Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

[Portions of sections 1 and 2 are quoted.]

Then Congress passed the act to establish the judicial courts of the United States, 1 Stat. at Large, 73, chap. 20, and in the 13th section of it declared that the Supreme Court shall have exclusively all such jurisdiction of suits or proceedings against ambassadors or other public ministers or their domestics or their domestic servants as a court of law can have or exercise consistently with the laws of nations, and original, but not exclusive jurisdiction of suits brought by ambassadors, or other public ministers, or in which a consul or vice-consul shall be a party. In the same section, the Supreme Court is declared to have appellate jurisdiction in cases hereinafter expressly provided. In this section, it will be perceived that the jurisdiction given, besides that which is mentioned in the preceding part of the section, is an exclusive jurisdiction of suits or proceedings against ambassadors or other public ministers or their domestics or domestic servants, as a court of law can have or exercise consistently with the laws of nations, and original but not exclusive jurisdiction of all suits brought by ambassadors or other public ministers, or in which a consul or vice-consul shall be a party, thus guarding them from all other judicial interference, and giving to them the right to prosecute for their own benefit in the courts of the United States. Thus substantially reaffirming the constitutional declaration, that the Supreme Court had original jurisdiction in all cases affecting ambassadors and other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a State shall be a party, and that it shall have appellate jurisdiction in all other cases before mentioned, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.

The appellate powers of the Supreme Court, as granted by the Constitution, are limited and regulated by the acts of Congress, and must be exercised subject to the exceptions and regulations made by Congress. Durousseau v. The United States, 6 Cranch, 314; Barry v. Mercein, 5 How. 119; United States v. Curry, 6 id. 113; Forsyth v. United States, 9 id. 571. In other words, the petition before us we think not to be within the letter or spirit of the grants of appellate jurisdiction to the Supreme Court. It is not in law or equity within the meaning of those terms as used in the 3d article of the Constitution. Nor is a military commission a court within the meaning of the 14th section of the Judiciary Act of 1789. That act is denominated to be one to establish the judicial courts of the United States, and the 14th section declares that all the "beforementioned courts" of the United States shall have power to issue writs of scire facias, habeas corpus, and all other writs not specially provided for by statute, which may be necessary for the exercise of their respective jurisdictions, agreeably to the principles and usages of law. The words in the section, "the before-mentioned" courts, can only have reference to such courts as were established in the

preceding part of the act, and excludes the idea that a court of military commission can be one of them.

Whatever may be the force of Vallandigham's protest, that he was not triable by a court of military commission, it is certain that his petition cannot be brought within the 14th section of the act; and further, that the court cannot, without disregarding its frequent decisions and interpretation of the Constitution in respect to its judicial power, originate a writ of certiorari to review or pronounce any opinion upon the proceedings of a military commission. It was natural, before the sections of the 3d article of the Constitution had been fully considered in connection with the legislation of Congress, giving to the courts of the United States power to issue writs of scire facias, habeas corpus, and all other writs not specially provided for by statute, which might be necessary for the exercise of their respective jurisdiction, that by some members of the profession it should have been thought, and some of the early judges of the Supreme Court also, that the 14th section of the act of 24th September, 1789, gave to this court a right to originate processes of habeas corpus ad subjiciendum, writs of certiorari to review the proceedings of the inferior courts as a matter of original jurisdiction, without being in any way restricted by the constitutional limitation, that in all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a State shall be a party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. This limitation has always been considered restrictive of any other original jurisdiction. The rule of construction of the Constitution being, that affirmative words in the Constitution, declaring in what cases the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction, must be construed negatively as to all other cases. Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137; State of New Jersey v. State of New York, 5 Pet. 284; Kendall v. The United States, 12 id. 637; Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264. The nature and extent of the court's appellate jurisdiction and its want of it to issue writs of habeas corpus ad subjiciendum have been fully discussed by this court at different times. We do not think it necessary, however, to examine or cite many of them at this time.

[ocr errors]

For the reasons given, our judgment is, that the writ of certiorari prayed for to revise and review the proceedings of the military commission, by which Clement L. Vallandigham was tried, sentenced, and imprisoned, must be denied, and so do we order accordingly.

