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America has to-day no problem more perplexing and disquieting than that of the proper and permanent relations between the white and the colored races. Although it concerns most vitally the twenty millions of Caucasians and the eight millions of Negroes in eleven States of the South, still it is a national problem, because whatever affects one part of our national organism concerns the whole of it. Although this question has been considered from almost every conceivable standpoint, few have turned to the laws of the States and of the Nation to see how they bear upon it. It was with the hope of gaining new light on the subject from this source that I undertook the present investigation.

I have examined the Constitutions, statutes, and judicial decisions of the United States and of the States and Territories between 1865 and the present to find the laws that have made any distinctions between persons on the basis of race. Reference has been made to some extent to laws in force before 1865, but only as the background of later legislation and decision. In order to make this study comparative as well as special, the writer has abandoned his original plan of confining it to the Southern States and laws applicable only to Negroes, and has extended it to include the whole United States and all the races.

Immediately after the Negro became a free man in 1865, the Federal Government undertook, by a series of constitutional amendments and statutory enactments, to secure to him all the rights and privileges of an American citizen. My effort has been to ascertain how far this attempt has been successful. The inquiry has been: After forty-five years of freedom from physical bondage, how much does the Negro lack of being, in truth, a full-fledged American citizen? What limitations upon him are allowed or imposed by law because he is a Negro?

This is not meant, however, to be a legal treatise. Although the sources are, in the main, constitutions, statutes, and court reports, an effort has been made to state the principles in an untechnical manner. Knowing that copious citations are usually irksome to those who read for general information, I have relegated all notes to the ends of the chapters for the benefit of the more curious reader who often finds them the most profitable part of a book. There he will find citations of authorities for practically every important statement made.

All the chapters, except the last two, were published serially in The American Law Review/cite> during the year 1909. The substance of the chapter on “Separation of Races in Public Conveyances” was published also in The American Political Science Review for May, 1909.

I wish that I could make public acknowledgment of my indebtedness to all who have helped me in the preparation of this volume. Hundreds of public officials in the South—mayors of cities, clerks of courts, attorneys-general, superintendents of public instruction, etc.—have responded generously to my requests for information. I am thankful to Mr. John H. Arnold, Librarian of the Harvard Law School, for access to the stacks of that library, without which privilege my work would have been greatly delayed, and to his assistants for their uniform courtesy while I was making such constant demands upon them. I am under especial obligation to Professor Albert Bushnell Hart, of Harvard University, for his direction and assistance in my examination of the sources and his valuable advice while I have been preparing the material for publication in this form; also to Mr. Charles E. Grinnell, former Editor of The American Law Review, for his encouragement and suggestions during the preparation of the articles for his magazine. Lastly, I would express my gratitude to Mr. Charles Vernon Imlay, of the New York Bar, the value of whose painstaking help in the revision of the manuscript of this book is truly inestimable.

Gilbert Thomas Stephenson.

Warren Place, Pendleton, N. C.

June 1, 1910.