The Cornhill Magazine (Vol. IV, No. 2, August 1861) — John Shaqi
The Cornhill Magazine (Vol. IV, No. 2, August 1861)Various
General
The Cornhill Magazine (Vol. IV, No. 2, August 1861)
Various
England -- Periodicals; English literature -- Periodicals; Short stories, English -- Periodicals
is a party, or in which the citizen of one State sues the citizen of
another. They have also criminal jurisdiction in all cases in which the
offence is committed against the laws of the United States, and they
decide questions relating to revenue laws and the laws of patents and
copyrights. In the territories which are not yet formed into States the
law is administered by district courts.
The consequence of this system is, that in relation to all the mass of
powers conferred upon Congress by the constitution, the citizens of the
United States are governed by, and are in their individual capacity
responsible to, the authorities of the United States to the exclusion of
those of their own States, and in many points they can appeal not only
from the law courts, but from the State legislatures, to the general law
of the United States. For example: Dartmouth College obtained from the
Supreme Court a decision that a law of the State of New Hampshire, by
which its charter was altered without its consent, was void, as being
opposed to that article of the constitution which prohibits the States
from “passing laws impairing the obligation of contracts.” In the same
manner another State assigned lands for the use of the Indians, and
declared that those lands should not be taxed. The land was afterwards
sold to other persons, and after the sale the State repealed the law
freeing the land from taxation. This law was held to be void on the same
ground.
The constitutional right of Congress to tax carriages in a particular
manner, to tax unrepresented districts, to pass a law giving debts to
the United States priority over others, and to incorporate a national
bank, are instances of the sort of questions on which the Supreme Court
has given judicial decisions. These decisions, whether they are between
State and State, between the United States and some particular State,
or between States and individuals, are enforced by regular executive
officers like any other judicial decisions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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