reciprocal obligations. The one is a compen- | had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common sation for the other; allegiance for protection and protection for allegiance. For convenience it has been found necessary to give a name to this membership. The object is to designate by a title the person and the relation he bears to the nation. For this purpose the words " subject," inhabitant" and citizen " have been used, and the choice be tween them is sometimes made to depend upon the form of the government. Citizen is now more commonly employed, however, and as it has been considered better suited to the description of one living under a republican government, it was adopted by nearly all of the States upon their separation from Great Britain, and was afterwards adopted in the Articles of Confederation and in the Constitution of the United States. When used in this sense it is understood as conveying the idea of membership of a nation, and nothing more. To determine, then, who were citizens of the United States before the adoption of the Amendment, it is necessary to ascertain what persons originally associated themselves together to form the nation, and what were afterwards admitted to membership. Looking at the Constitution itself, we find that it was ordained and established by "the people of the United States" (Preamble, 1 Stat. at L., 10), and then going further back, we find that these were the people of the several States that had before dissolved the political bands which connected them with Great Britain, and assumed a separate and equal station among the powers of the earth (Dec. of Ind., 1 Stat. at L., 1), and that had by Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, in which they took the name of "the United States of America," entered into a firm league of friendship with each other for their common defense, the security of their liberties and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other against all force offered to or attack made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever. Art. Confed., sec. 3, 1 Stat. at L., 4. Whoever, then, was one of the people of either of these States when the Constitution of the United States was adopted, became ipso facto a citizen-a member of the nation created by its adoption. He was one of the persons associating together to form the nation, and was, consequently, one of its original citizens. As to this there has never been a doubt. Disputes have arisen as to whether or not certain persons or certain classes of persons were part of the people at the time, but never as to their citizenship if they were. Additions might always be made to the citizenship of the United States in two ways: first, by birth, and second, by naturalization. This is apparent from the Constitution itself, for it provides, art. 2, sec. 1, that "no person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President." and (art. 1, sec. 8), that Congress shall have power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization." Thus new citizens may be born or they may be created by naturalization. The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural born citizens. Resort must be law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction, without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case it is not necessary to solve these doubts. It is sufficient for everything we have now to consider that all children born of citizen parents within the jurisdiction are themselves citizens. The words "all children" are certainly as comprehensive, when used in this connection, as "all persons," and if females are included in the last they must be in the first. That they are included in the last is not denied. In fact the whole argument of the plaintiff proceeds upon that idea. Under the power to adopt a uniform system of naturalization Congress, as early as 1790, provided that any alien, being a free white person," might be admitted as a citizen of the United States, and that the children of such persons so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under twenty-one years of age at the time of such naturalization, should also be considered citizens of the United States, and that the children of citizens of the United States that might be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, should be considered as natural-born citizens. 1 Stat. at L.. 103. These provisions thus enacted have, in substance, been retained in all the naturalization laws adopted since. In 1855, however, the last provision was somewhat extended, and all persons theretofore born or thereafter to be born out of the limits of the jurisdiction of the United States, whose fathers were or should be at the time of their birth citizens of the United States, were declared to be citizens also. 10 Stat. at L., 604. As early as 1804 it was enacted by Congress that when any alien who had declared his intention to become a citizen in the manner provided by law died before he was actually naturalized, his widow and children should be considered as citizens of the United States, and entitled to all rights and privileges as such upon taking the necessary oath (2 Stat. at L.. 292); and in 1855 it was further provided that any woman who might lawfully be naturalized under the existing laws, married or who should be married to a citizen of the United States, should be deemed and taken to be a citizen. 