The Civil Rights Cases
The Civil Rights Act of 1875 was an effort of the Post-Civil War Congresses to enforce civil rights throughout the United States. It was a part of the Reconstructionists to eliminate racial discrimination throughout the United States and this Act was one form to attempt to accomplish this. They took the authority to pass this Act from Section 5 of the 14th Amendment. They interpreted that section to allow the Congress the power to define as well as enforce the rights established by the 14th Amendment. When the Civil Rights Act of 1875 was tested by the Supreme Court it held that interpretation of the amendment and thus the Act was unconstitutional, and in passing the Act overstepped the power granted by the amendment to Congress. The ruling and the dissent to this opinion of the Court looked to four main constitutional issues to support their findings: civil and social rights, implied and expressed powers, federal supremacy and state sovereignty, and finally strict and broad interpretations. One of the issues exhibited in the Civil Rights Cases was the protection of civil rights versus the protection of what has been deemed as social rights. The argument of Justice Bradley indicted that the 13th and 14th Amendment can only be
The protection of these rights instead fell to the States and their authority to legislate their own domestic affairs. Justice Harlan, however, notes that the States right to legislate domestic affairs is not infringed upon with the enforcement of this law. Congress can create legislation over a subject if they are accompanied by an express or implied denial of such power to the states. Booth pronounced that power to be fully within the bounds and construction of the Constitution of the United States. In the 14th Amendment no such power exists and legislation, as already argued, can only be corrective in nature. I cannot resist the conclusion that the substance and spirit of the recent amendments of the Constitution have been sacrificed by a subtle and ingenious verbal criticism. Thus the injured party's rights remain, and the individual must look to laws of the state to vindicate a redress of their grievances. Another Constitutional argument, which was also discussed extensively in the South Carolina nullification, is the issue of state sovereignty versus federal supremacy. " He went on to say "the public have rights in respect of such places, which may be vindicated by the law. " The Congress must have the authority to legislate on rights and privileges granted to its citizens by the Constitution in order to prevent those rights from being tarnished. It is for Congress, he stressed, not the judiciary to say which legislation is needed and the Court cannot "enter the domain of legislative discretion to dictate the means which Congress shall employ the exercise of its granted powers. Congress then can only regulate the States in a corrective measure, "to counteract and redress the operation of such prohibited State laws or proceedings of State officers. The 14th Amendment is only to be corrective in nature and does not encompass regulation of the social rights of citizens. Maryland which established the precedent of judicial review, the basis of the power of the Supreme Court. Another issue at arms in the decision was the extracting of implied or expressed powers from the Constitution in regards to the federal government.
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