Pace v. State of Alabama

H. C. Tompkins, for defendant in error. The counsel of the plaintiff in error compares sections 4184 and 4189 of the Code of Alabama, and assuming that the latter relates to the same offense as the former, and prescribes a greater punishment for it, because one of the parties is a negro, or of negro descent, claims that a discrimination is made against the colored person in the punishment designated, which conflicts with the clause of the fourteenth amendment prohibiting a state from denying to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.