Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

“ The states may now by a constitutional amendment, with few limitations, change the whole structure and powers of the government, and thus legalize any present excess of power. And the general right of a society in other cases to change the government at the will of a majority of the whole people, in any manner, that may suit its pleasure, is undisputed, and seems indisputable. If there be any remedy at all for the minority in such cases, it is a remedy never provided for by human institutions. ”

“ However, the Supreme Court declined to sustain Congress when, under the guise of enforcing the Fourteenth Amendment by appropriate legislation, it enacted a statute which was not limited to take effect only in case a State should abridge the privileges of United States citizens, but applied no matter how well the State might have performed its duty, and would subject to punishment private individuals who conspired to deprive anyone of the equal protection of the laws. ”

“ We are concerned solely with determining whether the statute before us has exceeded the bounds imposed by the Constitution when First Amendment rights are at stake. The task of writing legislation which will stay within those bounds has been committed to Congress. Our decision today simply recognizes that, when legitimate legislative concerns are expressed in a statute which imposes a substantial burden on protected First Amendment activities, Congress must achieve its goal by means which have a 'less drastic' impact on the continued vitality of First Amendment freedoms. ”

“ It is useless labor to petition for a Sixteenth Amendment—we do not need it. Our fundamental institutions most adequately protect the rights of all citizens of the United States, irrespective of sex. In the twenty-four years since the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment, 300 amendments to the Constitution have been introduced into Congress which never met with any approval from either House. ”

“ The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
The only right which the Supreme Court has explicitly acknowledged as protected by this amendment is the right to engage in political activity. That recognition was accorded by way of dictum in United Public Workers v. Mitchell, where the powers of Congress to restrict the political activities of federal employees was sustained. ”

“ Yet, this concept of 'national defense' cannot be deemed an end in itself, justifying any exercise of legislative power designed to promote such a goal. Implicit in the term 'national defense' is the notion of defending those values and ideals which set this Nation apart. For almost two centuries, our country has taken singular pride in the democratic ideals enshrined in its Constitution, and the most cherished of those ideals have found expression in the First Amendment. ”

“ What Hamilton scouted as impossible has been accomplished in the Nineteenth Amendment. It in effect strikes out the word "male" from the suffrage provisions of state constitutions. It overrides state policy and interferes with the right of states to manage their own affairs. From the theoretical standpoint a more serious inroad on state prerogatives would be hard to find. Control of the suffrage is one of the fundamental rights of a free state. It belonged to the North American states before their union, and was not surrendered to the National Government when the union was effected. ”

“ First Amendment rights are not merely curtailed by the construction of the Act which the Court adopts. Today's ruling abolishes First Amendment rights on a wholesale basis. Protection of minority groups, if any, can be no excuse. ”

“ Some of those who were interested in the ratification were asked to meet at the capital that day. Among those who responded were Alfred I., T. Coleman and Pierre S. du Pont, Governor Townsend, Senator Ball, Representative Layton, former United States Senator J. F. Allee, Secretary of State Johnson, Charles Warner, former Congressman Hiram R. Burton, Speaker Charles Grantland and others. These men argued and pleaded with the Republican legislators to give the 36th and final ratification of the 19th Amendment but without effect. ”

“ Even that idea was spurned by the states, and hence resulted the eleventh amendment. In repudiating the jurisdiction of the federal courts in relation to the citizens of other states that amendment more than abandoned the claim as it related to citizens of the same state. It was abandoned on the principle that it had never been given; and on the further principle that the greater includes the lesser. No man had ever said or believed or thought, that it ought to have been given, or was given. The proposition would have been indignantly spurned, if made at the time of adopting the constitution. ”

“ Each added amendment makes this change in the status of the People, in that it gives new guaranties of freedom, and removes all pretense of right from any existing usurped power. People are slow to comprehend the change which has been effected by the decision as to State rights. One, claims that only the negro, or persons of African descent, were affected by it. Others claim, and among them, some prominent Republicans, that every civil right is by these amendments, thrown under national control. Recently, two or three suits have come before the United States on this apprehension. ”

“ It only provides that development shall proceed in the way of regular and92 legal amendment, and not in that of violent collision and intimidation by street parades. The system of constitutional amendment works perfectly well in the United States. The power might be safely reposed in the people at large. ”