them.
In reply to this, we might content ourselves with saying that it is mere assertion, and can hardly be dignified as argument; but we answer, that if the XIV. Amendment does not secure the ballot to woman, neither does it to the negro; for it does not in terms confer the ballot upon any one. As we have already shown, it is the altered condition of citizenship that secures to the negro this right; but this plaintiff might well reply, I was born to that condition, and yet am denied its privileges.
We quote again, and finally, from the opinion:
This is not only shown by the history of the times when the Amendment was adopted, and the circumstances which produced it, but by reference to the second section of said Amendment, it will be seen that the right to restrict the right of suffrage to the male inhabitants by a State is clearly recognized. If "the right to vote, etc., is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age," etc., is the language used. This clearly recognizes the right, and seems to anticipate the exercise of the right on the part of the States, to restrict the right of suffrage to the male inhabitants.
We doubt if an instance can be found of a more complete misconception of the meaning and intention of the law. So far from its being a recognition of the right of the States to restrict the right to suffrage of males, it has an exactly opposite meaning. It was intended as a punishment on the States if they did this thing. It is no more a justification or authorization of the act than is the law punishing larceny an authority for stealing! Its object was to punish the States as such, which, but for this provision, could not have been done by diminishing their representation accordingly; and it was designed as a still further security for the rights of the colored population. But, even if it could be held to recognize a right on the part of the State to disfranchise any one, it would only extend to "males," not to females. They, as "citizens of the United States," are embraced in, and protected by, the broad language of the Amendment; a right that is fundamental, can not be taken away by implication. But more than this, the XIV. Amendment was an addition to the organic law of a great nation, intended to enlarge the area of human freedom, and secure more firmly individual rights. It is absurd to impute to the law-makers a design at the same time to restrict those rights. Although the point is not alluded to by the Supreme Court of Missouri, yet, as we desire to meet every possible objection, we think this a proper place to notice an argument sometimes put forward, based upon the XV. Amendment. It is of the nature of what is termed in law a negative pregnant, or, the familiar maxim of "the expression of one thing is the exclusion of another." As this Amendment says, that the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, it is claimed by some that it may be abridged on other grounds. But, aside from the well-known history of this Amendment, as shown by the debates in Congress, of which this court will take notice when necessary, and which
