The validity of the public debt of the Unit ed States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and boun ties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incur red in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave ; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.
The congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
This amendment has given rise to so much discussion by the courts that it requires full er treatment than can be given here. and for this see the title, FOURTEENTH AMEND MENT, and the cross-references therein ; Po LICE POWER; EMINENT DOMAIN.
Fifteenth Amendment (1870). 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 congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
This amendment under the decisions is not to be extended beyond the precise mean ing of the words employed. It does not operate to increase the right of suffrage in the states, except so far as that had been previously abridged by "race, color or previ ous condition of servitude," or had been con fined to white persons ; Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 651, 4 Sup. Ct. 152, 28 L. Ed. 274. It does not confer the right of suffrage upon women ; Minor v. Happersett, 21 Wall. (U.
S.) 162, 22 L. Ed. 627; nor upon Indians still under tribal relations and not naturalized ; Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U. S. 94, 5 Sup. Ct. 41, 28 L. Ed. 643. The amendment is not violat ed by the qualifications requiring a specific amount of literacy ; Williams v. Mississippi, 170 U. S. 213, 18 Sup. Ct. 583, 42 L. Ed. 1012.
Sixteenth Amendment (1913). Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, with out apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enu meration." Seventeenth Amendment (1913). The sen ate of the United States shall be composed of two senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years ; and each senator shall have one vote. The electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures.
When vacancies happen in the representa tion of any state in the senate, the executive authority of such state shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, that the legislature of any state may em power the executive thereof to make tem porary appointment until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.
The reader is referred to the notes to the United States Constitution in Vol. I of Ar demas Stewart's Edition of Purdon's Dig. (Pa. Stats.) which may be properly termed a treatise on the subject of great value.