Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 November 1883 — CIVIL RIGHTS. [ARTICLE]

CIVIL RIGHTS.

The Dissenting Opinion of Justice Harlan, of the Supreme Court [Washington Telegram.] Justice Harlan, of the United States Supremo Court, in his dissenting opinion in the civik rights cases says; “The opinion in these case* proceeds upon grounds entirely too narrow and artificial. The substance and spirit of the recent amendments to the constitution have been sacrificed by subtle and ingenions verbal criticism. The constitutional provisions adopted in the interest of liberty and for the purpose of securing, through national legislation, if need be, the rights inhering in a state of freedom and belonging to American citizenship have Ween so construed as to defeat the ends the people desired to ’ accomplish, which they attempted to accomplish, and which they supposed they bad accomplished by changes in their fundamental law. The court has departed from the familiar rule requiring that in the interpretation of constitutional provisions full effect be given to the intent with which they were adopted. The power conferred by the Thirteenth amendment does not rest upon implication or inference, and the power to enforce it by appropriate leg station was expressly granted. Congress, therefore, may enact law* to protect the colored people against deprivation on account of their race of any civil rights enjoyed by other freemen, and snob legislation may be of a direct and primary character, operating upon States, their officers and agents, and upon those wielding power under the State. The Nat.onal Legislature may, without transcending the limit# of the constitution, do for human liberty and the fundamental rights of American citizenship what it did with the sanction of the Supreme court .for the protetSSe® ;.'eSw9h»ve»y » and the rights of masters of fugitive slaves. In every material sense applicable to the' practical enforcement of the Fourteenth amendment railroad corporations, keepers of inns, and managers of places of amusement are agents of the State, because amenable to public regulation and the denial, by these Instrumentalities of the State to a citizen, because of hie race, of that equality or Civil rights secured to him by law is u denial by the State and tbe supreme law of tbe land which has decreed that no authority shall be exercised in this country upon tbe basis of discrimination in respect to civil rttfits against tree men aud citizens because of their raee, color or previous condition of servitude. The assumption that tbe General Governmentcan not, ia advance of hostile State laws or hostile State proceedings, actively in'erfere for the protection of any rights, privileges, and immunities secured by the Fourteenth amendment is not authorized by its language.