The conditions which now confront the people in many states, where statutes regulating public service corporations are often tied up for years by litigation, tend to create discontent, impatience and dissatisfaction with the courts and to engender a desire for revolutionary change from an intolerable situation. Laws regulating public utilities are often essential for protection against those who otherwise would have the power to make a prey of the necessities of the people, and it is disgraceful that the enforcement of such laws can be delayed by litigation for years after their enactment. As the delays in our criminal procedure are crying for remedy, so the delays in this class of litigation are crying for immediate and effective relief. It is of paramount importance that the people should be convinced that they can obtain in the courts, and especially in the federal courts, a prompt determination of all litigation affecting the validity of legislation regulating public service corporations which they or their representatives have deemed necessary for their protection against extortion or oppression. In most cases, however, it will be found that the representatives of the state are as much to blame for the delays as are their adversaries. But, above all other considerations, stands the necessity for maintaining the absolute confidence of the people at large in the wisdom and impartiality of the federal judges, who are so often called upon to determine the validity of state statutes alleged to conflict with the Constitution of the United States and in so doing to administer justice as between the state and the individual--as between the majority and the minority. It should be a matter of profound concern to us as lawyers to make all laymen appreciate that the exercise of this jurisdiction by the federal courts is necessary for the preservation and perpetuation of the Constitution, and that it is right and just that every citizen should have the privilege of appealing to the national courts for the protection of rights and liberties guaranteed to him by the national Constitution. Equally important is it that the people should appreciate that in entertaining suits to restrain the enforcement of state laws alleged to be unconstitutional, the federal judges are only performing their duty according to their oath of office, which in the noble language prescribed in 1789 pledges them "to administer justice without respect to persons," to "do equal right to the poor and to the rich," and to "faithfully and impartially discharge and perform" their duty "agreeably to the Constitution and laws of the United States." An examination of the cases in which injunctions have been granted against the enforcement of state laws must satisfy any candid mind that in the great majority of cases the power has been impartially exercised, with tact and wise discretion, and that such injunctions have been granted