at case of _State of Texas v. White_[1] the rights of Texas as
a sovereign state were asserted, though Texas had joined in the
Rebellion and was not represented in the national legislature.

[Footnote 1: 7 Wall., 700 (1869).]

In _The Collector v. Day_[1] it was held that Congress had no power to
tax the salary of a state official.

[Footnote 1: 11 Wall., 113 (1871).]

In the Slaughter House cases[1] an act of the Legislature of Louisiana,
granting to a corporation created by it exclusive rights to maintain
slaughter houses for the City of New Orleans and other territory, was
upheld, as a valid exercise of state police power, against claims that
the legislation violated rights secured under the newly adopted
amendments to the Federal Constitution (Amendments XIII, XIV, XV). The
opinion of the Court delivered by a Northern judge (Miller of Iowa)
stands as one of the bulwarks of state authority.

[Footnote 1: 16 Wall., 36 (1873).]

In a series of later cases various reconstruction acts of Congress
involving encroachments upon state rights were either held
unconstitutional or radically limited in their effect. For example, the
decision in _United States v. Cruikshank_[1] greatly limited the effect
of the so-called Federal Enforcement Act. The decision in _United States
v. Harris_[2] declared unconstitutional portions of an act of Congress
designed for the suppression of activities of the Ku-Klux variety. In
the so-called Civil Rights cases[3] certain provisions of the federal
Civil Rights Act, passed in furtherance of the purposes of the new
constitutional amendments and designed to secure to persons of color
equal enjoyment of the privileges of inns, public conveyances, theatres,
etc., were held unconstitutional as an encroachment on the rights of the
states.

[Footnote 1: 92 U.S., 542 (1875).]

[Footnote 2: 106 U.S., 629.]

[Footnote 3: 109 U.S., 3.]

These are but a few of the many decisions of the Supreme Court in the
reconstruction period upholding the rights of the states against
attempted federal encroachment arising from the conditions of the Civil
War. The nation owes a debt of gratitude to the men who composed the
Court at this time for their courage and firmness in the face of popular
clamor and passion.

The solicitude of the Court for the rights of the states did not end
with the reconstruction period. It has continued down to the present
day. In the Income Tax cases[1] the Court held that a tax