But those who prepare constitutions are never those who adopt them, and consequently the views of those who frame them have little or no bearing upon their interpretation.  The question for consideration here is, what the people, who, through their representatives in the legislatures, adopted the amendments, understood, or must be presumed to have understood, from their language.  They must be presumed to have known that the “privileges and immunities” of citizens which were secured to them by the first section beyond the power of abridgment by the States, gave them the right to exercise the elective franchise, and they certainly cannot be presumed to have understood that the second section, which was also designed to be restrictive upon the States, would be held to confer by implication a power upon them, which the first section in the most express terms prohibited.

It has been, and may be again asserted, that the position which I have taken in regard to the second section is inadmissible, because it renders the section nugatory.  That is, as I hold, an entire mistake.  The leading object of the second section was the readjustment of the representation of the States in Congress, rendered necessary by the abolition of chattel slavery [not of political slavery], effected by the thirteenth amendment.  This object the section accomplishes, and in this respect it remains wholly untouched, by my construction of it.

Neither do I think the position tenable which has been taken by one tribunal, to which the consideration of this subject was presented, that the constitutional provision does not execute itself.

The provisions on which we rely were negative merely, and were designed to nullify existing as well as any future State legislation interfering with our rights.  This result was accomplished by the constitution itself.  Undoubtedly before we could exercise our right, it was necessary that there should be a time and place appointed for holding the election and proper officers to hold it, with suitable arrangements for receiving and counting the votes.  All this was properly done by existing laws, and our right being made complete by the Constitution, no further legislation was required in our behalf.  When the State officers attempted to interpose between us and the ballot-box the State Constitution or State law, whether ancient or recent, abridging or denying our equal right to vote with other citizens, we had but to refer to the United States Constitution, prohibiting the States from enforcing any such constitutional provision or law, and our rights were complete; we needed neither Congressional nor State legislation in aid of them.