NELSON, J., GRIER, J., and FIELD, J., concurred in the result of this opinion.1

1 In the case of MARBURY v. MADISON, I Cranch, 137 (1803), the court had under consideration an application for a writ of mandamus to be directed to defendant as Secretary of State of the United States requiring him to issue to plaintiff a commission as justice of the peace, such commission having been duly signed by the President of the United States, and placed in the hands of the Secretary of State for delivery but not

delivered. CHIEF JUSTICE MARSHALL, delivering the opinion of the court, after holding that the plaintiff was entitled to the commission and that mandamus was the proper remedy to compel its delivery, considered the question whether the writ could issue on an application to the Supreme Court, and used the following language: —

"The act to establish the judicial courts of the United States authorizes the Supreme Court to issue writs of mandamus, in cases warranted by the principles and usages of law, to any courts appointed, or persons holding office, under the authority of the United States.'

"The Secretary of State, being a person holding an office under the authority of the United States, is precisely within the letter of the description; and if this court is not authorized to issue a writ of mandamus to such an officer, it must be because the law is unconstitutional, and therefore absolutely incapable of conferring the authority, and assigning the duties which its words purport to confer and assign.

"The Constitution vests the whole judicial power of the United States in one Supreme Court, and such inferior courts as Congress shall, from time to time, ordain and establish. This power is expressly extended to all cases arising under the laws of the United States; and consequently in some form may be exercised over the present case, because the right claimed is given by a law of the United States.

"In the distribution of this power it is declared that 'the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction in all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a State shall be a party. In all other cases, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction.'

"It has been insisted, at the bar, that as the original grant of jurisdiction, to the supreme and inferior courts, is general, and the clause, assigning original jurisdiction to the Supreme Court, contains no negative or restrictive words, the power remains to the legislature to assign original jurisdiction to that court in other cases than those specified in the article which has been recited; provided those cases belong to the judicial power of the United States.

"If it had been intended to leave it in the discretion of the legislature to apportion the judicial power between the supreme and inferior courts according to the will of that body, it would certainly have been useless to have proceeded further than to have defined the judicial power, and the tribunals in which it should be vested. The subsequent part of the section is mere surplusage, is entirely without meaning, if such is to be the construction. If Congress remains at liberty to give this court appellate jurisdiction, where the Constitution has declared their jurisdiction shall be original; and original jurisdiction where the Constitution has declared it shall be appellate; the distribution of jurisdiction, made in the Constitution, is form without substance.

"Affirmative words are often, in their operation, negative of other objects than those affirmed; and in this case, a negative or exclusive sense must be given to them, or they have no operation at all.

"It cannot be presumed that any clause in the Constitution is intended to be without effect; and, therefore, such a construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it.

"If the solicitude of the convention, respecting our peace with foreign powers, induced a provision that the Supreme Court should take original jurisdiction in cases which might be supposed to affect them, yet the clause would have proceeded no further than to provide for such cases, if no further restriction on the powers of Congress had been intended. That they should have appellate jurisdiction in all other cases, with such exceptions as Congress might make, is no restriction; unless the words be deemed exclusive of original jurisdiction.

"When an instrument organizing fundamentally a judicial system, divides it into one supreme, and so many inferior courts as the legislature may ordain and establish; then enumerates its powers, and proceeds so far to distribute them, as to define the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court by declaring the cases in which it shall take original jurisdiction, and that in others it shall take appellate jurisdiction; the plain import of the words seems to be, that in one class of cases its jurisdiction is original and not appellate; in the other it is appellate, and not original. If any other construction

would render the clause inoperative, that is an additional reason for rejecting such other construction, and for adhering to their obvious meaning.

"To enable this court, then, to issue a mandamus, it must be shown to be an exercise of appellate jurisdiction, or to be necessary to enable them to exercise appellate jurisdiction.

"It has been stated at the bar that the appellate jurisdiction may be exercised in a variety of forms, and that if it be the will of the legislature that a mandamus should be used for that purpose, that will must be obeyed. This is true, yet the jurisdiction must be appellate, not original.

"It is the essential criterion of appellate jurisdiction, that it revises and corrects the proceedings in a cause already instituted, and does not create that cause. Although, therefore, a mandamus may be directed to courts, yet to issue such a writ to an officer for the delivery of a paper, is in effect the same as to sustain an original action for that paper, and, therefore, seems not to belong to appellate, but to original jurisdiction. Neither is it necessary, in such a case as this, to enable the court to exercise its appellate jurisdiction."

The portion of the opinion in which it is held that the court had the power to declare the act of Congress unconstitutional and of no effect is given infra, p. 815.

