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Minor v. Happersett - Significance, The "new Departure", A Constitutional Approach, All Or Nothing, The Fourteenth Amendment

Appellant

Virginia Minor (with Francis Minor, her husband, as required by Missouri law, which did not permit married women to bring suit on their own)

Appellee

Reese Happersett

Appellant's Claim

That Virginia Minor's constitutional rights were violated by Happersett's refusal to register her to vote in the election of 1872.

Chief Lawyers for Appellant

Francis Minor, John M. Rum, John B. Henderson

Chief Lawyer for Appellee

No opposing counsel

Justices for the Court

Joseph P. Bradley, Nathan Clifford, David Davis, Stephen Johnson Field, Ward Hunt, Samuel Freeman Miller, William Strong, Noah Haynes Swayne, Morrison Remick Waite (writing for the Court)

Justices Dissenting

None

Place

Washington, D.C.

Date of Decision

29 March 1875

Decision

The Fourteenth Amendment did not guarantee Virginia Minor's right to vote, although she was found to be a citizen of the United States.

Related Cases

  • Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. 293 (1857).
  • Slaughterhouse Cases, 16 U.S. 36 (1873).
  • U.S. v. Susan B. Anthony 24 F.Cas. 829 (1873).

Sources

West's Encyclopedia of American Law. St. Paul, MN: West Group, 1998.

Additional Topics

Minor v. Happersett - Further Readings

Minor v. Happersett - Significance

This case marked the second time in two years that the Supreme Court declined to extend Fourteenth Amendment protection to women's rights. Suffrage, the specific "privilege of citizenship" denied in the case, would not be obtained by women nationwide until ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. As Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor pointed out, the adoption of the Fourteenth Amen…

Minor v. Happersett - The "new Departure"

After the amendment's ratification and adoption, attorney Francis Minor--husband of Virginia Minor, the president of the Woman Suffrage Association of Missouri--argued that its section 1 was actually an advance for women. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment states: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and…

Minor v. Happersett - A Constitutional Approach

In their petition filed in December of 1872, Virginia Minor's attorneys argued her constitutional rights had been abridged. They cited Article I, section 9, that no bill of attainder shall be passed; Article I, section 10, prohibiting states from passing bills of attainder or "any title of nobility--a status that `male citizens' seemed to have been awarded; Article IV, section 2, which gave citize…

Minor v. Happersett - All Or Nothing

Plaintiffs' argument and briefs presented to the Supreme Court repeated points made before the lower courts and also contained a new claim: "There can be no half-way citizenship. Woman, as a citizen of the United States, is entitled to all the benefits of that position, and liable to all its obligations, or to none." They cited several previous Supreme Court decisions, including Scott v. Sandford,…

Minor v. Happersett - The Fourteenth Amendment

The Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, is the most prominent of the three Aamendments designed to secure the civil rights of the millions of slaves freed during the Civil War. Indeed, the Fourteenth is one of the most important of all constitutional amendments, and has been the case of more legal action--and more discussion by legal scholars--than any other part of the Constitution. Most of t…

Thomas Wilson Dorr Trial: 1844 - Reformers Draft A "people's Constitution", Reformers Attempt To Seize State Arsenal, Dorr's Treason Trial [next] [back] Bradwell v. Illinois - Significance, The Marriage Disability, The Female Disability, All Or Nothing, God's Say So

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