their own safety and the safety of those who trusted and confided in
them.

Besides, this want of foresight and care would have been utterly
inconsistent with the caution displayed in providing for the admission
of new members into this political family. For, when they gave to the
citizens of each State the privileges and immunities of citizens in
the several States, they at the same time took from the several States
the power of naturalization, and confined that power exclusively to
the Federal Government. No State was willing to permit another State
to determine who should or should not be admitted as one of its
citizens, and entitled to demand equal rights and privileges with
their own people, within their own territories. The right of
naturalization was therefore, with one accord, surrendered by the
States, and confided to the Federal Government. And this power granted
to Congress to establish an uniform rule of _naturalization_ is, by
the well-understood meaning of the word, confined to persons born in a
foreign country, under a foreign Government. It is not a power to
raise to the rank of a citizen any one born in the United States, who,
from birth or parentage, by the laws of the country, belongs to an
inferior and subordinate class. And when we find the States guarding
themselves from the indiscreet or improper admission by other States
of emigrants from other countries, by giving the power exclusively to
Congress, we cannot fail to see that they could never have left with
the States a much more important power--that is, the power of
transforming into citizens a numerous class of persons, who in that
character would be much more dangerous to the peace and safety of a
large portion of the Union, than the few foreigners one of the States
might improperly naturalize. The Constitution upon its adoption
obviously took from the States all power by any subsequent legislation
to introduce as a citizen into the political family of the United
States any one, no matter where he was born, or what might be his
character or condition; and it gave to Congress the power to confer
this character upon those only who were born outside of the dominions
of the United States. And no law of a State, therefore, passed since
the Constitution was adopted, can give any right of citizenship
outside of its own territory.

A clause similar to the one in the Constitution, in relation to the
rights and immunities of citizens of one State in