Supreme Court of Justice

“ Congress shall establish a court of claims to consist of five justices, one of whom shall be chief-justice, with such original jurisdiction as may be provided by law in cases involving claims against the United States, and with such other original jurisdiction as may be provided by law, and Congress may also confer on any other of the courts of the United States inferior to the Supreme Court, original jurisdiction in like cases. ”

“ We want a Supreme Court which will do justice under the Constitution—not over it. In our courts we want a government of laws and not of men. ”

“ Said the chief justice: 'As the supreme court of the state was reviewing the decision of the trial court, it must appear that the claim was made in that court, because the supreme court was only authorized to review the judgment for errors committed there; and we can do no more. ”

“ The Constitution nowhere makes reference to 'legislative courts.' The power given Congress in Art. I, § 8, cl. 9, 'To constitute Tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court,' plainly relates to the 'inferior Courts' provided for in Art. III, § 1; it has never been relied on for establishment of any other tribunals.
The concept of a legislative court derives from the opinion of Chief Justice Marshall in American Insurance Co. ”

“ The extension of the judiciary power of the United States to such controversies, appears to me to be wise, because it is honest, and because it is useful. It is honest, because it provides for doing justice without respect of persons, and by securing individual citizens as well as States, in their respective rights, performs the promise which every free Government makes to every free citizen, of equal justice and protection. It is useful, because it is honest, because it leaves not even the most obscure and friendless citizen without means of obtaining justice from a neighbouring State ”

“ Lower courts can freely substitute one district or circuit judge for another. The Supreme Court consists of nine Members who always sit together. Thus, Justices have a duty to sit that precludes withdrawal from a case as a matter of convenience or simply to avoid controversy. ”

“ As the state of nature was a state of peace, and not a state of war, the natural state of nations is a state of peace and society, and hence it is a maxim of the law of nations, founded on every principle of reason, justice and morality, that one nation ought not to do an injury to another. ”

“ As controversies between State and State, and between a State and citizens of another State, might tend gradually to involve States in war and bloodshed, a disinterested civil tribunal was intended to be instituted to decide such controversies, and preserve peace and friendship. Further; if a State is entitled to Justice in the Fœderal Court, against a citizen of another State, why not such citizen against the State, when the same language equally comprehends both? The rights of individuals and the justice due to them, are as dear and precious as those of States. ”

“ Individuals can obstruct the process of justice even when an investigation or proceeding is not pending. For example, a murderer may threaten to kill a witness if the witness reports information to the police. Such an act is no less obstructive merely because the government has yet to catch on and begin an investigation. As the Solicitor General persuasively states, one can obstruct the wheels of justice even before the wheels have begun to move; indeed, obstruction of justice is often “most effective” when it prevents “an investigation or proceeding from commencing in the first place.” ”

“ It would be strange, indeed, that the joint and equal sovereigns of this country, should, in the very Constitution by which they professed to establish justice, so far deviate from the plain path of equality and impartiality, as to give to the collective citizens of one State, a right of suing individual citizens of another State, and yet deny to those citizens a right of suing them. ”

“ That is true both when we initially decide a constitutional issue and when we consider whether to overrule a prior decision. As Chief Justice Rehnquist explained, “The Judicial Branch derives its legitimacy, not from following public opinion, but from deciding by its best lights whether legislative enactments of the popular branches of Government comport with the Constitution. The doctrine of stare decisis is an adjunct of this duty, and should be no more subject to the vagaries of public opinion than is the basic judicial task.” ”

“ Is it altogether a vain expectation, that a State may have other motives than such as arise from the apprehension of coercion, to carry into execution a judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States, though not conformable to their own ideas of justice? ”

“ I wish the State of society was so far improved, and the science of Government advanced to such a degree of perfection, as that the whole nation could in the peaceable course of law, be compelled to do justice, and be sued by individual citizens. ”

“ Will it be said, that the fifty odd thousand citizens in Delaware being associated under a State Government, stand in a rank so superior to the forty odd thousand of Philadelphia, associated under their charter, that although it may become the latter to meet an individual on an equal footing in a Court of Justice, yet that such a procedure would not comport with the dignity of the former?—In this land of equal liberty, shall forty odd thousand in one place be compellable to do justice, and yet fifty odd thousand in another place be privileged to do justice only as they may think proper? ”

“ The only reason, I believe, why a free man is bound by human laws, is, that he binds himself. Upon the same principles, upon which he becomes bound by the laws, he becomes amenable to the Courts of Justice, which are formed and authorised by those laws. If one free man, an original sovereign, may do all this; why may not an aggregate of free men, a collection of original sovereigns, do this likewise? If the dignity of each singly is undiminished; the dignity of all jointly must be unimpaired. ”

“ Upon general principles of right, shall the former when summoned to answer the fair demands of its creditor, be permitted, proteus-like, to assume a new appearance, and to insult him and justice, by declaring I am a sovereign State? Surely not. Before a claim, so contrary, in its first appearance, to the general principles of right and equality, be sustained by a just and impartial tribunal, the person, natural or artificial, entitled to make such claim, should certainly be well known and authenticated. Who, or what, is a sovereignty? ”

“ No Justice of this Court has ever argued that the Court should never overrule a constitutional decision, but overruling a precedent is a serious matter. It is not a step that should be taken lightly. Our cases have attempted to provide a framework for deciding when a precedent should be overruled, and they have identified factors that should be considered in making such a decision. ”

