ral William L. Frierson and Assistant U. S. District Attorney
James B. Archer. Mr. Fairchild and the league were represented by
Everett P. Wheeler, a New York attorney and officer of the league. He
contended that under the U. S. Constitution Congress had no power to
submit the amendment and that various ratifications were illegal.
Justice Thomas J. Bailey dismissed the injunction proceedings on the
ground that neither Mr. Fairchild nor the league had sufficient
interest to entitle them to ask for an injunction and that the court
had no authority to go behind the action of the Legislatures in voting
for ratification. The case was taken to the District Court of Appeals.
On October 4 this court denied the injunction and dismissed the case
as "frivolous and brought for delay." It was then carried to the
Supreme Court of the United States.

Litigation was threatened in Tennessee. In Maryland a League for State
Defense was formed to defeat ratification. It succeeded in the
Maryland Legislature and had delegations of legislators sent to
Tennessee and West Virginia for the purpose, who were not successful.
On Oct. 30, 1920, this league brought a test case in the Court of
Common Pleas in Baltimore through Attorney William L. Marbury against
J. Mercer Garnett et al., constituting the Board of Registry, to
compel them to strike the names of two women from the registration
books. The suit was filed in the name of Oscar Leser, a former Judge,
who had long fought woman suffrage, and twenty members of the league,
on the following grounds: The alleged 19th Amendment is not authorized
by Article V of the U. S. Constitution; it was never legally ratified
by the Legislatures of three-fourths of the States; (those of West
Virginia, Tennessee and Missouri were cited); it was rejected by the
Maryland Legislature. Everett P. Wheeler assisted in the trial just
before Christmas. The case was conducted for the State by Attorney
General J. Lindsay Spencer. Judge Heuisler gave an adverse decision on
Jan. 29, 1921. The case was taken to the Court of Appeals and set for
April 7. The decision of the lower court was sustained--that "the
power to amend the Constitution of the United States granted by
Article V is without limit except as to the words 'equal suffrage in
the Senate.' ... From all the exhibits and other evidence submitted
the court is of the opinion that there was due, legal and proper
ratification of the amendment by the required number o