Court of judicature

“ Judges who perform 'judicial' functions on Article I courts do not adjudicate 'cases' or 'controversies' in the sense of Article III. They are not bound by the requirements of the Seventh Amendment concerning trial by jury. ”

“ Whatever may be the power of the states in respect of grand and petit juries, it is firmly settled that the Constitution absolutely forbids the trial and conviction, in a Federal civil tribunal, of any one charged with crime, otherwise than upon the presentment or indictment of a grand jury, and the unanimous verdict of a petit jury, composed, as at common law, of twelve jurors. ”

“ Whether or not the Court of Claims has jurisdiction in a case such as the present, is a question which we do not propose now to determine, for we are of opinion that if that court had jurisdiction, it erred in giving judgment for the plaintiff. ”

“ The defendant has the option to have his case considered by the first jury, and where the judge, acting without defendant's consent, aborts the trial, the defendant has been deprived of his 'valued right to have his trial completed by a particular tribunal'. ”

“ The right of having an appellate tribunal pass upon matters of law in all contests between parties, is regarded in some sort as a sacred right by our people. It is given in the broadest terms by the great Judiciary Act of 1789. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Mandamus, prohibition and injunction against judges are drastic and extraordinary remedies. We do not doubt power in a proper case to issue such writs. But they have the unfortunate consequence of making the judge a litigant, obliged to obtain personal counsel or to leave his defense to one of the litigants before him. ”

“ The local laws can never confer jurisdiction on the courts of the United States.'
It is clear, therefore, that the judgment of the Circuit Court, dismissing the libel for want of jurisdiction, must be affirmed, without noticing other questions raised by the pleadings. ”

“ The thirty-second section of the Judiciary Act of 1789, declares that the courts of the United States, 'respectively, shall proceed and give judgment according as the right of the cause and the matter in law shall appear unto them, without regarding imperfections, defects, or want of form in such writ, declaration, or other pleading, return process, or judgment, or course of proceeding whatsoever, except those only in case of demurrer, which the party demurring shall specially set down and express, together with his demurrer as the cause thereof.' The effect of this provision is decisive. ”

“ That the acts and proceedings of these special tribunals need not be according to the course of the common law, but must be according to the exigencies of the state. Such has been the practice from the earliest period of the commonwealth, allowing finally, on appeal or otherwise, a trial by jury, since 1785. 7. That the proceedings of such tribunals, however constituted, are entitled to respect; they are not to be collaterally questioned; and after a length of time, everything is to be presumed in their favor, as in favor of any other tribunal. ”

“ The Circuit Court can give no judgment for plaintiff or defendant in a case where it has not jurisdiction, no matter whether there be a plea in abatement or not. And unless it appears upon the face of the record, when brought here by writ of error, that the Circuit Court had jurisdiction, the judgment must be reversed. ”

“ Rep. 987, we held that the supreme court of the District of Columbia had jurisdiction and authority to determine the validity of an act which authorized the waiver of a jury, and to dispose of the question as to whether the record of a conviction before a judge without a jury, where the prisoner waived trial by jury according to statute, was legitimate proof of a first offense ”

“ In the earlier judiciary acts of the United States, the general jurisdiction of the courts of the United States, as depending upon the suit being of a criminal or of a civil nature, was usually defined by the words 'any cause, civil or criminal' (Rev. St. § 637) ”

“ It also has 'power to issue writs of mandamus, certiorari, prohibition, and habeas corpus, and also all writs necessary or proper to the complete exercise of its appellate jurisdiction.' Id. § 4. The constitution of 1849 provided that the district courts 'shall have original jurisdiction, in law and equity, in all civil cases where the amount in dispute exceeded two hundred dollars, exclusive of interest. In all criminal cases not otherwise provided for, and in all issues of fact joined in the probate courts, their jurisdiction shall be unlimited.' Const. ”

“ Inasmuch as due process implies a tribunal both impartial and mentally competent to afford a hearing, it follows that the subjection of a defendant's liberty or property to the decision of a court, the judge of which has a direct, personal, substantial pecuniary interest in rendering a verdict against him, is violative of the Fourteenth Amendment. ”

“ Where the verdict and judgment are set aside on a writ of error in an appellate tribunal, if the law of the jurisdiction makes no provision for a second trial the prisoner must be discharged, but it is settled law that it is competent for the legislature to provide that on reversing the judgment in such a case the court, if the prior proceedings are regular, shall remand the case for the proper sentence. ”

“ Dispualifications of grand jurors do not destroy the jurisdiction of the court in which an indictment is returned, if the court has jurisdiction of the cause and of the person, as the trial court had in this case. ”

“ Granting that, as has been said, the judge during the term is a living record, and may alter and supply from memory any order, judgment, or decree which has been pronounced, -and this, because he is presumed to retain his own action in his recollection,-yet after the term has elapsed the exercise of such a power to the extent of supplying an order upon which jurisdiction depends, in the absence of any entry, minute, or memorandum to proceed by, or of any statutory provision expressly allowing it, ought not to be conceded in criminal cases. ”

