Space concerns? They could have.
Why doesn't Article I, Section 2 of the U.S.Constitution read, "The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by that portion of the people of the several states who are allowed by those states to vote, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature"?
“Space concerns? They could have.”
I think that you are reading too much into the 2nd, something that wasn’t meant to be there. Though there weren’t many, some free blacks actually fought on our side in the Revolutionary War, and some fought to earn their freedom. Surely those at the Constitutional Convention (where the delegates promised that a Bill of Rights would be proposed in the 1st Congress) knew this (esp. Washington, the President of the Convention), and if they meant to exclude blacks they could have easily done so.
Anyhow, I don’t think that space concerns were really an issue, not for the sake of 10 or so extra words - these guys were writing for all of posterity. My language didn’t have to be used word-for-word. There could have been other, shorter, language that said the same thing. THAT’S NOT MY POINT - the point is that they could’ve excluded blacks and women if they had wanted to do so, but they chose not to.
Because it would be redundant. The part after the comma says the same thing, since the states determine "qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature".