The Constitution provides that the House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several States, and that they shall be apportioned among the States according to their several populations, the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed, being counted.2 The Fourteenth Amendment provides, however, that "when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, representatives in Congress, the executive or judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of;age and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis, of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State."

1 The Senate and House of Representatives are spoken of as two "Houses" of Congress, the Senate being often termed the Upper House, and the House of Representatives, the Lower House, or, simply the "House."

2 The original provision of the Constitution (Art. 8, Sec. 88, CI. 3) was as follows: "Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons. The actual enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the pass of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such maimer as they shall by law direct. The number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand, but each State shall have at least one Representative; and until such enumeration shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to choose three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New York 6ix, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one. Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five. Soots Carolina five, and Georgia three."

By section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment, it is provided that "Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed.

This amendment thus leaves it within the constitutional power of the States to place such restrictions as they may choose upon the exercise of the suffrage within their limits, but subject to a reduction of the number of representatives to which they are entitled in Congress to the extent to which the right to vote is denied to adult male inhabitants, citizens of the United States.

The Fifteenth Amendment, adopted two years later, places the absolute prohibition upon the States that " the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged . . . on account of race, color or previous condition' of servitude."

By some it has been argued that the Fifteenth Amendment is to be construed as repealing the clause of the Fourteenth Amendment relating to the reduction of the representation of the States, in that it renders constitutionally impossible the action which it was the object of that clause to deter -the States from taking. This argument, though it has had the support of eminent authority,3 cannot be considered a sound one, for the clause of the Fourteenth Amendment provides for a reduction not simply in cases where adult male inhabitants, citizens of the United States, are denied the right to vote because of race, color or previous condition of servitude, but for any cause whatever, saving for participation in rebellion or other crime.

As is well known, most of the Southern States have, by various provisions adopted in their several constitutions, in large measure eliminated the negro vote. This has led to a certain amount of agitation both in the public press and in Congress for the enforcement of the reduction of representation clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, but as yet no decisive steps have been taken.4

3 E. g. Senator John Sherman, Recollections, I, 450. See also article by Mr. Emmet O'Neal in Norlh American Review, Vol. 181, p. 530.

4 In the platform of the Republican party adopted by the National Convention in 1904 it was declared: "We favor such congressional action as shall determine whether, by special discriminations, the elective franchise in any State has been unconstitutionally limited, and, if such be the case, we demand that representation in Congress and in the Electoral College shall be proportionally reduced, as directed by the Constitution of the United States."

In various States of the Union property, educational, and other qualifications upon the right to vote have been established. These limitations upon adult male suffrage have not, however, been held to warrant an application of the reduction of representation clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. To quote the words of Cooley: "To require the payment of a capitation tax is no denial of suffrage, it is demanding only the preliminary performance of public duty and may be classed, as may also presence at the polls, with registration, or the observance of any other preliminary to insure fairness and protect against fraud. Nor can it be said that to require ability to read is any denial of suffrage. To refuse to receive one's vote because he was born in some particular country rather than elsewhere, or because of his color, or because of any natural quality or peculiarity which it would be impossible for him to overcome, is plainly a denial of suffrage. But ability to read is within the power of any man, it Is not difficult to attain it, and it is no hardship to require it. On the contrary the requirement only by indirection compels one to appropriate a personal benefit he might otherwise neglect. It denies to no man the suffrage, but the privilege is freely tendered to all, subject only to a condition that is beneficial in its performance and light in its burden. If a property qualification, or the payment of taxes upon property when one has none to be taxed, is made a condition to suffrage, there may be room for more question." 5