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Cohens v. Virginia. 6 W.

Previous to the adoption of the confederation, congress established courts which received appeals in prize causes decided in the courts of the respective States. This power of the government to establish tribunals for these appeals, was thought consistent with, and was founded on, its political relations with the States. These courts did exercise appellate jurisdiction over those cases decided in the state courts, to which the judicial power of the federal government extended.

The confederation gave to congress the power "of establishing courts for receiving and determining finally appeals in all cases of captures."

This power was uniformly construed to authorize those courts to receive appeals from the sentences of state courts, and to affirm or reverse them. State tribunals are not mentioned; but this clause in the confederation necessarily comprises them, Yet the relation between the general and state governments was much weaker, much more lax, under the confederation, than under the present constitution; and the States being much more completely sovereign, their institutions were much more independent.

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The convention which framed the constitution, on * turning their attention to the judicial power, found it limited to a few objects, but exercised, with respect to some of those objects, in its appellate form, over the judgments of the state courts. They extend it, among other objects, to all cases arising under the constitution, laws, and treaties of the United States; and in a subsequent clause declare that in such cases the supreme court shall exercise appellate jurisdiction. Nothing seems to be given which would justify the withdrawal of a judgment rendered in a state court, on the constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States, from this appellate jurisdiction.

Great weight has always been attached, and very rightly attached, to contemporaneous exposition. No question, it is believed, has arisen to which this principle applies more unequivocally than to that now under consideration.

The opinion of the Federalist has always been considered as of great authority. It is a complete commentary on our constitution; and is appealed to by all parties in the questions to which that instrument has given birth. Its intrinsic merit entitles it to this high rank; and the part two of its authors performed in framing the constitution, put it very much in their power to explain the views with which it was framed. These essays having been published while the constitution was before the nation for adoption or rejection, and having been written in answer to objections founded entirely on the extent

Cohens v. Virginia. 6 W.

of its powers, and on its diminution of state sovereignty, are entitled to the more consideration, where they *frankly avow [*419] that the power objected to is given, and defend it.

In discussing the extent of the judicial power, the Federalist says: "Here another question occurs; what relation would subsist between the national and state courts in these instances of concurrent jurisdiction? I answer, that an appeal would certainly lie from the latter to the supreme court of the United States. The constitution, in direct terms, gives an appellate jurisdiction to the supreme court in all the enumerated cases of federal cognizance in which it is not to have an original one, without a single expression to confine its operation to the inferior federal courts. The objects of appeal, not the tribunals from which it is to be made, are alone contemplated. From this circumstance, and from the reason of the thing, it ought to be construed to extend to the state tribunals. Either this must be the case, or the local courts must be excluded from a concurrent jurisdiction in matters of national concern, else the judicial authority of the Union may be eluded at the pleasure of every plaintiff or prosecutor. Neither of these consequences ought, without evident necessity, to be involved; the latter would be entirely inadmissible, as it would defeat some of the most important and avowed purposes of the proposed government, and would essentially embarrass its measures. Nor do I perceive any foundation for such a supposition. Agreeably to the remark already made, the national and state systems are to be regarded as one whole. The courts of the latter will of course be natural auxiliaries to the execution of the laws of the Union, and an appeal from them [* 420 ] will as naturally lie to that tribunal which is destined to unite and assimilate the principles of natural justice, and the rules of national decision. The evident aim of the plan of the national convention is, that all the causes of the specified classes shall, for weighty public reasons, receive their original or final determination in the courts of the Union. To confine, therefore, the general expressions which give appellate jurisdiction to the supreme court, to appeals from the subordinate federal courts, instead of allowing their extension to the state courts, would be to abridge the latitude of the terms, in subversion of the intent, contrary to every sound rule of interpretation."

A contemporaneous exposition of the constitution, certainly of not less authority than that which has been just cited, is the Judiciary Act itself. We know that in the congress which passed that act were many eminent members of the convention which formed the constitution. Not a single individual, so far as is known, supposed

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Cohens v. Virginia. 6 W.

that part of the act which gives the supreme court appellate jurisdiction over the judgments of the state courts in the cases therein specified, to be unauthorized by the constitution.

While on this part of the argument, it may be also material to observe that the uniform decisions of this court on the point now under consideration, have been assented to, with a single exception, by the courts of every State in the Union whose judgments [421] have been revised. It has been the unwelcome duty of

this tribunal to reverse the judgments of many state courts in cases in which the strongest state feelings were engaged. Judges, whose talents and character would grace any bench, to whom a disposition to submit to jurisdiction that is usurped, or to surrender their legitimate powers, will certainly not be imputed, have yielded without hesitation to the authority by which their judgments were reversed, while they, perhaps, disapproved the judgment of reversal.

This concurrence of statesmen, of legislators, and of judges, in the same construction of the constitution, may justly inspire some confidence in that construction.

