Judicial authority

“ Congress having exercised its constitutional authority to impose on the Government a legally binding obligation, the decisive question is whether it invaded the judicial province of the Court of Claims by directing it to determine the extent of the obligation by reference, as directed, to the specified facts, and to give judgment for that amount. ”

“ As an exercise of raw judicial power, the Court perhaps has authority to do what it does today; but in my view its judgment is an improvident and extravagant exercise of the power of judicial review that the Constitution extends to this Court. ”

“ 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. ”

“ However late this objection has been made, or may be made, in any cause in an inferior or appellate court of the United States, it must be considered and decided before any court can move one farther step in the cause, as any movement is necessarily to exercise the jurisdiction. Jurisdiction is the power to hear and determine the subject matter in controversy between the parties to a suit, to adjudicate or exercise any judicial power over them. ”

“ If there be one power that a State possesses, which ought to be deemed beyond the control, in any mode, of the National Government or of any of its courts, it is the power by judicial proceedings to appear in its own courts, by its law-officer or by attorneys, and seek the guidance of those courts in respect of matters of a justiciable nature. If the state court, by its judgment, in such a suit, should disregard the injunctions of the Federal Constitution, that judgment would be subject to review by this court upon writ of error or appeal. ”

“ The Court's approach must trouble all concerned with the function of the judicial process in today's world. As my Brother Douglas has said: 'The judiciary is an indispensable part of the operation of our federal system. With the growing complexities of government it is often the one and only place where effective relief can be obtained. ”

“ The power to punish for contempts is inherent in all courts; its existence is essential to the preservation of order in judicial proceedings, and to the enforcement of the judgments, orders, and writs of the courts, and consequently to the due administration of justice. The moment the courts of the United States were called into existence and invested with jurisdiction over any subject, they became possessed of this power. ”

“ The judicial system, which includes supreme courts, district courts, circuit courts, police courts and other minor courts, is intended to give justice to the defendant in a criminal action, and to both parties in a civil action, but in many cases—to an American—the result does not seem to be satisfactory. ”

“ Unless we respect and bow in deference to the final decisions of the highest judicial tribunal in our country, we are driven at once to anarchy, to violence, to mob law, and there is no security left for our property, or our own civil rights. What protects your property but the law, and who expounds the law but the judicial tribunals; and if an appeal is to be taken from the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, in all cases where a person does not like the adjudication, to whom is that appeal to be taken! ”

“ Who is the sovereign, de jure or de facto, of a territory, is not a judicial, but a political, question, the determination of which by the legislative and executive departments of any government conclusively binds the judges, as well as all other officers, citizens, and subjects of that government. ”

“ It is stipulated that judges, who are appointed by the crown, may not be dismissed except in consequence of judicial sentence, nor transferred against their wishes from one tribunal to another, unless in the event of a reorganization of the courts; [799] that they shall exercise their functions strictly in compliance with law; that in criminal cases and cases involving political offenses trial shall be by jury; that in the administration of justice there shall be, so far as practicable, publicity and oral procedure ”

“ It is none the less the judgment of a judicial tribunal dealing with questions judicial in their nature, and presented in the customary forms of judicial proceedings, because its effect may be to aid an administrative or executive body in the performance of duties legally imposed upon it by congress in execution of a power granted by the constitution. ”

“ Now, this want of jurisdiction of the inferior court in a summary proceeding to remove an officer of the court, or disbar an attorney or counsellor, is one of the specific cases in which this writ is the appropriate remedy. We have already seen, from the definition and office of it, that it is issued to the inferior courts 'to enforce the due exercise of those judicial or ministerial powers with which the crown or legislature have invested them ”

“ It is thought safer to entrust power to a law court, performing definite functions under clear laws and in accordance with strict judicial standards, or to a single conspicuous magistrate, who can be watched and cannot escape responsibility for his official acts, than to entrust it to a numerous body which burrows toward its ends in committee-rooms, getting its light through lobbies ”

“ The attorney-general of the United States, in a written opinion, given by command of the President of the United States, says as follows: “These officers, [Pg 345] [the commissioners,] and each of them, have judicial power, and jurisdiction to hear, examine, and decide the case.” “The certificate to be granted to the owner is to be regarded as the act and judgment of a judicial tribunal having competent jurisdiction.” “Congress has constituted a tribunal with exclusive jurisdiction to determine summarily, and without appeal, who are fugitives from service.” ”

“ The administration of justice is the right and privilege of the members of the body politic itself. Those who stand outside the community—whether they are individuals or states—have no claim to the impartial arbitrament of judicial tribunals, and may be struck at directly by the armed and heavy hand of the state. ”

“ Here a special tribunal has been created for a special purpose. It has been clothed with power to compel the attendance of witnesses, 'and to finally determine the right of each claimant or occupant to purchase' from the United States, under the provisions of the act of congress, the ground he occupies or claims. The duties of the tribunal are judicial in their character, and their decisions evidently intended to be binding on the parties. ”

