ce any law which shall abridge the privileges
or immunities of citizens of the United States."

5th. It follows that the provisions of the Missouri Constitution
and registry law before recited, are in conflict with and must
yield to the paramount authority of the Constitution of the
United States.

A few words more and we have done. The plaintiff has sought, by
this action, for the establishment of a great principle of
fundamental right, applicable not only to herself, but to the
class to which she belongs; for the principles here laid down (as
in the Dred Scott case) extend far beyond the limits of the
particular suit, and embrace the rights of millions of others,
who are thus represented through her. She has a right, therefore,
to be heard for her cause; and in making this plea, she seeks
only to give expression to those principles upon which, as upon a
rock, our Government is founded.

It is impossible that that can be a Republican government in
which one half the citizens thereof are forever disfranchised. A
citizen disfranchised is a citizen attainted; and this, too, in
face of the fact, that you look in vain in the great charter of
government, the Constitution of the United States, for any
warrant or authority for such discrimination. To that instrument
she appeals for protection.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. No. 182.--October Term, 1874.
Virginia L. Minor and Francis Minor, her husband, Plaintiffs in
Error, _vs._ Reese Happersett. In error to the Supreme Court of
the State of Missouri.

Mr. Chief Justice Waite delivered the opinion of the court.
(March 29. 1875.)

The question is presented in this case, whether, since the
adoption of the XIV. Amendment, a woman, who is a citizen of the
United States and of the State of Missouri, is a voter in that
State, notwithstanding the provision of the Constitution and laws
of the State, which confine the right of suffrage to men alone.
We might perhaps decide the case upon other grounds, but this
question is fairly made. From the opinion, we find that it was
the only one decided in the court below, and it is the only one
which has been argued here. The case was undoubtedly brought to
this court for the sole purpose of having that question decided
by us, and, in view