Morrison Waite

“ This is a question peculiarly within the province of the Court of Admiralty to decide. Why are we to find that the Court of Admiralty cannot deal with it? If it entertains the suit, there is an appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, a court of the highest authority. I feel disinclined to grant a rule for a prohibition in a case where the facts are in doubt, and the court whose jurisdiction is sought to be impeached is just as competent to determine the question as we are. ”

“ The suit is for damages growing out of the collission. Having jurisdiction in respect to the collission, it would seem necessarily to follow that the court had jurisdiction to hear and decide what liability the vessel had incurred thereby. Suppose the courts of common law had never decided that an action could not be maintained at common law for damages caused by the death of a human being, would any one doubt the power of courts of admiralty to determine whether such an action could be brought in that jurisdiction? ”

“ It is competent to try the facts, and, as we think, to determine whether, since the common-law courts in England, and to a large extent in the United States, are permitted to estimate the damages which a particular person has sustained by the wrongful killing of another, the courts of admiralty may not do the same thing. If the District Court entertains such a suit, an appeal lies from its decree to the Circuit Court, and from there here, if the value of the matter in dispute is sufficient. ”