markable feature in the tyranny and
injustice of this case, that although James Fortin was not considered
white enough (he is, I believe, a mulatto) to _vote_ as a citizen, he
has always been quite white enough to be _taxed_ as one, and has to pay
his proportion, (which, from the extent of his business, is no trifle)
of all the rates and assessments considered requisite for the support of
the poor, and improving and beautifying that city, of which he is
declared not to be a citizen.

Although the decision of the Supreme Court enters into a lengthened
detail, yet as it is very acute and argumentative, and touches upon
several other points equally anomalous to the boasted freedom of the
American institutions, I wish the reader would peruse it carefully, as
it will amply repay him for his trouble; and it is that he _may_ read
it, that I have not inserted it in an Appendix.

The question arose upon a writ of error to the judgment of the Common
Pleas of Luzerne county, in an action by Wm. Fogg, a negro, against
Hiram Hobbs, inspector, and Levi Baldwin and others, judges of the
election, for refusing his vote. In the Court below the plaintiff
recovered. The Supreme Court being of opinion that a negro has not a
right to vote under the present constitution, reversed the judgment.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Respectfully, FRED. WATTS.

"Wm. Fogg _versus_ Hiram Hobbs and others.

"The opinion of the Court was delivered by Gibson, CJ.

"This record raises, a second time, the only question on a phrase in the
Constitution which has occurred since its adoption; and, however
partisans may have disputed the clearness and precision of phraseology,
we have often been called upon to enforce its limitations of legislative
power; but the business of interpretation was incidental, and the
difficulty was not in the diction, but in the uncertainty of the act to
which it was to be applied. I have said a question on the meaning of a
phrase has arisen a second time. It would be more accurate to say the
_same_ question has arisen the second time. About the year 1795, as I
have it from James Gibson, Esquire, of the Philadelphia bar, the very
point before us was ruled by the High Court of Errors and Appeals
against the right of negro suffrage. Mr Gibson declined an invitation
to be concerned in the argument, and therefore has no memorandum of the
cause to direct us to the record. I have