Judge (law)

“ The court asks, 'When can a man slay another? When can he sit as a judge passing upon the law and a jury passing on the facts, and then as a jury applying the law to those facts and finding a verdict, and then acting again as the court and entering up judgment, and then going out as a marshal or sheriff and executing that judgment, all at the same time, determining the law, determining the facts as judge, jury, and executioner, all at the same time?' And because of this question, stated as a preliminary to the laying down of the rule of law, the judgment is set aside. ”

“ If they could legally decide upon questions of law, their decision must, of necessity, be final and conclusive, which would involve an absurdity in all judicial proceedings, and would be contradictory to the fundamental principles of our jurisprudence.' 'The jury, when called upon to decide facts which are complicated with law, are therefore constitutionally, and must be, from the nature and intention of the institution, bound to seek and to obey the direction of the judge with respect to the law. ”

“ It is to be found in the earliest judicial records, and it has been steadily maintained by an undisputed current of decisions. * * * It is essential in all Courts that the Judges who are appointed to administer the law should be permitted to administer it under the protection of the law, independently and freely, without favor and without fear. * * * How could a Judge so exercise his office if he were in daily and hourly fear of an action being brought against him, and having the question submitted to a jury * * * ? Does an action lie against a man for maliciously doing his duty? ”

“ Nay, the very officials who administer these laws are generally as grossly ignorant of them as it is possible to be, and in every judge's yamen in the Empire there are one or two "law experts," who are always prepared to give chapter and verse at a moment's notice,—in fact, to guide the judge in delivering a proper verdict, and one such as must meet with the approbation of his superiors. ”

“ Under any such circumstances, the wisdom of Congress has provided the means of protection to all persons sued or imprisoned for any act done or omitted to be done in pursuance of a law of the United States, or any order, process, or decree of any Federal judge or court of competent jurisdiction. ”

“ The Government theory, though often laid down in the charge, is seldom if ever practically carried out by a judge in its full extent. For he does not declare on his own authority what is the law and what constitutes the crime, but gives the statutes, precedents, decisions and the like ”

“ In a trial by jury in a federal court, the judge is not a mere moderator, but is the governor of the trial for the purpose of assuring its proper conduct and of determining questions of law. This discharge of the judicial function as at common law is an essential factor in the process for which the Federal Constitution provides. ”

“ As to questions of pure policy and expediency, no express or necessarily implied constitutional provision intervening, it is the sole judge. It has also the undoubted right to take a comprehensive view in determining the necessity of a law, and the character of the purpose to be accomplished by it. ”

“ Should the supreme court, or any of its members, from interest, partiality, or negligence, judge so wrong that an individual, contrary to law and evidence, did lose or might have lost life, liberty, honour, or property, the attorney-general shall be bound, and the chancellor of justice authorised, to arraign the guilty, according to the laws of the realm, in the court after mentioned. ”

“ which ought seldom, if ever, to be decided in the affirmative, in a doubtful case.' 'The opposition between the constitution and the law should be such, that the judge feels a clear and strong conviction of their incompatibility with each other.' And in the Dartmouth College case, 4 Wheat. ”

“ When the code of laws is once fixed, it should be observed in the literal sense, and nothing more is left to the judge, than to determine, whether an action be, or be not conformable to the written law. ”

“ This practice of Judge Marshall, of travelling out of his case to prescribe what the law would be in a moot case not before the court, is very irregular and very censurable. ”

“ The Judiciary, including this Court, is the most vulnerable and comes nearest to illegitimacy when it deals with judge-made constitutional law having little or no cognizable roots in the language or even the design of the Constitution. ”

“ "I am the law, and I am the judge! ”

“ But for their right to judge of the law, and the justice of the law, juries would be no protection to an accused person, even as to matters of fact; for, if the government can dictate to a jury any law whatever, in a criminal case, it can certainly dictate to them the laws of evidence. ”

“ General Aspects.—The provisions of the Statuto respecting the administration of justice are brief and general. Justice, it is declared, emanates from the king and is administered in his name by the judges whom he appoints. These judges, after three years of service, are irremovable. Proceedings of courts in civil cases and hearings in criminal cases are required to be public. No one may be withdrawn from his ordinary legal jurisdiction; and no modification may be introduced in respect to courts, tribunals, or judges, save by law. ”

“ The enactment which we have just cited recognizes this body of men, and their utility in the judicial system of the United States, and imposes upon the courts the duty of providing rules, by which persons entitled to become members of this class, may be permitted to exercise the privilege of managing and conducting causes in these courts. They are as essential to the successful working of the courts, as the clerks, sheriffs, and marshals, and perhaps as the judges themselves, since no instance is known of a court of law without a bar. ”

“ No, sir. The Judiciary are our security. The Legislature may enact penalties, and denounce punishments against those who do not yield obedience to their unconstitutional acts; their penalties cannot be exacted, nor punishments inflicted, without the judgment of a court. The judges are to expound the law, and that fundamental, paramount law, the constitution. To this purpose they are sworn to support the constitution. ”

