Trial of the Officers and Crew of the Privateer Savannah, on the Charge of Piracy, in the United States Circuit Court for the Southern District of New YorkWarburton, A. F. (Adolphus Frederick)
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Trial of the Officers and Crew of the Privateer Savannah, on the Charge of Piracy, in the United States Circuit Court for the Southern District of New York
Warburton, A. F. (Adolphus Frederick)
Piracy -- United States; Privateering -- United States; United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865
"It is true the criminal laws of the Federal and State Governments
emanated from different sovereignties; but they operate on the same
people, and should have the same end in view. In this respect the
Federal Government, though sovereign within the limitation of its
powers, may, in some sense, be considered as the agent of the
States, to provide for the general welfare by punishing offences
under its own laws within its jurisdiction."
I wish also to refer to the case of the _United States_ vs. _Booth_,
in 21 Howard--the opinion of CHIEF JUSTICE TANEY--in connection with
the question of what the result is where the judiciary has not power
to act. He says:
"The importance which the framers of the Constitution attached to
such a tribunal, for the purpose of preserving internal
tranquillity, is strikingly manifested by the clause which gives
this Court jurisdiction _over the sovereign States which compose
this Union_, when a controversy arises _between them_. Instead of
reserving the right to seek redress for injustice from another
State by their sovereign powers, they have bound themselves to
submit to the decision of this Court, and to abide by its judgment.
And it is not out of place to say, here, that experience has
demonstrated that this power was not unwisely surrendered by the
States; for, in the time that has already elapsed since this
Government came into existence, several irritating and angry
controversies have taken place between adjoining States, in
relation to their respective boundaries, and which have sometimes
threatened to end in force and violence, but for the power vested
in this Court to hear them and decide between them.
"The same purposes are clearly indicated by the different language
employed when conferring supremacy upon the laws of the United
States and jurisdiction upon its Courts. In the first case, it
provides that 'this Constitution, and the laws of the United
States, _which shall be made in pursuance thereof_, shall be the
supreme law of the land, and obligatory upon the Judges in every
State.' The words in italics show the precision and foresight which
marks every clause in the instrument. The sovereignty to be created
was to be limited in its powers of legislation; and, if it passed a
law not authorized by its enumerated powers, it was not to be
regarded as the supreme law of the land, nor were the State Judges
bound to carry it into execution."
And further on, speaking of the claimed right of the State of Wisconsin
to discharge a prisoner convicted in the United States Court upon a
criminal conviction, and to refuse afterwards to obey a writ of error
issued out of the Supreme Court of the United States to review that
judgment, he uses language of this kind:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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