10 Stat. at L, 604. From this it is apparent that, from the commencement of the legislation upon this subject, alien women and alien minors could be made citizens by naturalization, and we think it will not be contended that this would have been done if it had not been supposed that native women and native minors were already citizens by birth. But if more is necessary to show that women have always been considered as citizens the same as men, abundant proof is to be found in the legislative and judicial history of the country. Thus, by the Constitution, the judicial power of the United States is made to extend to con troversies between citizens of different States. Under this it has been uniformly held that the citizenship necessary to give the courts of the United States jurisdiction of a cause must be affirmatively shown on the record. Its existence as a fact may be put in issue and tried. If found not to exist, the case must be dismissed. Notwithstanding this the records of the courts are full of cases in which the jurisdiction depends upon the citizenship of women, and not one can be found, we think, in which objection was made on that account. Certainly none can be found in which it has been held that women could not sue or be sued in the courts of the United States. Again; at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, in many of the States (and in some probably now) aliens could not inherit or transmit inheritance. There are a multitude of cases to be found in which the question has been presented whether a woman was or was not an alien, and as such capable or incapable of inheritance, but in no one has it been insisted that she was not a citizen because she was a woman. On the contrary, her right to citizenship has been in all cases assumed. The only question has been whether, in the particular case under consideration, she had availed herself of the right. In the Legislative Department of the Government, similar proof will be found. Thus, in the preemption laws (5 Stat. at L., 455, sec. 10), a widow, "being a citizen of the United States," is allowed to make settlement on the public lands and purchase upon the terms specified, and women, "being citizens of the United States,' are permitted to avail themselves of the benefit of the homestead law. 12 Stat. at L.. 392. of the United States are all elected directly or indirectly by state voters. The members of the House of Representatives are to be chosen by the people of the States, and the electors in each State must have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State Legislature. Const., art. 1, sec. 2. Senators are to be chosen by the Legislatures of the States, and necessarily the members of the Legislature required to make the choice are elected by the voters of the State. Const., art. 1, sec. 3. Each State must appoint in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, the elect ors to elect the President and Vice-President. Const., art. 2, sec. 2. The times, places and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives are to be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but Congress may at any time, by law, make or alter such regulations, except as to the place of choosing Senators. Const., art. 1, sec. 4. It is not necessary to inquire whether this power of supervision thus given to Congress is sufficient to authorize any interference with the state laws prescribing the qualifications of voters, for no such interference has ever been attempted. The power of the State in this particular is certainly supreme until Congress acts. The Amendment did not add to the privileges and immunities of a citizen. It simply furnished an additional guaranty for the protection of such as he already had. No new voters were necessarily made by it. Indirectly it may have had that effect, because it may have increased the number of citizens entitled to suffrage under the Constitution and laws of the States, but it operates for this purpose, if at all, through the States and the state laws, and not directly upon the citizen. the privileges and immunities of citizenship as they existed at the time it was adopted. This makes it proper to inquire whether suffrage was co-extensive with the citizenship of the States at the time of its adoption. If it was, then it may with force be argued that suffrage was one of the rights which belonged to citizenship, and in the enjoyment of which every citizen must be protected. But if it was not, the contrary may with propriety be assumed. Other proof of like character might be found, It is clear, therefore, we think, that the Conbut certainly more cannot be necessary to estab-stitution has not added the right of suffrage to lish the fact that sex has never been made one of the elements of citizenship in the United States. In this respect men have never had an advantage over women. The same laws precisely apply to both. The Fourteenth Amend ment did not affect the citizenship of women any more than it did of men. In this particular, therefore, the rights of Mrs. Minor do not depend upon the Amendment. She has always been a citizen from her birth, and entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizenship. The Amendment prohibited the State, of which she is a citizen, from abridging any of her privileges and immunities as a citizen of the United States; but it did not confer citizenship on her. That she had before its adoption. If the right of suffrage is one of the necessary privileges of a citizen of the