“ Blair, Justice.⁠My sentiments have coincided, ’till this moment, with the sentiments entertained by the majority of the Court; but a doubt has just occurred, which I think it my duty to declare.
I do not conceive, indeed, that any judgment, can be binding upon the rights and interests of a third person, who is not a party to the suit. The very nature of a bill of Interpleader pre-supposes, that the party by whom it is exhibited, would be liable a second time, if he should either voluntarily, or otherwise, pay the money which he owes, to a wrong claimant. ”

“ Prisoners have here a right to the testimony of their witnesses upon oath, and to the assistance of counsel, as well in matters of fact, as of law; which was not the case in England in the year 1353, when that statute was enacted. We do not think, indeed, that granting a medietas linguæ, will, at all contribute to the advancement of justice; and we know it is a privilege which the Citizens of Pennsylvania cannot reciprocally enjoy, as, at this day, there are no juries in any part of Europe, except in the British dominions. ”

“ That the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States, or of any other court to be instituted by the Congress, is not in any case to be increased, enlarged, or extended, by any faction, collusion, or mere suggestion ”

“ Article 12 of the Constitution 4) Any person who is arrested or detained shall have the right to prompt assistance of counsel. When a criminal defendant is unable to secure counsel by his own efforts, the State shall assign counsel for the defendant as prescribed by Act.
Article 1 of the Attorney-at-law Act (Mission of Attorney-at-Law) (1) The mission of an attorney-at-law shall be to defend fundamental human rights and realize the social justice. ”

“ In the present case, however, the majority’s resolution of the merits question (“legislature” means “the people”) is so outrageously wrong, so utterly devoid of textual or historic support, so flatly in contradiction of prior Supreme Court cases, so obviously the willful product of hostility to districting by state legislatures, that I cannot avoid adding my vote to the devastating dissent of the Chief Justice. ”

“ Our seminal opinion on fair use quoted the illustrious Justice Story:
“In truth, in literature, in science and in art, there are, and can be, few, if any, things, which ... are strictly new and original throughout. Every book in literature, science and art, borrows, and must necessarily borrow, and use much which was well known and used before.” ”

“ When a case goes beyond that, it is not primarily to preserve the rights of the litigants. The Supreme Court's function is for the purpose of expounding and stabilizing principles of law for the benefit of the people of the country, passing upon constitutional questions and other important questions of law for the public benefit. ”

“ This has been done in the constitution of the United States. Its framers were well aware of their responsibilities to secure justice to the people; and well knew, as the object of all trials in courts was to determine the suits between citizens, that it could not be done satisfactorily to them, unless they had the privilege to appeal from the first tribunal which had jurisdiction of a suit to another which should have authority to pronounce definitively upon its merits. ”

“ Judges ought to know, that the poorest peasant is a man as well as the King himself: all men ought to obtain justice; since in the estimation of justice, all men are equal; whether the Prince complain of a peasant, or a peasant complain of the Prince. ”

“ It would be of very dangerous consequence, if it was establifhed, that a commercial agent was not amendable as a witness in a Court of Justice, in a cause against his constituent. It is straining the matter of privilege too far: and the law makes him a witness, we are too fond of getting at the truth, to permit him to excuse himself from declaring it, because he conceives, that, in point of delicacy, it would be a breach of conscience . ”

“ The judges ought to be as immovable as the law which they interpret, impartial as the justice which they dispense, and firm as the authority which they represent.
To guaranty the independence of the judiciary power, on which depends civil liberty, and to insure to the system of jurisprudence the necessary stability, it is proper that the Court of Final Appeal should be an integral part of the legislature.
Decisions of cases are the interpretations of the law; consequently they are of general interest; the facts on the contrary concern only the parties. ”

“ And whilst we view the exercise of this noble prerogative of the Judges in the hands of such able, wise and independent men as compose the present Judiciary of the United States, it affords a just hope that not only future encroachments will be prevented, but also that any existing law of Congress which may be supposed to trench upon the constitutional rights of individuals or of States, will, at convenient seasons, undergo a revision ”

“ When looking for a tribunal fitted by its character and recognized authority to act as the great umpire of political parties in determining the result of a disputed Presidential election we find only one—it is the Supreme Court of the United States. ”

“ It is of vital importance that these powers be kept distinct. The Constitution provides that the judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court and such inferior courts as the Congress shall from time to time ordain and establish. ”

“ Unfortunately the United States has no "well-ordered system of jurisprudence." A citizen may be tried, condemned and put to death by the erroneous judgment of a single inferior judge, and no court can grant him relief or a new trial. If a citizen have a cause involving the title to his farm, if it exceed $2,000 in value, he may bring his cause to the Supreme Court ”

“ Under the act of 1895, as under the previous acts of congress, where the matter in controversy exceeds $5 in value, an appeal lies to a court of record from any judgment of a justice of the peace, whether rendered upon a verdict or not, and either party may have a trial by a common-law jury in the appellate court; and the trial by jury in that court is, and the trial before a justice of the peace is not, a trial by jury, within the meaning of the seventh amendment to the constitution. ”

“ There is certainly very strong grounds to maintain, that the language of the constitution meant to confer the appellate jurisdiction absolutely on the Supreme Court, independent of any action by congress ”