e of. I
am quite sure that it will be fortunate for the country, if this great
question of female suffrage, than which few greater were ever presented
for the consideration of any people, shall be found, almost
unexpectedly, to have been put at rest.

The opinion of Mr. Justice Bradley, in regard to this amendment, in the
case before referred to, if I understand it, corresponds very nearly
with what I have here said. The learned judge, in one part of his
opinion, says: "It is possible that those who framed the article were
not themselves aware of the far-reaching character of its terms. They
may have had in mind but one particular phase of social and political
wrong, which they desired to redress--yet, if the amendment, as framed
and expressed, does, in fact, have a broader meaning, and does extend
its protecting shield over those who were never thought of when it was
conceived and put in form, and does reach such social evils which were
never before prohibited by constitutional amendment, it is to be
presumed that the American people, in giving it their imprimatur,
understood what they were doing, and meant to decree what has, in fact,
been done....

"It embraces much more. The 'privileges and immunities' secured by the
original Constitution were only such as each State gave its own
citizens. Each was prohibited from discriminating in favor of its own
citizens, and against the citizens of other States.

"But the fourteenth amendment prohibits any State from abridging the
privileges or immunities of the citizens of the United States, whether
its own citizens or any others. It not merely requires equality of
privileges, but it demands that _the privileges and immunities of all
citizens shall be absolutely unabridged, unimpaired_. (_1 Abbott's U.S.
Rep. 397._)

It will doubtless be urged as an objection to my position (that
citizenship carries with it the right to vote) that it would, in that
case, follow that infants and lunatics, who, as well as adults and
persons of sound mind, are citizens, would also have that right. This
objection, which appears to have great weight with certain classes of
persons, is entirely without force. It takes no note of the familiar
fact, that every legislative provision, whether constitutional or
statutory, which confers any _discretionary_ power, is always confined
in its operation to persons who are _compos mentis_. It is wholly
unnecessary to except idiots and lunatics out of any su