United States, then the Constitution and laws of Missouri confining it to men are in violation of the Constitution of the United States, as amended, and consequently void. The direct question is, therefore, presented whether all citizens are necessarily voters. The Constitution does not define the privileges and immunities of citizens. For that definition we must look elsewhere. In this case we need not determine what they are, but only whether suffrage is necessarily one of them. It certainly is nowhere made so in express terms. The United States has no voters in the States of its own creation. The elective officers When the Constitution of the United States was adopted, all the several States, with the exception of Rhode Island, had Constitutions of their own. Rhode Island continued to act under its charter from the Crown. Upon an examination of those Constitutions we find that in no State were all citizens permitted to vote. Each State determined for itself who should have that power. Thus, in New Hampshire, “Every male inhabitant of each town and parish with town privileges, and places unincorporated in the State, of twenty-one years of age and upwards, excepting paupers and persons excused from paying taxes at their own request," were its voters; in Massachusetts "Every male inhabitant of twenty-one years of age and upwards, having a freehold estate within the Commonwealth of the annual income of three pounds, or any estate of the value of sixty pounds:" in Rhode Island Such as are admitted free of the company and society" of the Colony; in Connecticut such persons as had "Maturity in years, quiet and * found both in and out of the Constitution. By article 4, sec. 2, it is provided that “The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States." If suffrage is necessarily a part of citizenship. then the citizens of each State must be entitled to vote in the several States precisely as their citizens are. This is more than asserting that they may change their residence and become citizens of the State and thus be voters. It goes to the extent of insisting that while retaining their original citizenship they may vote in any State. This, we think, has never been claimed. And again, by the very terms of the Amendment we have been considering (the fourteenth). Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in the rebellion, or other crimes, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State." Why this, if it was not in the power of the Legislature to deny the right of suffrage to some male inhabitants? And if suffrage was necessarily one of the absolute rights of citizenship, why confine the operation of the limitation to male inhabitants? Women and children are, as we have seen, persons." They are counted in the enumeration upon which the appropriation is to be made, but if they were necessarily voters because of their citizenship unless clearly excluded, why inflict the penalty for the exclusion of males alone? Clearly, no such form of words would have been selected to express the idea here indicated, if suffrage was the absolute right of all citizens. peaceable behavior, a civil conversation, and In this condition of the law in respect to suffrage in the several States, it cannot for a moment be doubted that if it had been intended to make all citizens of the United States voters, the framers of the Constitution would not have left it to implication. So important a change in the condition of citizenship as it actually existed, if intended, would have been expressly declared. But if further proof is necessary to show that no such change was intended, it can easily be And still again; after the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, it was deemed necessary to adopt a fifteenth, as follows: "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." The Fourteenth Amendment had already provided that no State should make or enforce any law which should abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States. If suffrage was one of these privileges or immunities, why amend the Constitution to prevent its being denied on account of race, etc.? Nothing is more evident than that the greater must include the less, and if all were already protected, why go through with the form of amending the Constitution to protect a part? It is true that the United States guaranties to every State a republican form of government. Const., art. 4, sec. 4. It is also true that no State can pass a bill of attainder (Const., art. 1. sec. 10), and that no person can be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. Const. Amend., 5. All these several provisions of the Constitution must be construed in connection with the other parts of the instru- | followed Tennessee, in 1796, with voters of freement, and in the light of the surrounding cir cumstances. The guaranty is of a republican form of government. No particular government is designated as republican, neither is the exact form to be guarantied, in any manner especially designated. Here, as in other parts of the instrument, we are compelled to resort elsewhere to ascertain what was intended. The guaranty necessarily implies a duty on the part of the States themselves to provide such a government. All the States had governments when the Constitution was adopted. In all, the people participated to some extent, through their representatives elected in the manner specially provided. These governments the Constitution did