Monday, September 28, 2009
Passage of 14th Amendment was no easy trick
Tom Angleberger
The New River Valley-based reporter answers your questions Mondays in his column, What's on Your Mind?
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Q: When did the state of Virginia ratify the 14th Amendment?
-- Tyrone Lee, Roanoke
A: First, let's recall what the 14th Amendment is.
This five-section amendment took care of several post-Civil War matters, including the citizenship and rights of former slaves.
"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."
This seems like basic stuff to us today, but remember that slavery -- which violated every one of those decrees -- had only just been abolished when Virginia and other states first considered the amendment. Thus the passage of this amendment was not easy.
"Ratification of a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution takes three-fourths of the states," explained Virginia Tech history professor Peter Wallenstein.
Because of this, "several of the former Confederate states would have to ratify [it] before the amendment could be adopted."
But the Southern states didn't like the amendment, which was designed to weaken the power of Southern whites. With former slaves now counted as free men, the South would have gained seats in Congress. The second section of the amendment was written to keep that from happening.
"Those who fought a war for disunion would not be permitted by the victors in that war to return to power -- that is, with greater power than before, power inflated as a consequence of the abolition of slavery," wrote Wallenstein.
At first Virginia and most other Southern states tried to reject or ignore the amendment. But having lost the war, they were doomed to lose this fight, too. The federal government put its foot down.
"In each of the ten former Confederate states that had failed to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment, new elections would be held. Black men as well as white men would get to vote -- and perhaps gain election as delegates to a state constitutional convention." Afterward, on Oct. 8, 1869, a beaten Virginia agreed to the amendment.
Later, the 15th Amendment would clear things up much more simply: Men of any color had the right to vote. Of course, it would be many years before that right became a reality.
Grammar Grumblings
Several readers dashed to their computers to tell me I'd made a mistake last week. I had used an "it's" where I should have used an "its."
Believe me folks, last week wasn't the first time. I make this mistake constantly. Occasionally I catch it myself. Sometimes the computer catches it. And the rest fall to my poor beleaguered editor to catch.
Don't blame him; he's been trying to teach me the simple rule for 10 years or more now. So, why haven't I learned it yet? I can't say. Why shouldn't "it" get an apostrophe when it becomes possessive? Perhaps it should! Perhaps I'm right and it's the rest of the world that wrong.
Got a question? Got an answer? Call Tom Angleberger at 777-6476 or e-mail woym@ roanoke.com. Look for Tom Angleberger's column Mondays.
