James v. Henry Bowman

• Citation: 23 S.Ct. 678,47 L.Ed. 979,190 U.S. 127
• Decision Date: 04 May 1903
• Docket Number: No. 213,213
• Parties: A. D. JAMES, United States Marshal for the Western District of Kentucky, and The United States, Appts. , v. HENRY BOWMAN
• Court: United States Supreme Court

190 U.S. 127

23 S.Ct. 678

47 L.Ed. 979

A. D. JAMES, United States Marshal for the Western District of Kentucky, and The United States, Appts.,

v HENRY BOWMAN.

No. 213.

Argued March 16, 1903.

Decided May 4, 1903.

In December, 1900, an indictment was found by the United States district court for the district of Kentucky against the appellee, Henry Bowman, and one Harry Weaver, based upon § 5507 of the Revised Statutes of the United States (U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 3712). The indictment charged, in substance, that certain 'men of African descent, colored men, negroes, and not white men,' being citizens of Kentucky and of the United States, were, by means of bribery, unlawfully and feloniously intimidated and prevented from exercising their lawful right of voting at a certain election held in the fifth congressional district of Kentucky on the 8th day of November, 1898, for the election of a representative in the Fifty-sixth Congress of the United States.

No allegation is made that the bribery was because of the race, color, or previous condition of servitude of the men bribed. The appellee, Henry Bowman, having been arrested and held in default of bail, sued out a writ of habeas corpus on the ground of the unconstitutionality of § 5507. The district judge granted the writ, following reluctantly the decision of the circuit court of appeals for the sixth circuit, in Lackey v. United States, 53 L. R. A. 660, 46 C. C. A. 189, 107 Fed. 114. From that judgment the government has taken this appeal.

Section 5507 is as follows:

'Sec. 5507. Every person who prevents, hinders, controls, or intimidates another from exercising, or in exercising the right of suffrage, to whom that right is guaranteed by the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, by means of bribery or threats of depriving such person of employment or occupation, or of ejecting such person from a rented house, lands, or other property, or by threats of refusing to renew leases or contracts for labor, or by threats of violence to himself or family, shall be punished as provided in the preceding section.'

The 15th Amendment provides:

'Sec. 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

'Sec. 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.'

Solicitor General Hoyt and Mr. W. R. Harr for appellants.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 128-131 intentionally omitted] Messrs. Swagar Sherley and W. B. Dixon for appellee.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 131-135 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Brewer delivered the opinion of the court:

The single question presented for our consideration is whether § 5507 can be upheld as a valid enactment, for, if not, the indictment must also fall, and the defendant was rightfully discharged. On its face the section purports to be an exercise of the power granted to Congress by the 15th Amendment, for it declares a punishment upon anyone who, by means of bribery, prevents another to whom the right of suffrage is guaranteed by such amendment from exercising that right. But that amendment relates solely to action 'by the United States or by any state,' and does not contemplate wrongful individual acts. It is in this respect similar to the following clauses in the 14th Amendment:

'No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.'

Each of these clauses has been often held to relate to action by a state, and not by individuals. As said in Virginia v. Rives, 100 U. S. 313, 318, sub nom. Ex parte Virginia, 25 L. ed. 667, 669:

'The provisions of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution we have quoted all have reference to state action exclusively, and not to any action of private individuals.'

Again, in Ex parte Virginia, 100 U. S. 339, 346, 25 L. ed. 676, 679:

'They have reference to actions of the political body denominated a state, by what ever instruments or in whatever modes that action may be taken. A state acts by its legislative, its executive, or its judicial authorities. It can act in no other way. The constitutional provision, therefore, must mean that no agency of the state, or of the officers or agents by whom its powers are officers or agents by whom its powers are jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.'

Again , in United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 554, 23 L. ed. 588, 592:

'The 14th Amendment prohibits a state from denying to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws; but this provision does not, any more than the one which precedes it, and which we have just considered, add anything to the rights which one citizen has under the Constitution against another. The equality of the rights of citizens is a principle of republicanism. Every republican government is in duty bound to protect all its citizens in the enjoyment of this principle, if within its power. That duty was originally assumed by the states; and it still remains there. The only obligation resting upon the United States is to see that the states do not deny the right. This the amendment guarantees, but no more. The power of the national government is limited to the enforcement of this guaranty.'

In Civil Rights Cases, 109 U. S. 3, 13, 27 L. ed. 835, 840, 3 Sup. Ct. Rep. 18, 22:

'And so in the present case, until some state law has been passed, or some state action through its officers or agents has been taken, adverse to the rights of citizens sought to be protected by the 14th Amendment, no legislation of the United States under said amendment, nor any proceeding under such legislation, can be called into activity; for the prohibitions of the amendment are against state laws and acts done under state authority. Of course, legislation may, and should be, provided in advance to meet the exigency when it arises; but it should be adapted to the mischief and wrong which the amendment was intended to provide against; and that is, state laws, or state action of some kind, adverse to the rights of the citizen secured by the amendment. Such legislation cannot properly cover the whole domain of rights appertaining to life, liberty, and property, defining them and providing for their vindication. That would be to establish a code of municipal law regulative of all private rights between man and man in society. It would be to make Congress take the place of the state legislatures, and to supersede them. It is absurd to affirm that, because the rights of life, liberty, and property (which include all civil rights that men have) are by the amendment sought to be protected against invasion on the part of the state without due process of law, Congress may therefore provide due process of law for their vindication in every case; and that, because the denial by a state to any persons of the equal protection of the laws is prohibited by the amendment, therefore Congress may establish laws for their equal protection. In fine, the legislation which Congress is authorized to adopt in this behalf is not general legislation upon the rights of the citizen, but corrective legislation; that is, such as may be nec- essary and proper for counteracting such laws as the states may adopt or enforce, and which, by the amendment, they are prohibited from making or enforcing, or such acts and proceedings as the states may commit or take, and which, by the amendment, they are prohibited from committing or taking.'

United States v. Harris, 106 U. S. 629, 639, 27 L. ed. 290, 294, 1 Sup. Ct. Rep. 601, 609:

'The language of the amendment does not leave this subject in doubt. When the state has been guilty of no violation of its provisions; when it has not made or enforced any law abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; when no one of its departments has deprived any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, or denied to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws; when, on the contrary, the laws of the state, as enacted by its legislative, and construed by its judicial, and administered by its executive, departments, recognize and protect the rights of all persons,—the amendment imposes no duty, and confers no power, upon Congress.'

See also Slaughter-House Cases, 16 Wall. 36. 21 L. ed. 394; Scott v. McNeal, 154 U. S. 34, 45, 38 L. ed. 896, 901, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1108; Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226, 233, 41 L. ed. 979, 983, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 581.

But we are not left alone to this reasoning from analogy. The 15th Amendment itself has been considered by this court, and the same limitations placed upon its provisions. In United States v. Reese, 92 U. S. 214, 217, 23 L. ed. 563, 564, we said:

'The 15th Amendment does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone. It prevents the states, or the United States, however, from giving preference, in this particular, to one citizen of the United States over another on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Before its adoption this could be done. It was as much within the power of state to exclude citizens of the United States from voting on account of race, etc., as it was on account of age, property, or education. Now it is not. If citizens of one race having certain qualifications are permitted by law to...