MAY 9, 1832.] Case of Samuel Houston. [H. OF R. the constitution, all barriers for the security of our liber- NOTE 2.-Amendments to the Constitution of the United ties, in order to invest him with absolute power; little States. thinking of the shortness of the time during which he can hold it, or of the impossibility of preventing it from pass- in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against un4th Amendment. "The right of the people to be secure ing into other hands, or of restraining its exercise when- reasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated; ever it may fall into those of an ambitious President, dis- and no warrant shall issue but upon probable cause, supposed to respect no law but his own will, and to disregard ported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing all restraints on its free indulgence. the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be sezed." The gentleman from Tennessee has thought proper to notice certain rumors in the public prints, that there is an association of some sort between the President and the party for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a pre5th Amendment. "No person shall be held to answer accused, in relation to the subject, and connecting him sentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases with the enterprises before mentioned. These were men- arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia when tioned by the gentleman for the purpose of giving them a in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor contradiction. He has contradicted them in his place; but shall any person be subject, for the same offence, to be does he expect his word to be taken by those who have twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be comtheir fears? If he does, he asks too much. A statement pelled, in any criminal case, made by that gentleman of facts which could be within self; nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without to be a witness against himhis knowledge, I would believe, and, without hesitation, due process of law," &c. make the foundation of an order, as did the House of Delegates of Virginia, in 1784, on the word of Patrick Hen-cused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial by 6th Amendment. "In all criminal prosecutions, the acry, in Warden's case. This credence I would give, be- an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the cause not only the gentleman from Tennessee possesses crime shall have been committed, which district shall have the confidence of forty or fifty thousand freemen, whom been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of he represents here, but because of his personal worth, the nature and cause of the accusation, to be confronted and of his talents and public services here. But he can with the witnesses against him, to have compulsory prohave no personal knowledge of those matters, nor can any cess for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the one except the parties implicated; and unless we knew assistance of counsel for his defence." the witnesses whom he has consulted, and could hear the facts, no obligation of courtesy challenges our assent. would not have alluded to the rumors of the day, had not the gentleman dragged them into debate, for the purpose of their refutation. I Rumor, indeed, with her hundred tongues, has said much on these topics, and much to alarm; but public rumors are so frequently false, that but little confidence, I admit, is to be placed in them. I generally disregard them, and wait for proof. If the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. POLK] will extend the inquiry he proposed the other day, to some of those matters, I would thank him. What to me bears the most inauspicious appearance, the most ominous threatenings, is, the industry of purpose, of means, of modes of attack-all tending to arbitrary power. This identity may result from the operations of one mind, or of many combined. The latter I think far the most probable, because the purpose has long been manifest, and many of the means employed, before he, who is now President, was even thought of as such. NOTE 1.-Art. 3, Sect. 1, Constitution of the United States. 1. "The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may, from time to time, ordain and establish," &c. 2. "The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity arising under this constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority," &c. The above amendments are not original. They exist in beginning with the charter granted at Runny Mead, in England, and have grown out of their civil revolutions, the early part of the thirteenth century, called the great establishment of an independent judiciary, the rights and charter. Since the great revolution of 1688, and the privileges of an Englishman are secured, precisely as ours are by the above amendments. Yet these provisions were never understood to interfere with the power of the courts, or of Parliament, to punish contempts or breaches of privilege. The twenty-first Congress explained and limited the provision in the judicial act of 1789, relating to contempts, and, in doing so, never dreamed that they or their predecessors of the first Congress were interfering with the constitution as originally adopted, or with the amendments relied on. The people of Virginia have the same enactments as those in the amendments before mentioned; yet the General Assembly, and their courts, punish contempts in the usual manner. Virginia has legislated on this subject, and limited the power, still treating and defining it as a power existing without any enactment. That State has but lately refused to imitate the provisions of the act of the last Congress. NOTE 3. I have mentioned the law of Pennsylvania, authorizing the employment of military force to resist the execution of a decree of the Supreme Court, in Olmstead's case. I will now present to the public the resolutions of that State, proposing to amend the constitution so as to create an impartial tribunal to settle questions of right and jurisdiction between the State and Federal Governments. It is manifest that the first and second sections of the The act of Assembly being referred to in the resolutions, third article of the constitution have relation only to that I omit its insertion. I also add the letter of Governor judicial power which is vested by each nation in its judi- Snyder to President Madison, with the answer of the latcial tribunals, for the trial of all causes, of whatever na- ter; the Executive communication of Pennsylvania to the ture, civil and criminal, between parties, or in rem, where several States, proposing the amendment to which I have one party is either unknown, or whose appearance cannot alluded. I add the answers of New Hampshire, Vermont, be enforced. These provisions have no possible reference New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, North Caroto that incidental, inherent power of self-defence, which lina, Tennessee, and Georgia. I regret that I have not all tribunals, when created, must possess to enable them those of Delaware and South Carolina. The doctrine to exercise their powers. contended for by Pennsylvania, in 1809, was, so far as the The first Congress so thought, and gave power to pun-judicial power is concerned, the present State right doc. ish contempts of court by fine and imprisonment in a sum- trine. That State denied the competency of the Supreme mary manner. Court to decide, finally, on the constitutional powers of VOL. VIII.