the United States citizen, which the states are forbidden to abridge, or
it is not. If it is, then the women whose votes these defendants
received, being citizens of the United States, and in every other way
qualified to vote, possessed the right to vote, and their votes were
rightfully received. If it is not, then the fourteenth amendment confers
no power upon Congress, to legislate, on the subject of voting in the
States. There is no other clause or provision of that amendment which
can by any possibility confer such power--a power which cannot be
implied, but which, if it exist, must be expressly given in some part of
the Constitution, or clearly needed to carry into effect some power that
is expressly given.

No such power is conferred by the fifteenth amendment. That amendment
operates upon the States and upon the United States, and not upon the
citizen. "The right of citizens of the United States to vote, shall not
be denied or abridged by 'THE UNITED STATES OR BY ANY STATE.'" The terms
"_United States_" and "State," as here used, mean the government of the
United States and of the States. They do not apply to individuals or to
offenses committed by individuals, but only to acts done by the State or
the United States.

But at any rate, the operation of this amendment, and the power given to
Congress to enforce it, is limited to offenses committed in respect of
depriving persons of the right to vote because of their "_race, color,
or previous condition of servitude_."

This is not such a case. There is no ground for saying that these
defendants have committed any offense against the spirit or the letter
of the fifteenth amendment, or any legitimate legislation for its
enforcement.