Samuel Freeman Miller

“ We answer, that such action of the government was justified because it pertained to the foreign relations of the United States, in respect to which the federal government is the exclusive representative and embodiment of the entire sovereignty of the nation, in its united character; for to foreign nations, and in our intercourse with them, states and state governments, and even the internal adjustment of federal power, with its complex system of checks and balances, are unknown, and the only authority those nations are permitted to deal with is the authority of the nation as a unit. ”

“ Nor, again, do we dispute the proposition that whatever is necessarily implied in the constitution and laws of the United States is as much a part of them as if it were actually expressed. All these questions we pretermit. The recognition by this court, including ourselves, of their soundness, does not in the least elucidate the case; for they lie outside of the true controversy. ”

“ The United States government being thus powerless to try and punish a man charged with murder, we are not prepared to affirm that it is omnipotent to discharge from trial, and give immunity from any liability to trial, where he is accused of murder, unless an express statute of congress is produced permitting such discharge. ”

“ The Terrys are unable to appreciate that an officer should perform his official duty when that duty in any way requires his efforts to be directed against them. The marshal, his deputies, and myself suffer daily indignities and insults from Mrs. Terry, in court and out of court, committed in the presence of her husband, and without interference upon his part. I do not propose being deterred from any duty, nor do I purpose being intimidated in the least degree from doing my whole duty in the premises ”

“ If no other motive for its insertion can be suggested, a sufficient one is found in the desire to remove all doubts respecting the right to legislate on that vast mass of incidental powers which must be involved in the constitution, if that instrument be not a splendid bauble. We admit, as all must admit, that the powers of the government are limited, and that its limits are not to be transcended. ”

“ The United States is the owner of millions of acres of valuable public land, and has been the owner of much more, which it has sold. Some of these lands owe a large part of their value to the forests which grow upon them. These forests are liable to depredations by people living in the neighborhood, known as 'timber thieves,' who make a living by cutting and selling such timber, and who are trespassers. But until quite recently, even if there be one now, there was no statute authorizing any preventive measures for the protection of this valuable public property. ”

“ We hold it to be an incontrovertible principle that the government of the United States may, by means of physical force , exercised through its official agents execute on every foot of American soil the powers and functions that belong to it. ”

“ The plan which Terry and wife had in mind, of insulting him and assaulting him, and drawing him into a defensive physical contest, in the course of which they would slay him, shows the little value of such remedies. We do not believe that the government of the United States is thus inefficient, or that its constitution and laws have left the high officers of the government so defenseless and unprotected. ”

“ That such a power should exist somewhere, and that the United States should not be more helpless in relieving itself from frauds, impostures, and deceptions than the private individual, is hardly open to argument. * * * There must, then, be an officer or officers of the government to determine when the United States shall sue, to decide for what it shall sue, and to be responsible that such suits shall be brought in appropriate cases. ”

“ Murder is not an offense against the United States except when committed on the high seas or in some port or harbor without the jurisdiction of the state, or in the District of Columbia, or in the territories, or at other places where the National Government has exclusive Jurisdiction. ”

“ There is no principle which pervades the Union, and has the authority of law, that is not embodied in the constitution or laws of the Union. The common law could be made a part of our federal system only by legislative adoption.' Per MCLEAN, J., Wheaton v. Peters, 8 Pet. 658;' and citing many other authorities. In Tennessee v. Davis, 100 U.S. 257, 267, referring to the judiciary act of 1789, the court said: 'It [the constitution] did not attempt to confer upon the federal courts all the judicial power vested in the government. Additional grants have from time to time been made. ”

“ If a person in the situation of Judge FIELD could have no other guaranty of his personal safety while engaged in the conscientious discharge of a disagreeable duty than the fact that, if he was murdered, his murderer would be subject to the laws of a state, and by those laws could be punished, the security would be very insufficient. ”

“ Does it not, by necessary implication, invest the president with self-executing powers,-that is, powers independent of statute?'
In reply to these propositions, we have this to say: We recognize that the powers of the government, 'within its sphere,' as defined by the constitution and interpreted by the well-settled principles which have resulted from a century of wise and patriotic analysis, are supreme; that these supreme powers extend to the protection of itself and all of its agencies, as well as to the preservation and the perpetuation of its usefulness ”

“ So, also, the law, which is intended to prevent crime, in its general spread among the community, by regulations, police organization, and otherwise, which are adapted for the protection of the lives and property of citizens, for the dispersion of mobs, for the arrest of thieves and assassins, for the watch which is kept over the community, as well as over this class of people, is more efficient than punishment of crimes after they have been committed. ”

“ Cooley, in his work on Constitutional Limitations, *19, collates from the numerous adjudications of this court cited by him the following principles: 'So far as that instrument [the constitution] apportions powers to the national judiciary, it must be understood, for the most part, as simply authorizing congress to pass the necessary legislation for the exercise of those powers by the federal courts, and not as directly, of its own force, vesting them with that authority. ”

“ The United States is a government with authority extending over the whole territory of the Union, actingu pon the states and upon the people of the states. While it is limited in the number of its powers, so far as its sovereignty extends, it is supreme. ”

“ But, while that is all true, it is also true that the powers must be exercised not only by the organs, but also in conformity with the modes, prescribed by the constitution itself. These great federal powers, whose existence in all their plenitude and energy is incontestable, are not autocratic and lawless. They are organized powers committed by the people to the hands of their servants for their own governe nt, and distributed among the legislative, executive, and judicial departments. ”