with the original States in all respects whatsoever," phraseology which has ever since been substantially followed in admission acts, concluding with the Oklahoma act, which declares that Oklahoma shall be admitted "on an equal footing with the original States."

The power is to admit "new States into this Union."

"This Union" was and is a union of States, equal in power, dignity and authority, each competent to exert that residuum of sovereignty not delegated to the United States by the Constitution itself. To maintain otherwise would be to say that the Union, through the power of Congress to admit new States, might come to be a union of States unequal in power, as including States whose powers were restricted only by the Constitution, with others whose powers had been further restricted by an act of Congress accepted as a condition of admission. Thus it would result, first, that the powers of Congress would not be defined by the Constitution alone, but in respect to new States, enlarged or restricted by the conditions imposed upon new States by its own legislation admitting them into the Union; and, second, that such new States might not exercise all of the powers which had not been delegated by the Constitution, but only such as had not been further bargained away as conditions of admission. . . .

If anything was needed to complete the argument against the assertion that Oklahoma has not been admitted to the Union upon an equality of power, dignity and sovereignty with Massachusetts or Virginia, it is afforded by the express provision of the act of admission, by which it is declared that when the people of the proposed new State have complied with the terms of the act that it shall be the duty of the President to issue his proclamation, and that "thereupon the proposed State of Oklahoma shall be deemed admitted by Congress into the Union under and by virtue of this act, on an equal footing with the original States." The proclamation has been issued and the Senators and Representatives from the State admitted to their seats in the Congress.

Has Oklahoma been admitted upon an equal footing with the original States? If she has, she by virtue of her jurisdictional Sovereignty as such a State may determine for her own people the proper location of the local seat of government. She is not equal in power to them if she cannot. . . .

To this we may add that the constitutional equality of the States is essential to the harmonious operation of the scheme upon

which the Republic was organized.

When that equality disappears we may remain a free people, but the Union will not be the Union of the Constitution.

MCKENNA and HOLMES, JJ., dissent.

Judgment affirmed.↳

1 On the present effect of the Ordinance of 1787 as to the Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, see Escanaba Company v. Chicago, 107 U. S. 678 (1882), and Cincinnati v. L. & N. R. Co., 223 U. S. 390 (1912). — Ed.

Eligor of the flext cal law not sue in the Ted. Ct. Webin the diversity of Religiochip problem.

аминир реален.

CHAPTER III.

THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, THE TERRITORIES,
THE INSULAR POSSESSIONS, AND KINDRED TOPICS:
OR QUASI-IMPERIAL GOVERNMENT.

HEPBURN AND DUNDAS v. ELLZEY.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 1805.

[2 Cranch, 445.]

THIS was a question certified from the circuit court for the fifth circuit, holden in the Virginia district, on which the opinions of the judges of that court were opposed. (2 U. S. Stat. 159, sec. 6.)

The certificate sets forth that "in this cause it occurred as a question whether Hepburn and Dundas, the plaintiffs in this cause, who are citizens and residents of the District of Columbia, and are so stated in the pleadings, can maintain an action in this court against the defendant who is a citizen and inhabitant of the commonwealth of Virginia, and is also stated so to be in the pleadings, or whether for want of jurisdiction the said suit ought not to be dismissed."

E. J. Lee, for the plaintiffs; and C. Lee, contra.

MARSHALL, C. J., delivered the opinion of the court.

The question in this case is whether the plaintiffs, as residents of the district of Columbia, can maintain an action in the circuit court of the United States for the district of Virginia.

This depends on the act of congress describing the jurisdiction of that court. That act gives jurisdiction to the circuit courts in cases between a citizen of the state in which the suit is brought, and a citizen of another state. To support the jurisdiction in this case therefore it must appear that Columbia is a state.

On the part of the plaintiffs it has been urged that Columbia is a distinct political society; and is therefore "a state " according to the definitions of writers on general law.

This is true. But as the act of congress obviously uses the word "state" in reference to that term as used in the Constitution, it becomes necessary to inquire whether Columbia is a state in

the sense of that instrument. The result of that examination is a conviction that the members of the American confederacy only are the states contemplated in the Constitution.

The House of Representatives is to be composed of members chosen by the people of the several states; and each state shall have at least one representative.

The senate of the United States shall be composed of two senators from each state.

Each state shall appoint, for the election of the executive, a number of electors equal to its whole number of senators and representatives.

These clauses show that the word state is used in the Constitution as designating a member of the union, and excludes from the term the signification attached to it by writers on the law of nations. When the same term which has been used plainly in this limited sense in the articles respecting the legislative and executive departments, is also employed in that which respects the judicial department, it must be understood as retaining the sense originally given to it.

Other passages from the Constitution have been cited by the plaintiffs to show that the term state is sometimes used in its more enlarged sense. But on examining the passages quoted, they do not prove what was to be shown by them.

It is true that as citizens of the United States, and of that particular district which is subject to the jurisdiction of congress, it is extraordinary that the courts of the United States, which are open to aliens, and to the citizens of every state in the union, should be closed upon them. But this is a subject for legislative, not for judicial consideration.

The opinion to be certified to the circuit court is that that court has no jurisdiction in the case.1

1 See Barney v. Baltimore, 6 Wall. 280 (1867); Cissel v. McDonald, 16 Blatch. C. C. 150 (1879); Hooe v. Jamieson, 166 U. S. 395 (1897). Compare Loughborough v. Blake, 5 Wheat. 317 (1820). — Ed.

CORPORATION OF NEW ORLEANS v. WINTER et al.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 1816.
[1 Wheaton, 91.]

ERROR from the district court for the district of Louisiana.
The defendants in error commenced their suit in the said court,
to recover the possession and property of certain lands in the city
of New Orleans; claiming title as the heirs of Elisha Winter,
deceased, under an alleged grant from the Spanish government,
in 1791; which lands, it was stated, were afterwards reclaimed
by the Baron de Carondelet, governor of the province of Louisiana,
for the use of fortifications. One of the parties, petitioners in
the court below, was described in the record as a citizen of the
state of Kentucky; and the other, as a citizen of the Mississippi
territory. The petitioners recovered a judgment in the court
below, from which a writ of error was brought.

Winder and Harper, for the plaintiffs in error; and Key, contra. MARSHALL, C. J., delivered the opinion of the court, and, after stating the facts, proceeded as follows:

The proceeding of the court, therefore, is arrested in limine, by a question respecting its jurisdiction. In the case of Hepburn & Dundas v. Ellzey, this court determined, on mature consideration, that a citizen of the district of Columbia could not maintain a suit in the circuit court of the United States. That opinion is still retained.

It has been attempted to distinguish a Territory from the district of Columbia; but the court is of opinion, that this distinction cannot be maintained. They may differ in many respects, but neither of them is a state, in the sense in which that term is used in the Constitution. Every reason assigned for the opinion of the court, that a citizen of Columbia was not capable of suing in the courts of the United States, under the Judiciary Act, is equally applicable to a citizen of a territory. Gabriel Winter, then, being a citizen of the Mississippi Territory, was incapable of maintaining a suit alone in the circuit court of Louisiana. Is his case mended by being associated with others who are capable of suing in that court? In the case of Strawbridge et al. v. Curtis' 1 3 Cranch, 267 (1806). See also Coal Co. v. Blatchford, 11 Wall. 172 (1870); Peninsular Iron Co. v. Stone, 121 U. S. 631 (1887); Smith v. Lyon, 133 U. S. 315 (1890).

ED.