“ PRECEDENT, n. In Law, a previous decision, rule or practice which, in the absence of a definite statute, has whatever force and authority a Judge may choose to give it, thereby greatly simplifying his task of doing as he pleases. As there are precedents for everything, he has only to ignore those that make against his interest and accentuate those in the line of his desire. Invention of the precedent elevates the trial-at-law from the low estate of a fortuitous ordeal to the noble attitude of a dirigible arbitrament. ”

“ Beyond all doubt it is the duty of the court to render the judgment required by law in the first instance, but the experience of ages makes it evident that mistakes in that behalf will sometimes occur, even in the courts of general jurisdiction, and hence the rule, which may be traced to the very origin of the common law, that a court may vacate and set aside an erroneous judgment, during the same term, and render in its stead the judgment required by law. ”

“ In short, if the jury have no right to judge of the justice of a law of the government, they plainly can do nothing to protect the people against the oppressions of the government; for there are no oppressions which the government may not authorize by law. ”

“ Let our judgment be what it may, as to the law, it can do harm to no one, without their sanction; with their approbation, a safe rule of titles and property will be established; your judgment might not lead to one so sound or permanent. Much of what you have heard, has been repeated from the adjudications of that court, much from those of England, their judges and chancellors, whose judgments, decrees and opinions have been carefully reviewed and approved by the pure and eminent jurists who have presided in our own courts. ”

“ Chief Justice Marshall, that "the judicial department has no will in any case. Judicial power, as contradistinguished from the power of the laws, has no existence. Courts are the mere instruments of the law, and can will nothing. ”

“ With respect to decisions of justices of the peace sitting at quarter sessions, or as a court of summary jurisdiction, except in the case above stated, the subject matter of appeal is for the most part of a criminal or quasi-criminal character, the civil jurisdiction of justices being comparatively limited. The appeal in such cases is as to matters of law only, the justices’ decision on facts not being subject to review. ”

“ It is a doctrine of law too long established to require a citation of authorities, that, where a court has jurisdiction, it has a right to decide every question which occurs in the cause, and whether its decision be correct or otherwise, its judgment, till reversed, is regarded as binding in every other court; and 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. ”

“ The principal grounds which have been assigned for denying the right of a jury, upon the general issue in a criminal case, to determine the law against the instructions of the court, have been that the old maxim, 'Ad quaestionem juris respondent judices, ad quaestionem facti respondent juratores,' is of universal application; that judges are more competent than juries to determine questions of law ”

“ XIV. — We doe not impower them to give judgment upon any ones person or estate, where no Law hath been before provided, nor to give power to any other Court or Jurisdiction so to do, Because where there is no Law, there is no transgression, for men or Magistrates to take Cognisance of; neither doe we impower them to intermeddle with the execution of any Law whatsoever. ”

“ From the earliest times the judges of the king’s courts have been a small and compact body of legal experts. They have worked together in harmony, imposing their own views of law and justice upon the whole realm, and establishing thereby a single homogeneous system of common law. ”

“ When your case is called for trial the first thing will be to select the twelve men who will be the jury in your case. I am not going to give the manner of selection at this time. This will be fully explained later. I wish now to impress upon you the fact that the Constitution expressly guards your rights by providing that you shall be entitled to have your case tried, not before a judge, but by a jury composed of men from the ordinary walks of life, laborers, merchants, farmers, people of all classes; men just like your fathers are. ”

“ A judge, or any person acting by authority as such, where he has over the subject-matter, and over the person, a general jurisdiction which he has not exceeded, will not be liable to have his judgment examined in an action brought against himself ”

“ 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. ”

“ Justice Miller stated the general doctrine to be 'that an officer to whom public duties are confided by law is not subject to the control of the courts in the exercise of the judgment and discretion which the law reposes in him as a part of his official functions. ”

“ If a contrary principle can be found in the law, it is a little remarkable that the rule should ever have obtained that, in an action founded upon the adjudication or decision of a magistrate, or any other officer of special and limited jurisdiction, the party claiming a right under it, must aver and prove jurisdiction in the particular case, for the very adjudication, or decision, would afford all the necessary evidence of the officer acting as such within the principle contended for. ”

“ For the freeholders being generally the judges, and conversing one among another, and being as it were the chief judges, not only of the fact, but of the law; every man that had a suit there, sped according as he could make parties." 1 Hale's History of the Common Law, p. 246.
"In all these tribunals," (county court, hundred court, &c;..) "the judges were the free tenants, owing suit to the court, and afterwards called its peers." ”

“ Those who write upon the principles of jurisprudence, consider only what the person to whom the obligation is due, ought to think himself entitled to exact by force; what every impartial spectator would approve of him for exacting, or what a judge or arbiter, to whom he had submitted his case, and who had undertaken to do him justice, ought to oblige the other person to suffer or to perform. ”

“ Ingenious men may strain the law very far, but to pervert it was to new-model it—the genius of our constitution says, judges have no such authority, nor shall presume to exercise it.’ I conclude, my lords, with the respectful expression of my conviction, that your lordships’ judgment in this case, whatever it may be, will be according to truth and the justice of the case, and that you will preserve the high reputation in the exercise of judicial functions which has so long been enjoyed by your lordships and your ancestors. ”