The first step taken by Congress, under the power supposedly arising out of the Thirteenth Amendment, was an attempt to secure to the Negro his so-called “civil rights.” Unfortunately, there seems to be no succinct definition of this term. Bouvier[214] defines the phrase thus: “A term applied to certain rights secured to citizens of the United States by the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution and by various acts of Congress made in pursuance thereof.” This definition, however, helps little, and one is thrown back upon the Amendments and subsidiary enactments themselves to work out from them what are the civil rights of a citizen and of the Negro in particular.
During the summer and fall of 1865, between the close of the War and the convening of Congress, there had developed on the part of the radical element of the Republican party under Thaddeus Stevens an opposition to President Johnson’s Reconstruction plans. The first Civil Rights Bill passed the Senate on February 2, 1866, passed the House a few days later, but on March 27, was returned with the veto of the President. It was passed, however, over his veto on April 9, 1866, and was thereafter known as the Civil Rights Bill[215] of 1866. The first section reads: “All persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States; and such citizens, of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall have the same right, in every State and Territory in the United States, to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefits of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishments, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding.”
It is evident that the first phrase was intended to contravene the Dred Scott decision and to establish the Negro’s citizenship. While the Bill was before Congress, the great subject of debate was as to just what rights would be given thereby to the Negro. Some opposed it because they thought it would give him the right of suffrage, the right to intermarry with whites, to attend the same schools and churches, to sit on juries, and to testify in courts. It must be remembered that the “Black Laws” of the free States were still in force, and the Congressmen from those States were as jealous of Federal interference on the subject as those from the Southern States.