“ We believe as much as Judge Douglas (perhaps more) in obedience to, and respect for, the judicial department of government. We think its decisions on constitutional questions, when fully settled, should control not only the particular cases decided, but the general policy of the country, subject to be disturbed only by amendments of the Constitution as provided in that instrument itself. More than this would be revolution. But we think the Dred Scott decision is erroneous. We know the court that made it has often overruled its own decisions, and we shall do what we can to have it to overrule this. We offer no resistance to it.
Judicial decisions are of greater or less authority as precedents according to circumstances. ”

“ Justice shall be administered gratuitously throughout the entire territory of the Republic.{229}
Art. 85. The courts shall take cognizance of all cases, whether civil, criminal, or between the Government and private parties.
Art. 86. No judicial commissions or extraordinary tribunals, no matter under what name, shall ever be created. ”

“ It must stand in need of no intermediate legislations; but must itself be empowered to employ the arm of the ordinary magistrate to execute its own resolutions. The majesty of the National authority must be manifested through the medium of the Courts of Justice. ”

“ Surely it may be assumed as a postulate, that a court of justice, in adjudicating upon the rights of the citizen or of the State, should do, and can have power to do, nothing which is irregular, or vain, or useless. ”

“ Federal judicial power, beyond all doubt, has its origin in the Constitution, but the organization of the system and the distribution of the subjects of jurisdiction among such inferior courts as Congress may from time to time ordain and establish, within the scope of the judicial power, always have been, and of right must be the work of the Congress. ”

“ Something more than a bare assertion of such an authority seems essential to the jurisdiction of this court. The authority intended by the act is one having a real existence, derived from competent governmental power. ”

“ In the case referred to, the claims, as concerned those asserting them, were, on their part, tainted by no principle of illegality or immorality; on the contrary, were sustained by every principle of national law and natural justice, and nothing was wanting to render them recuperable, but a judicial tribunal competent to take cognizance thereof. ”

“ It being, then, established that the language of this clause is imperative, the next question is as to the cases to which it shall apply. The answer is found in the constitution itself. The judicial power shall extend to all the cases enumerated in the constitution. As the mode is not limited, it may extend to all such cases, in any form, in which judicial power may be exercised. ”

“ The jus ad rem by the performance of that executive act becomes a jus in re, judicial in its nature, and under the cognizance and protection of the judicial in its nature, and as well as the others. Gaines v. ”

“ It is, that whenever it appears that a court possessing judicial powers has rightfully obtained jurisdiction of a cause, all its subsequent proceedings are valid, however erroneous they may be, until they are reversed on error, or set aside by some direct proceeding for that purpose. The only difficulty in applying the rule, is to ascertain the question of jurisdiction. ”

“ The people place the judicial power in the hands of a Supreme Court, Circuit Court, Landrosts, Juries, and such other persons as shall be entrusted with judicial powers, and leave all these free to discharge their function according to their judgment and consciences, according to the laws of the land. ”

“ In deciding on prerogative or legislative grants, the court can look only to the power and right by which they are made; questions of policy, expediency or discretion, are not judicial ones; if necessity or public good brings a power into action, the court cannot judge of its degree or extent. 4 Wheat. 143. It 'would be to pass the line which circumscribes the judicial department, and to tread on legislative ground. This court disclaims all pretensions to such a power.' Ibid. ”

“ 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 the United States the judicial system is complicated by a system of lesser courts, State and local, independent of federal control, attached to which is a body of police, numerous judges, juries, and lawyers; the higher courts also have their justices and practising lawyers, but there is less haste and confusion and greater dignity and ability displayed. ”

“ After all, this is the Nation's ultimate judicial tribunal, not a super-legal-aid bureau. ”

“ I feel well assured that it will be better to trust the rights, privileges, and immunities of the citizen to tribunals thus established, and presided over by competent and impartial judges, bound by fixed rules of law and evidence, and where the right of trial by jury is guaranteed and secured, than to the caprice or judgment of an officer of the Bureau, who it is possible may be entirely ignorant of the principles that underlie the just administration of the law. ”

“ Since, however, considerations governing the exercise of judicial power are not mechanical criteria but derive from conceptions regarding the distribution of governmental powers in their manifold, changing guises, differences in the application of canons of jurisdiction have arisen from the beginning of the Court's history. [2] Conscious or unconscious leanings toward the serviceability of the judicial process in the adjustment of public controversies clothed in the form of private litigation inevitably affect decisions. ”

“ In the English courts, when it is made to appear that property of the government ought, in justice, to contribute to a general average, or to salvage, it seems to be the usual course of proceeding for the proper officer of the government to consent in court that it may take jurisdiction of the matter. ”

“ Sometimes, indeed, the general power conferred upon a subordinate officer carried with it authority to establish such tribunals; as, for example, the power conferred upon a military commander to establish a civil government, carried authority to establish tribunals with civil as well as criminal jurisdiction in the territory governed, for the administration of justice. ”

“ Judicial force does not move to the maintenance of rights or the suppression of wrongs, until these rights and wrongs have been authoritatively declared and ascertained by the formal judgment of a court. The primary purpose of judicial force is to execute judgment against those who will not voluntarily yield obedience to it. ”

“ But with an enormous population which has no representative institutions it has been deemed wise to provide ample means of correcting judicial errors at the instance not only of the aggrieved person but also at the instance of the supervising judicial authorities, as a means of ensuring regularity and propriety in the conduct of judicial business by subordinate judges in out-of-the-way districts. ”