“ As the Court was without jurisdiction to vacate the judgment mandamus is the appropriate remedy unless to grant that writ is beyond the power of the Circuit Court of Appeals. In re Metropolitan Trust Co., 218 U.S. 312, 321, 31 S.C.t. 18, 54 L. Ed. 1051. We perceive no reason to doubt the power of that Court. ”

“ Throughout the whole trial, the Commission took the law from the Judge-Advocates with the unquestioning docility usually manifested by a jury on such matters in civil courts. In truth, the main function of a Judge-Advocate appears to be to furnish law to the Court, as in civil courts the main function of the Judge is to furnish law to the jury. ”

“ It encroaches upon the jurisdiction of the State tribunals.
1st. It takes away the trial by jury.
Nothing can be clearer than that our ancestors attached a high value to the right of trial by jury. But there is a wide difference between an English admiralty judge and one appointed under the Constitution of the United States. The reasons for entertaining a jealousy against the former do not apply to the latter. ”

“ The court said: 'It is well settled that a judgment obtained in a court of one state cannot be enforced in the courts and against a citizen of another, unless the court rendering the judgment has acquired jurisdiction over the defendant by actual service of process upon him, or by his voluntary appearance to the suit and submission to that jurisdiction. ”

“ Section 3 of the Act of 1937 directs that a court of three judges is to be convened whenever an interlocutory or permanent injunction is sought 'suspending or restraining the enforcement, operation, or execution of, or setting aside, in whole or in part, any Act of Congress' upon the ground that it is repugnant to the Constitution. ”

“ It is plain that such court has jurisdiction to render a particular judgment only when the offense charged is within the class of offenses placed by the law under its jurisdiction, and when, in taking custody of the accused, and in its modes of procedure to the determination of the question of his guilt or innocence, and in rendering judgment, the court keeps within the limitations prescribed by the law, customary or statutory. When the court goes out of these limitations, its action, to the extent of such excess, is void. ”

“ In all proceedings in the territorial courts in the nature of suits in equity, therefore, as well as in those proceedings in the nature of actions at common law, in which no trial by jury is had, either because a jury has been duly waived or because the issues tried are issues of law only, the appellate jurisdiction of this court must be invoked by appeal, and not by writ of error. ”

“ There is nothing to restrain use of that privilege as all choices of tribunal are commonly used by all plaintiffs to get away from judges who are considered to be unsympathetic and to get before those who are considered more favorable; to get away from juries thought to be smallminded in the matter of verdicts and to get to those thought to be generous; to escape courts whose procedures are burdensome to the plaintiff and to seek out courts whose procedures make the going easy. ”

“ Civil suits, in the name and for the benefit of the United States, are also instituted by the district attorney, and, in the absence of any directions from the Attorney-General, he controls the prosecution of the same in the district and circuit courts, and may, if he sees fit, allow the plaintiffs to become nonsuit, or consent to a discontinuance. ”

“ And though the powers of a judge even when acting as a one-man grand jury may be, as Michigan holds, judicial in their nature, [11] the due process clause may apply with one effect on the judge's grand jury investigation, but with quite a different effect when the judge-grand jury suddenly makes a witness before it a defendant in a contempt case.
Here we are concerned, not with petitioner's rights as a witness in a secret grand jury session, but with his rights as a defendant in a contempt proceeding. ”

“ Higley to be the almost uniform rule, among the people who make the common law of England the basis of their jurisprudence, to have a distinct tribunal for the establishment of wills, and the administration of the estates of men dying either with or without wills, which tribunals are variously called 'prerogative courts,' 'probate courts,' 'surrogate courts,' 'orphans' courts,' etc. ”

“ If relief on equitable grounds is to be obtained it is right that it should be sought by a formal suit upon adequate pleadings and should be granted only after a trial of issues according to the usual course of the trial of questions of fact. A court of first instance is the appropriate tribunal, and the only tribunal, equipped for such a trial. Appellate courts have neither the power nor the means to that end. ”

“ If, then, in both classes of civil cases of which the instance court has jurisdiction, subject-matter in the one class, and locality in the other, ascertains it, neither a jury trial nor the concurrent jurisdiction of the common law courts can be a test for jurisdiction in either class. Crimes, as well those of which the admiralty has jurisdiction as those of which it has not, except in cases of impeachment, the constitution declares shall be tried by a jury. ”

“ The acts of Congress point out but one mode by which the judgments of State courts can be revised or annulled, and that is by this court, under the twenty-fifth section of the Judiciary Act. In certain cases, where one of the parties is a citizen of another State, he has the privilege of removing his suit to the courts of the United States. ”

“ The doctrine is firmly established that where the jurisdiction of a court, and the right of a plaintiff to prosecute his suit in it, have once attached, that right cannot be arrested or taken away by proceedings in another court, and that, where property is actually in the possession of one court of competent jurisdiction, such possession cannot be disturbed by process out of another court of concurrent jurisdiction. ”

“ The traditional use of the writ in aid of appellate jurisdiction both art common law and in the federal courts has been to confine an inferior court to a lawful exercise of its prescribed jurisdiction or to compel it to exercise its authority when it is its duty to do so. ”

“ May a state court enjoin resident state-court suitors from prosecuting in the federal courts vexatious, duplicative litigation which has the effect of thwarting a state-court judgment already rendered against them? ”