In the fall of 1946, Fairman was developing views on the 14th Amendment that would prove influential among conservatives of the day, though Fairman himself did not identify with the political right. The amendment, adopted in 1868, provides: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Fairman argued that the framers of the amendment had not intended to apply the Bill of Rights to the states. The “privileges and immunities” of citizens the amendment protected were limited to such matters as the making of contracts and service on juries, he said. The federal government’s powers to fight discrimination or other abuses by the states would, accordingly, be limited. “This is not merely an academic question,” Fairman wrote in a seminal 1949 Stanford Law Review article. “It presents itself insistently today because Justices of the Supreme Court are prepared to make decisions turn upon their reading of the historical record.” Indeed, he wrote in direct rebuttal of Justice Hugo Black, who was taking the opposite view of history in his opinions at the court.Stanfordalumni.orgFairman’s narrow interpretation of the 14th Amendment likely came through in lectures to undergraduates such as Rehnquist. “He clearly taught that the 14th Amendment did not apply the Bill of Rights to the states,” Davies recalls.
And personally I wouldn't give a spit for the Radical Republicans of 1866. However the 14th Amendment's intent as well as a discussion of some of the cases it has affected are found more in depth here.
I prefer to follow an interpretation which is consistent with orignial intent - namely that the BOR applies to the states. Whatever interpretation Fairman came up with, it doesn't square with the what the authors and approvers of the 14th Amendment said in the course of their debates. The article I referenced is only summary of the comments and the issues raised. Whole books have been written about the Constitution and I can hardly offer the whole story in a posting here at Freerepublic.
No matter how far into your ears you stick your fingers or how loudly you hum, the fact remains that the Radical Republicans of 1866 were able to carry enough votes to amend the Constitution in accordance with their agenda. The historical record is quite clear that incorporation (not the "selective" variety invented via judicial activism) was the intent of the Fourteenth Amendment.