In opposition to it, the counsel who made this point has presented, in a great variety of forms, the idea already noticed, that the federal and state courts must, of necessity, and from the nature of the constitution, be in all things totally distinct and independent of each other. If this court can correct the errors of the courts of Virginia, he says it makes them courts of the United States, or becomes itself a part of the judiciary of Virginia.

But it has been already shown that neither of these consequences necessarily follows. The American people may certainly give to a national tribunal a supervising power over those judgments of the state courts, which may conflict with the constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States, without converting them into federal

courts, or converting the national into a state tribunal. [* 422] The one court still derives its authority from the State; the other still derives its authority from the nation.

If it shall be established, he says, that this court has appellate jurisdiction over the state courts in all cases enumerated in the third article of the constitution, a complete consolidation of the States, so far as respects judicial power, is produced.

But, certainly, the mind of the gentleman who urged this argument is too accurate not to perceive that he has carried it too far: that the premises by no means justify the conclusion. "A complete consolidation of the States, so far as respects the judicial power," would authorize the legislature to confer on the federal courts appellate jurisdiction from the state courts in all cases whatsoever. The

Cohens v. Virginia. 6 W.

distinction between such a power, and that of giving appellate jurisdiction in a few specified cases, in the decision of which the nation takes an interest, is too obvious not to be perceived by all.

This opinion has been already drawn out to too great a length to admit of entering into a particular consideration of the various forms in which the counsel who made this point has, with much ingenuity, presented his argument to the court. The argument in all its forms is essentially the same. It is founded, not on the words of the constitution, but on its spirit, a spirit extracted, not from the words of the instrument, but from his view of the nature of our Union, and of the great fundamental principles on which the fabric stands.

To this argument in all its forms the same answer may

be given. Let the nature and objects of *our Union be [* 423 ] considered; let the great fundamental principles on which the fabric stands be examined; and we think the result must be that there is nothing so extravagantly absurd in giving to the court of the nation the power of revising the decisions of local tribunals, on questions which affect the nation, as to require that words which import this power should be restricted by a forced construction. The question, then, must depend on the words themselves; and on their construction we shall be the more readily excused for not adding to the observations already made, because the subject was fully discussed and exhausted in the case of Martin v. Hunter.1

3. We come now to the third objection, which, though differently stated by the counsel, is substantially the same. One gentleman has said that the Judiciary Act does not give jurisdiction in the

case.

The cause was argued in the state court, on a case agreed by the parties, which states the prosecution under a law for selling lottery tickets, which is set forth, and further states the act of congress by which the City of Washington was authorized to establish the lottery. It then states that the lottery was regularly established by virtue of the act, and concludes with referring to the court the questions, whether the act of congress be valid? whether, on its just construction, it constitutes a bar to the prosecution? and, whether the Act of Assembly, on which the prosecution is founded, be not itself invalid? These questions were decided against the operation of the act of congress, and in favor of the operation of the act of the State.

If the 25th section of the Judiciary Act be inspected, it [* 424 ]

11 W. 304.

22 Stats. at Large, 726.

Cohens v. Virginia. 6 W.

will at once be perceived that it comprehends expressly the case under consideration.

But it is not upon the letter of the act that the gentleman who stated this point in this form, founds his argument. Both gentlemen concur substantially in their views of this part of the case. They deny that the act of congress, on which the plaintiff in error relies, is a law of the United States; or, if a law of the United States, is within the second clause of the sixth article.

In the enumeration of the powers of congress, which is made in the 8th section of the first article, we find that of exercising exclusive legislation over such district as shall become the seat of government. This power, like all others which are specified, is conferred on congress as the legislature of the Union; for, strip them of that character, and they would not possess it. In no other character can it be exercised. In legislating for the district, they necessarily preserve the character of the legislature of the Union; for it is in that character alone that the constitution confers on them this power of exclusive legislation. This proposition need not be enforced.

The second clause of the sixth article declares that: "This constitution, and the laws of the United States, which shall be made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land."

The clause which gives exclusive jurisdiction is, unquestionably, a part of the constitution, and, as such, binds all the United States.

Those who contend that acts of congress, made in pur[* 425] suance of *this power, do not, like acts made in pursuance of other powers, bind the nation, ought to show some safe and clear rule which shall support this construction, and prove that an act of congress, clothed in all the forms which attend other legis lative acts, and passed in virtue of a power conferred on, and exercised by congress, as the legislature of the Union, is not a law of the United States, and does not bind them.

One of the gentlemen sought to illustrate his proposition that congress, when legislating for the district, assumed a distinct character, and was reduced to a mere local legislature, whose laws could possess no obligation out of the ten miles square, by a reference to the complex character of this court. It is, they say, a court of common law and a court of equity. Its character, when sitting as a court of common law, is as distinct from its character when sitting as a court of equity, as if the powers belonging to those departments were vested in different tribunals. Though united in the same tribunal, they are never confounded with each other.

Without inquiring how far the union of different characters in one court may be applicable, in principle, to the union in congress of the

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