be limited by the duration of the acts of concession of the Universal Suez Canal Company.

ARTICLE 15.

The stipulations of the present treaty shall not interfere with the sanitary measures in force in Egypt. ARTICLE 16.

The high contracting parties undertake to bring the present treaty to the knowledge of the States which have not signed it, inviting them to accede to it.

ARTICLE 17.

The present treaty shall be ratified and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Constantinople within the space of one month, or sooner if possible. In faith of which the respective plenipotentiaries have signed the present treaty and have affixed to it the seal of their

arms.

Done at Constantinople the 29th day of the month of October in the year 1888.

Signed by the representatives respectively of Great Britain, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Spain, France, Italy, Netherlands, Russia, and the Ottoman Empire.*

This treaty is given in both French and English in Senate Doc. Mis. 56 Cong. 1st sess. 1899, Vol. 10. Doc. 151; and in English in Senate Rep. 56 Cong. 2nd sess. 1900, Vol. 1, Doc. 1339; and in House Doc. 62 Cong. 2nd sess. 1912, Doc. 680; and in White's Expansion of Egypt pg. 339.

CHAPTER XXVI.

CONSTITUTIONAL EQUALITY.

The tolls question has been tried by almost all known legal tests, excepting the one arising under the Constitution. This question could only be raised by American citizens, and not by a foreign power. What is this constitutional question?

The United States has built the canal at a large expenditure of public money. When the nation or a state builds a highway or a public utility or any other public improvement with public tax funds it cannot discriminate between its citizens, permitting some the free use thereof, and placing tolls and rates upon others. This would be opposed to the principles of the American constitutional system; opposed to a free republican government.

It is not the old question of regulating interstate traffic carried on by private industries; but it is a question of the government, with public funds of which it is trustee, itself, carrying on business, whether interstate or otherwise.

For instance, take the streets of Washington. The government could not deny one law-abiding private citizen the use thereof, while other citizens were allowed full liberty therein. The same rule would hold as to the public parks, the Congressional Library, and even as to the Capitol itself. Every public enterprise carried on at public expense must be public in fact and not in theory alone; it must be public in the sense of affording like treatment to all citizens.

A court is a public institution and all must find

justice therein at one uniform rate. All must find equal protection under the police laws of the country; equal protection from the army and navy; equal protection in his property rights and in liberty itself. There can be no discrimination in the use of the United States mail, except as to officials, and they are a part of the governmental institution. There is one fundamental principle that must pervade all proper national action, and that is that this is a government for all the people and not a government for a selected portion or class of citizens. Class distinctions seem to be running to excess under political encouragement and by the apparent approval of a large part of the citizens.

Class laws are passed and enforced which very able publicists believe to be out of harmony with the American system as ordained by the founders. Every one should realize that an act illegal at the hand of a single citizen would be equally illegal if done by any class of the people. A favor to a class should not be permitted, if denied to an individual or to another class of citizens. This is declared to be a land of freedom. How can this be if some are given liberty and others are bound under unjust restraint and discrimination? How can there be any clear and evident class distinctions under a constitution the offspring of 1776 and based on liberty and equality, and which were still more strongly guaranteed by the amendments gained by the great civil combat of 1861? There can be no assured liberty where class favoritism and distinctions are fostered and encouraged by the political opinion of the citizens.

This is not a government for John Doe and Richard Roe, but for all of the American people! The Pilgrim fathers before leaving the Mayflower signed a compact pledging their faith to establish a body politic

and thereby to enact "such just and equal laws" as shall be for the general good of the colony.

And in the famous Declaration of American Independence it is asserted that "we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." Jefferson's thoughts seemed to dwell on creating a nation whose very corner-stone was equality. The whole absorbing idea in the building of the great republic was that men should be equal, and governed by laws conferring equality of privilege, equality of opportunity and equality of rights in all the public benefits growing out of national exertions and operations. The colonists had lived under a different system and yearned for liberty and political equality.

The first words of our Constitution are: We the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice *** promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this Constitution. Can we suppose that the whole body of the people made a constitution to grant the privileges and benefits of government, in any instance, to only a part of the people?

The whole tenor of the Constitution with the amendments, is in favor of equality of rights and privileges.

We note the following provisions:

1. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, to pay the debts and provide for the " common defense and genral welfare of the United States."'

2. To establish uniform rules of naturalization and uniform laws on bankruptcy.

3. No bills of attainder shall be passed.

4. No capitation or direct tax shall be laid only in proportion to the census or enumeration.

5. No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to the ports of one state over those of another. 6. No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States.

7. The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privi leges and immunities of citizens in the several states.

8. Congress shall make no law for the establishment of religion, or abridge the freedom of speech or the press.

9. No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.

10. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States. No state shall by law abridge the privileges and immunities of the citizens of the United States; nor deny to any person the equal protection of the laws.

11. The right to vote shall not be denied by the United States or by any state on account of race, color or previous condition of servitude.

These selected provisions show most conclusively the theory upon which the Constitution was adopted. It breathes, throughout, the spirit of equality and liberty. Liberty may in many ways be restrained for the good of the whole body politic; but equality, in a governmental sense, cannot be impaired without doing violence to the public welfare.

Suppose that toll exemption were now in force, as to the Panama Canal, and that the owner of an American ship engaged in foreign trade paid large taxes to the nation; and suppose the owner of a coastwise ship was so lacking in thrift as to pay only nominal taxes; could the nation legally or morally levy tolls against the former, and discharge the latter from all tolls and charges? What kind of a free government could justify such a proceeding? This would most surely be a robbing of Peter to pay Paul.

We are not making proper use of our perception, if we do not see the tendency of the departments of our state and national governments to run to class extremities. Even the wholesome anti-trust laws, passed for the purpose of enforcing equality of opportunity in business, must be amended so as to further intrench class exemptions and privileges. Such policies are not only most illogical but they are in a manner op

Note: The Federal Sup. Court on Nov. 1, 1915, decided that the Alien Labor Law of Arizona was an unjust class law and violated the equality provisions of the Constitution. This case supports the reasoning in the above chapter.