In the case of EX PARTE WATKINS, 7 Pet. 568 (1833), it was considered whether the Supreme Court had jurisdiction to issue a writ of habeas corpus on an application in behalf of a person imprisoned under a capias ad satisfaciendum issued from the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia, and MR. JUSTICE STORY, delivering the opinion of the court, used this language:

"Upon this state of the facts several questions have arisen and been argued at the bar; and one, which is preliminary in its nature, at the suggestion of the court. This is, whether, under the circumstances of the case, the court possess jurisdiction to award the writ. And upon full consideration we are of opinion that the court do possess jurisdiction. The question turns upon this, whether it is an exercise of original or appellate jurisdiction. If it be the former, then, as the present is not one of the cases in which the Constitution allows this court to exercise original jurisdiction, the writ must be denied. Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137. If the latter, then, it may be awarded, since the Judiciary Act of 1789, c. 20, § 14, 1 Stats. at Large, 81, has clearly authorized the court to issue it. This was decided in the case Er parte Hamilton, 3 Dall. 17; Ex parte Bollman and Swartwout, 4 Cranch, 75; and Ex parte Kearney, 7 Wheat. 38. The doubt was whether, in the actual case before the court, the jurisdiction sought to be exercised was not original, since it brought into question, not the validity of the original process of capias ad satisfaciendum, but the present right of detainer of the prisoner under it. Upon further reflection, however, the doubt has been removed.

"The award of the capias ad satisfaciendum must be considered as the act of the Circuit Court, it being judicial process, issuing under the authority of the court. The party is in custody under that process. He is then in custody, in contemplation of law, under the award of process by the court. Whether he is rightfully so, is the very question now to be decided. If the court should, upon the hearing, decide that the capias ad satisfaciendum justifies the present detainer, and should remand the prisoner, it would clearly be an exercise of appellate jurisdiction; for it would be a revision and confirmation of the act of the court below. But the jurisdiction of the court can never depend upon its decision upon the merits of a case brought before it, but upon its right to hear and decide it at all. In Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137, it was said, that it is the essential criterion of appellate jurisdiction that it revises and corrects the proceedings in a cause already instituted; and does not create that

cause.

"Tried by this criterion, the case before us comes in an appellate form, for it seeks to revise the acts of the Circuit Court. In Ex parte Bollman and Swartwout, 4 Cranch, 75, the prisoners were in custody under an order of commitment of the Circuit Court; and it was held that an award of a writ of habeas corpus by the Supreme Court was an exercise of appellate jurisdiction. On that occasion, the court said, so far as the

c. By Removal.

GAINES v. FUENTES.

92 United States, 10. 1875.

MR. JUSTICE FIELD delivered the opinion of the court.

[ocr errors][ocr errors]

In the view we take of the application of the plaintiff in error to remove the cause to the Federal court, no other question than the one raised upon that application is open for our consideration. If the application should have been granted, the subsequent proceedings were without validity; and no useful purpose would be subserved by an examination of the merits of the defence, upon the supposition that the State court rightfully retained its original jurisdiction.

The action is in form to annul the alleged will of 1813 of Daniel Clark, and to recall the decree by which it was probated; but as the petitioners are not heirs of Clark, nor legatees, nor next of kin, and do not ask to be substituted in place of the plaintiff in error, the action cannot be treated as properly instituted for the revocation of the probate, but must be treated as brought against the devisee by strangers to the estate to annul the will as a muniment of title, and to restrain the enforcement of the decree by which its validity was established, so far as it affects their property. It is, in fact, an action between parties; and the question for determination is, whether the Federal court can take jurisdiction of an action brought for the object mentioned between citizens of different States, upon its removal from a State court. The Constitution declares that the judicial power of the United States shall extend to "controversies between citizens of different States," as well as to cases arising under the Constitution, treaties, and laws of the United States; but the conditions upon which the power shall be exercised, except so far as case of Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137, had distinguished between original and appellate jurisdiction, that which the court is asked to exercise is clearly appellate. It is the decision of an inferior court, by which a citizen has been committed to jail. Ex parte Hamilton, 3 Dall. 17, was a commitment under a warrant by a district judge; and the Supreme Court awarded a writ of habeas corpus to revise the decision, and admitted the party to bail. In Ex parte Burford, 3 Cranch, 448, the prisoner was in custody under a commitment by the Circuit Court for want of giving a recognizance for his good behavior, as awarded by the court. The Supreme Court relieved him on a writ of habeas corpus. In all these cases the issuing of the writ was treated as an exercise of appellate jurisdiction; and it could make no difference in the right of the court to entertain jurisdiction, whether the proceedings of the court below were annulled or confirmed. Considering then, as we do, that we are but revising the effect of the process awarded by the Circuit Court, under which the prisoner is detained, we cannot say that it is the exercise of an original jurisdiction."

« AnteriorContinuar »