Georgia was the only one of the original States which set up no Supreme Court at the beginning of its statehood. Her Constitution established (Art. III, Sec. 1) a Superior Court, and left it to the General Assembly to give it, if they thought best, appellate jurisdiction. The judges were subsequently by statute authorized to sit _in banc_ and hear appeals. In 1815, while so sitting, they declared a certain statute of the State unconstitutional and void. The legislature showed its resentment by a set of resolutions, of which the parts material in this connection read thus: Whereas, John McPherson Berrien, Robert Walker, Young Gresham and Stephen W. Harris, judges of the Superior Court, did, on the 13th day of January, 1815, assemble themselves together in the city of Augusta, pretending to be in legal convention, and assuming to themselves ... the power to determine on the constitutionality of laws passed by the general assembly, and did declare certain acts of the legislature to be unconstitutional and void; and ... the extraordinary power of determining upon the constitutionality of acts of the state legislature, if yielded by the general assembly whilst it is not given by the constitution or laws of the state, would be an abandonment of the dearest rights and liberties of the people, which we, their representatives, are bound to guard and protect inviolate; Be it therefore resolved, That the members of this general assembly view, with deep concern and regret, the aforesaid conduct of the said judges ... and they can not refrain from an expression of their entire disapprobation of the power assumed by them of determining upon the constitutionality of laws regularly passed by the general assembly, as prescribed by the constitution of this state; we do, therefore, solemnly declare and protest against the aforesaid assumption of powers, as exercised by the said judges, and we do, with heartfelt sensibility, deprecate the serious and distressing consequences which followed such decision; yet we forbear to look with severity on the past, in consequence of judicial precedents, calculated in some measure to extenuate the conduct of the judges, and hope that for the future this explicit expression of public opinion will be obeyed.