-182 H. OF R.] Case of Samuel Houston. [MAY 9, 1832. the State and General Government, or on rights claimed if they resist encroachments on their rights, will freby a State, and adjudged to it by its own courts. She quently be interrupted; and if, to prevent this evil, they accused the Supreme Court of usurpation, and proposed should, on all occasions, yield to stretches of power, the the creation of a separate special tribunal for such pur- reserved rights will depend on the arbitrary power of the poses. Mr. Madison was President; he considered, as he courts. did when he wrote the judicial act of 1789, when he as- Resolved, That, should the independence of the States, sisted to adopt the constitution, and, as he has lately ex- as secured by the constitution, be destroyed, the liberties plained himself, that the Supreme Court was the very of the people in so extensive a country cannot long surtribunal created for this great purpose, without which the vive. To suffer the United States' courts to decide on scheme of a Federal Government must have been imper- State rights, will, from a bias in favor of power, necesfect, and must have soon fallen to pieces by conflicts of sarily destroy the federal part of our Government: and, authority. whenever the Government of the United States becomes consolidated, we may learn from the history of nations what will be the event. To prevent the balance between the General and State Governments from being destroyed, and the harmony of the States from being interrupted, During the administration of Mr. Madison, and of his immediate predecessor, the party, calling itself republican, was kept together: it remained unbroken; was not, as now, mixed up and compounded of the elements of all the parties that ever existed, and embracing the leaders of all. When that party had the ascendancy in the Gene- Resolved, That our Senators in Congress be instructed, ral Government, and in a sufficient number of the States, and our Representatives requested, to use their influence to make any amendment they pleased, all the old States to procure an amendment to the constitution of the United east of the Mississippi, and south of the Hudson, together States, that an impartial tribunal may be established to with Tennessee and Kentucky, formed out of two of them, determine disputes between the General and State Governsolemnly decided that the Supreme Court was the tribu- ments; and that they be further instructed to use their nal appointed by the constitution to decide finally on the endeavors, that, in the meanwhile, such arrangements rights, powers, and jurisdiction of the General and State may be made between the Government of the Union and Governments. Perhaps I ought not to say all; I am not of this State, as will put an end to existing difficulties. certain whether South Carolina and Delaware acted at Resolved, That the Governor be requested to transmit a all; if they did, Delaware must have concurred, for such has copy of these resolutions to the Executive of the United always been her doctrine. I think it was understood that States, to be laid before Congress at their next session. South Carolina also concurred. Pennsylvania ought not And that he be authorized and directed to correspond to be excepted, because, although her Government re- with the President on the subject in controversy, and to sisted, her people overthrew the resistance, and concur- agree to such arrangements as may be in the power of red with all the country south of the Hudson. President the Executive to make, or that Congress may make, either Madison felt himself bound by the decision of the Su- by the appointment of commissioners or otherwise, for preme Court; assumed to himself no power to controvert settling the difficulties between the two Governments. that decision, but determined to enforce it. I add the And that the Governor be also requested to transmit a answer of New Hampshire, also, because that State ap-copy to the Executives of the several States in the Union, pears to concur with the South in their present politics. with a request that the same be laid before their respectLet any reflecting citizen look upon the doctrines of ive Legislatures. the whole South, in 1809, and contrast them with those of part of the South now; the peaceful constitutional principles of the former, with the turbulent nullifying notions of the present time; and, while making the comparison, let him reflect on what the party, calling itself republican, then was, and on the strange, discordant elements of which the party assuming the same name now is concocted. Whoever seriously reflects on these things, must be led to fear that dissolution lies at the bottom of the present doctrines of the South. JAMES ENGLE, Speaker of the House of Representatives. Approved the 3d day of April, 1809. SIMON SNYDER. LANCASTER, April 7, 1809. To the President of the United States: SIR: In discharge of a legislative injunction, I transmit Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of to you the proceedings of the General Assembly on the the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, &c. That, as a mem-long litigated case of Gideon Olmstead and others versus ber of the Federal Union, the Legislature of Pennsylvania Elizabeth Sergeant and Esther Waters, executrixes of acknowledges the supremacy, and will cheerfully submit David Rittenhouse, deceased, late treasurer of Pennsylto the authority of the General Government, as far as that vania. Believing it will tend to a more perfect underauthority is delegated by the constitution of the United standing of the subject, I take the liberty of enclosing a States. But, whilst they yield to this authority, when ex- copy of an act of the General Assembly relative thereto, ercised within constitutional limits, they trust they will and also to beg leave to refer you to two other acts, passnot be considered as acting hostile to the General Govern-ed February 1st, 1801, and 2d April, 1803. ment, when, as guardians of the State rights, they cannot While I deeply deplore the circumstance which has led to permit an infringement of those rights, by an unconstitu- this correspondence, I am consoled with the pleasing idea tional exercise of power in the United States' courts. that the chief magistracy of the Union is confided to a man Resolved, That, in a Government like that of the United who merits and who possesses so great a portion of the States, where there are powers granted to the General esteem and confidence of a vast majority of the citizens Government, and rights reserved to the States, it is im- of the United States; who is so intimately acquainted with possible, from the imperfection of language, so to define the principles of the federal constitution; and who is no the limits of each, that difficulties should not sometimes less disposed to protect the sovereignty and independence arise from a collision of powers: and it is to be lamented of the several States, as guarantied to them, than to defend that no provision is made in the constitution for determin- the rights and legitimate powers of the General Governing disputes between the General and State Governments by an impartial tribunal, when such cases occur. Resolved, That, from the construction the United States' courts give to their powers, the harmony of the States, ment; who will justly discriminate between opposition to the constitution and laws of the United States, and that of resisting the decree of a judge, founded, as it is conceived, in a usurpation of power and jurisdiction, not delegated |