ELECTORAL QUALIFICATIONS; TERMS OF AND QUALIFICATIONS FOR The theory that suffrage is a natural, inherent right, belonging to every man, is now generally discredited. Political rights are not essential to citizenship, and in a dissenting opinion in the case of Amy vs. Smith (1 Litt. [Ky.], 326, 333, 342), one judge said: "A State may deny all her political rights to an individual and yet he may e a citizen. The rights of office and suffrage are political purely, and are denied by some or all the States to part of their population, who are still citizens. A citizen, then. is one who owes to government allegiance, service, and money by way of taxation, and to whom the government, in turn, grants and guarantees liberty of person and of con science, the right of acquiring and possessing property, of marriage and social relations, of suit and defence, and security to person. estate and reputation. These, with some others which might be enumerated, being guaranteed and secured by government, constitute a citizen." Again the Supreme Court has held that "The fact that one is a subject or citizen determines nothing as to his rights as such. They vary in different localities and according to circumstances. Citizenship has no necessary connection with the franchise of voting, eligi bility to office, or indeed with any other rights, civil or political. Women, minors, and persona non compos are citizens and not the less so on account of their disabilities." (United State* es. Rhodes, 1866, Abb. U. S. 28, Fed. Cas. No. 16,151; see also Minor vs. Happersett, 1874, 21 Wall. 162).
That suffrage cannot be termed a "right" is obvious since no community can ever enfran chise all its citizens, two-fifths of whom are ex cluded from participation in governmental affairs because legally they are infants and, as such, unfitted to cope with government prob lems to the benefit of the State. Hence there is no necessary relation between citizenship and the right to vote. Minors and women (the lat ter save in those States having woman suffrage) do not usually possess the right to vote, al though they are citizens; and on the other hand, some States and many municipalities permit persons to vote who have no claim to citizenship merely because they are residents and possess the other qualifications. Such a thing as the 'popular vote' does not exist since millions of women have not yet been vested with full suf frage; in many States bigamists, bribers, idiots, insane persons, etc., cannot vote; certain classes of foreigners may never exercise the elective franchise; paupers, as dependents, do not participate in shaping the government on which they are a burden and to which they contribute nothing; and the criminal, by his very acts, has exhibited his total incapacity to understand his citizenship privileges. Nevertheless, and in spite of the above restrictions, the suffrage is gradually widening and broadening, partly due to the progress of woman suffrage.
The Right to Vote and the Power to Con fer previously stated, the elective fran chise is a privilege rather than a natural right; its extension to any excluded class is a ques tion of political expediency; it may be taken away by the power which conferred it and if this be done no vested right is violated nor bill of attainder passed. Subject to the restric tions of the national Constitution as to race, color and previous condition of servitude, each State possesses the supreme and exclusive power to regulate the right of suffrage and to define the qualifications of its voters, however unwise, unjust or even tyrannical its regula tions may be or seem to be in this regard. Hence the clauses in some State constitutions requiring of voters the ability to read, under stand or interpret reasonably any section of such constitutions are not in contravention of the United States Constitution. Once granted by a State constitution, the right to vote can not be abridged by the legislature; if they be fixed by the constitution that body cannot add to the qualifications of voters nor create other classes of voters, nor dispense with any of the constitutional qualifications nor enact provisions imposing upon a particular class of citizens conditions and requirements not imposed upon all others. On the other hand, the legislature may enact laws to regulate the exercise of the elective franchise, if those laws do not deny the right of the franchise itself. Under the national Constitution Congress cannot prescribe the qualifications of electors in the States, but Congress may penalize a criminal by forfeiting his United States citizenship, and if under the State constitution only United States citizens are allowed to vote, Congress may thus deprive a person of the opportunity to enjoy a right which belongs to him as a citizen of the State, even the right of voting, but cannot deprive him of the right itself. The Constitution does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone indi vidually nor upon any class of persons— the United States has no voters of its own creation in the States. It is true that the Fifteenth Amendment is usually interpreted as giving the negro the right to vote, but it merely exempts from discrimination in the exercise of the elective franchise and no negro possesses the right to vote unless he conform to all the qualifications and restrictions imposed by the State constitutions upon white voters. But Congress may punish any State official who re fuses to perform the duties necessary to qualify all colored citizens. Thus the right to vote in the States is conferred by the States but the right of exemption from the prohibited dis crimination comes from the national govern ment.