not change. They were accepted precisely as they were, and it is, therefore, to be presumed that they were such as it was the duty of the States to provide. Thus we have unmistakable evidence of what was republican in form, with in the meaning of that term as employed in the Constitution. As has been seen, all the citizens of the States were not invested with the right of suffrage. In all, save perhaps New Jersey, this right was only bestowed upon men and not upon all of them. Under these circumstances it is certainly now too late to contend that a government is not republican, within the meaning of this guaranty in the Constitution, because women are not made voters. men of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, possessing a freehold in the county wherein they inay vote, and being inhabitants of the State, or freemen being inhabitants of any one county in the State, six months immediately preceding the day of election. But we need not particularize further. No new State has ever been admitted to the Union which has conferred the right of suffrage upon women, and this has never been considered a valid objection to her admission. On the contrary, as is claimed in the argument, the right of suffrage was withdrawn from women as early as 1807 in the State of New Jersey, without any attempt to obtain the interference of the United States to prevent it. Since then the governments of the insurgent States have been re-organized under a requirement that before their representatives could be admitted to seats in Congress they must have adopted new Constitutions, republican in form. In no one of these Constitutions was suffrage conferred upon women, and yet the States have all been restored to their original position as States in the Union. Besides this, citizenship has not in all cases been made a condition precedent to the enjoyment of the right cf suffrage. Thus, in Missouri, persons of foreign birth, who have declared their intention to become citizens of the United States, may under certain circumstances vote. The same provision is to be found in the Constitutions of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Minnesota and Texas. construction of so important an instrument as the Constitution of the United States confessedly is, most certainly it has been done here. Our province is to decide what the law is, not to declare what it should be. The same may be said of the other provisions just quoted. Women were excluded from suf- Certainly, if the courts can consider any quesfrage in nearly all the States by the express pro- tion settled, this is one. For nearly ninety years vision of their Constitutions and laws. If that the people have acted upon the idea that the had been equivalent to a bill of attainder, cer- Constitution, when it conferred citizenship, did tainly its abrogation would not have been left not necessarily confer the right of suffrage. If to implication. Nothing less than express lan-uniform practice, long continued, can settle the guage would have been employed to effect so radical a change. So, also, of the Amendment which declares that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law, adopted as it was as early as 1791. If suffrage was intended to be included within its obligations, language better adapted to express that intent would most certainly have been employed. The right of suffrage, when granted, will be protected. He who has it can only be deprived of it by due process of law, but in order to claim protection he must first show that he has the right We have given this case the careful consideration its importance demands. If the law is wrong, it ought to be changed; but the power for that is not with us. The arguments addressed to us bearing upon such a view of the subject may, perhaps, be sufficient to induce those having the power to make the alteration, but they ought not to be permitted to influence our judgment in determining the present rights of the parties now litigating before us. argument as to woman's need of suffrage can be considered. We can only act upon her rights as they exist. It is not for us to look at the hardship of withholding. Our duty is at an end if we find it is within the power of a State to withhold. No But we have already sufficiently considered the proof found upon the inside of the Constitution. That upon the outside is equally effective. The Constitution was submitted to the States for adoption in 1787, and was ratified by nine States in 1788, and finally by the thirteen original States in 1790. Vermont was the first new State admitted to the Union, and it came in under a Constitution which conferred the right of suffrage only upon men of the full age of twentyone years, having resided in the State for the space of one whole year next before the election, and who were of quiet and peaceable behavior. This was in 1791. The next year, 1792, Kentucky followed with a Constitution confining the right of suffrage to free male citizens of the age of twenty-one years who had resided in the State two years, or in the county in which they offered 41 Am. Rep., 240; 3 Tex. Ct. App., 271; 30 Am. Rep., to vote one year next before the election. Then 136. Being unanimously of the opinion that the Constitution of the United States does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone, and that the Constitutions and laws of the several States which commit that important trust to men alone are not necessarily void, we affirm the judgment of the court belowo. Cited-92 U. S., 555; 3 Wood, 195: 131 Mass., 377: HENRY A. TILDEN ET AL., Plffs. in Err., | per annum, he having no knowledge that the v. CHAUNCEY B. BLAIR. (See S. C., 21 Wall., 241-249.) Acceptor of bill, liability of Illinois contractjudgment for less than due, when affirmed. 