on is wholly different from a mere
exercise in philology. The question is not whether certain words
were aptly employed--but the context must be searched to
ascertain the sense in which such words were used.

It is evident that there are certain "privileges and immunities"
which belong to a citizen of the United States as such; otherwise
it would be nonsense for the XIV. Amendment to prohibit a State
from abridging them; and it is equally evident from the XIV.
Amendment that the right to vote is not one of those privileges.
And the question recurs whether admission to the bar, the proper
qualification being possessed, is one of the privileges which a
State may not deny. In Cummings _vs._ Missouri, 4 Wall., 321,
this court say:

In France, deprivation or suspension of civil rights, or
some of them--and among these of the right of voting, of
eligibility to office, of taking part in family councils, of
being guardian or trustee, of bearing arms, and of teaching
or being employed in a school or seminary of learning--are
punishments prescribed by her code. The theory upon which
our political institutions rest is, that all men have
certain inalienable rights--that among these are life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and that in the
pursuit of happiness all avocations, all honors, all
positions, are alike open to every one, and that in the
protection of these rights all are equal before the law. Any
deprivation or extension of any of these rights for past
conduct is punishment, and can be in no otherwise defined.

No broader or better enumeration of the privileges which pertain
to American citizenship could be given. "Life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness; and, in the pursuit of happiness, all
avocations, all honors, all positions, are alike open to every
one; and in the protection of these rights all are equal before
the law." In _ex parte_ Garland (4 Wall., 378) this court say:

The profession of an attorney and counselor is not like an
office created by an act of Congress, which depends for its
continuance, its powers, and its emoluments upon the will of
its creator, and the possession of which may be burdened
with any conditions n