tion; no statute should be declared unconstitutional unless it is in direct, clear, and necessary conflict with the constitution; a law, unconstitutional in part, may be enforced as to its constitutional provisions. A statute evading the terms and frustrating the general and clearly expressed or necessarily implied purposes of the constitution is as certainly void as if expressly forbidden; in the case of an act susceptible of valid or invalid construction courts should lean to construction of validity; if an act is corruptly administered, this is no reason for holding it unconstitutional; the long and undisputed practice in the construction of a constitutional provision by the legislature has almost the force of judicial exposition in its interpretation. The Suffrage The ultimate political power in every state, subject to the limitations of the federal Constitution, is vested in those persons who possess the qualifications required for exercise of the suffrage under the fundamental law of the state. These qualifications may be classified into five groups: age, sex, residence, citizenship, and miscellaneous. All of the states have adopted the ancient English rule of fixing the age limit at twenty-one years. Four of the states, Colorado, Idaho, Utah, and Wyoming, have conferred the right to vote at all elections upon women as well as men. In Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington, Wisconsin, and some other states women may vote in school elections; in Kansas, women vote in municipal elections; and in New York, women otherwise qualified, whenever they own property in the village or town, may vote in village elections and town meetings on questions involving taxation. Undoubtedly there is a general tendency to extend the suffrage to women, on account of their growing demand for it. They claim that they are as vitally interested in government-in 1 A constitutional amendment providing for woman's suffrage was submitted to the voters in Oregon in June, 1906. It was defeated by a vote of 47,075 to 36,902. The same question had been submitted in that state in 1900, when it was defeated by a vote of 28,402 to 26,265. In 1908, it was again defeated by a large majority. fixing the maximum rates of interest, safeguarding public health, creating charitable and eleemosynary institutions, andi controlling the care and management of public property.1 VI. The last part of our composite constitution makes p vision for future alterations by prescribing the way in whi amendments may be proposed and adopted." The State Courts and the Constitution The constitution of a state is its fundamental law, and very nearly in the same relation to the authorities of t in which the federal Constitution stands to federal auth In other words, it is the supreme law of the common: 1 the state courts are bound to hold unconstitution! any state authority, legislative or executive, which supreme law. This principle, which met with son. in the beginning of our history, has now been univers.. "In exercising this high authority," it has been claim no judicial supremacy; they are only th of public will. If an act of the legislature is ... because the judges have any control over the but because the act is forbidden by the constit.. the will of the people which is therein declare that of their representatives expressed in In passing upon the constitutionality of... the courts of New York have laid down cat. are quite commonly accepted througho The constitution should be so construc... objects for which it was made, avoidin wide and a strict construction; stat constitutional; an act must be contit well as in form; the constitutionalit passed upon unless necessary to the st a : Colo, at icipal An 1904 er cent at * 25 per cultural men out moomof their person e to two ... Rhode states - Arsunses, bona-fide citizens Thiana, Michigan, Nebraska, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, and Wisin it to the suffrage aliens who have declared their of becoming citizens. This practice of conferring its upon foreigners was early adopted to encourage ion, but within recent years it has met with serious et, and no doubt it will be abandoned in due time. Arong the special limitations imposed by the states on suffrage are tx and educational tests, and the peculiar tests applied in the South to exclude the negroes. Tax qualifications are imposed by only a few states. The constitution of Arkansas requires the veter to evhibit a poll tax receipt or other evidence that he has paid his poll tax; Tennessee likewise requires the payment of a poll tax; and the constitution of Pennsylvania provides that Voters of twenty-two years of age or upwards must have paid within two years a state or county tax, assessed at least two months, and paid at least one month, before election. In some of the southern states the tax-paying qualification forms one of the alternative qualifications laid on voters. Almost one-third of the states impose some kind of an educational test, either as an absolute or optional qualification.3 Massachusetts, for example, requires the voter to be able to read the constitution of the state in the English language and write his own name, if he is not prevented by physical disability or was not over sixty years of age at the time the amendment went into effect. Connecticut likewise prescribes that the citizen must be prepared to read, in the English language, any article 1 Readings, p. 143. Idiots, insane persons, and criminals are excluded from the right to vote. In 1950, thirteen States Alabama, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, North Carolina, South Carolina, Washington, and Wyoming-had a reading qualification. Eight of these states added some sort of a writing qualification, some requiring the voter to write his name, while in others the voter had to write a portion of the constitution; one state required the voter to write out the application for registration. In the southern states, however, the force of the educational qualifications is generally greatly diminished by exempting from them large classes of persons by "grandfather clauses" or by provisions exempting property owners from the requirements. Some of the other states exempted persons who were voters at the time of the adoption of the requirement. Most of the thirteen states also exempted persons who were physically unable to read or write. John B. Phillips, Educational Qualifications of Voters, University of Colorado Studies, Vol. III, pp. 55 ¤. In Lo hester must temunscrie is uniit uredi and write, on his g, made for masticon, i i and ante te must be the con- wier per not less then Soc. piel, Wever acumule 1 January 1, 1997, or may müz zur Berth) sursa y sace entitled to vote unter the Castrucca of the United States wherein he then set and an grandson of any such person not less than everyone years i age at the late of the adoption of this onstriton mi to male person of foreign birth who was naturalizei nur ʼn the first day of January, 1995, shall be fenied the night oægster imi vote in this state by reason of his failure to possess the stucational or property qualifications prescribed by this constitution.” It will be noted that none of these provisions requiring an eiucationdi, property, or family qualifications in contravention of the Fateenth Amendment, which meresy provides that no person, shum be disfranchised on account si race, chat, or previous condition of servitude. However, they make the date which imposes them liable to a reduction in representation in Congress under the Fourteenth Amendment. The effect of these southern limitations on the negro vote can Resident and dular julliflations are, nurse, required. For the suffrage provide us of the Virginia Juostituzion é Tyga rauhasing textos, Reading: p. 402. An attempt to distanciase "De groes in Maryland was d in the election of Novembar, tyoy. |