1. The liability of an acceptor does not arise from merely writing his name on the bill, but commences with the subsequent delivery to a bona fide holder, or with notice of acceptance given to such holder. 2. Where defendants resided in New York, and there wrote their acceptance upon a draft and then sent it to Illinois to have it negotiated there, the contract is an Illinois contract and draws interest according to the law of that State, although made payable in New York. 3. Where the circuit court gave plaintiff a judgment for the principal of the draft without interest, the judgment was only too favorable to him. It should have been for the full amount of the acceptance, with interest from the time it fell due. But the case having been brought here by the defendants, this court can only affirm the judgment. [No. 207.] Argued Mar. 4, 1875. Decided Mar. 29, 1875. IN ERROR to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. The plaintiffs in error, residents of the State of New York, were sued in the court below by the defendant in error, a resident of the State of Illinois, as the acceptors of a draft drawn in Illinois on the acceptors, and accepted and payable in New York. The draft and acceptance are as follows: $5.000. CHICAGO, August 4th, 1869. Sixty days after date, pay to the order of my self $5,000, value received, with exchange, and charge to account of WILLIAM T. PELTON. To Messrs. Tilden & Co., New Lebanon, N. Y. (Written across the face): Accepted; payable at The acceptors interposed the defense that the acceptance was made without funds, for the accommodation of the drawer, and was negotiated in Illinois, at a rate of interest exceeding twenty-five per cent. per annum, in violation of the statute against usury of the State of Illinois and of the State of New York. The issue was tried by the court, a jury having been waived. acceptance was for the drawer's accommodation, that the statutes of Illinois allow the taking of ten per cent. for the loan and forbearance of money, and forfeit the interest when forfeit the principal; and found, as a conclumore than ten per cent. is exacted, but do not sion of law, and decided that the transaction negotiation of the draft was unlawful as to the was governed by the law of Illinois; that the interest and lawful as to the principal sum loaned or advanced; and rendered judgment accordingly. Whereupon the defendants sued out this writ of error. Mr. Joshua M. Van Cott, for plaintiff in error: as a contract while in the hands of the drawer. The acceptance had no inception or validity It could not acquire validity through a usurious contract. Catlin v. Gunter, 11 N. Y., 368; Jewell v. Wright, 30 N. Y., 259. This acceptance is a contract made and to be performed in New York, and is governed by the law of New York. interest than seven per cent. renders the con- est than ten per cent., is illegal. draft was to be negotiated in Illinois is, legally, That the draft was accepted and was payable in New York, appeared on its face and was notice to all the world. A contract for the payment of money deplace where it is stipulated to be paid. pends, for its validity, upon the law of the It is an exercise of comity by the State of sued in its courts to enforce a contract made New York when it permits its citizen to be in another State, to pay a higher rate of interest than its own policy and law allow. In the case of such a contract, both States punish the penalty of a forfeiture of the interest; the courts illegality, the courts of one inflicting the milder of the other inflicting a severer retribution of a forfeiture of both principal and interest. While the sterner penalty of the New York law has in the courts of Illinois, so the milder penalty no extraterritorial operation in the State and eration in the State of New York, and will not of the Illinois law has no extraterritorial op. be imported there, by a strained comity, to miti The court found, as facts, that the draft was accepted in New York, without funds and for the drawer's accommodation; that it was sent to the drawer, who resided at Chicago, the ac-gate the penal severity of its own law. cepters knowing that it was there to be negotiated; that it was negotiated to the plaintiff at a rate of interest exceeding twenty five per cent. NOTE.-Bills drawn in one State and payable in another are foreign bills. See note to Buckner v. Finley, 27 U. S. (2 Pet.), 586. Lex loci and lex fori as to bills and notes; as to interpretation, effect and validity of, and usury. See note to Ślacum v. Pomery, 10 U. S. (6 Cranch), 221. Who is deemed to have acted in good faith in taking bills and notes. What is notice to prevent holder from recovery. See note to Fowler v. Brantly, 39 U. S. (14 Pet.), 318. 632 ment of this acceptance to the defendant in er- Messrs. John E. Burrill and Jno. D. Niles, for defendant in error: Although the signature of the defendants was affixed to the draft in this State, it was not delivered here, but was sent to Pelton, the drawer, at Chicago, by letter, and it was there received and there negotiated by Pelton, in accordance with the intention of the defendants. |