The United States v. Peters.

NOTE.

THE case is of interest mainly as it shows the temper of the country toward the federal courts in the first decade of the nineteenth century. The legislature of Pennsylvania, disliking a judgment of the federal court in Pennsylvania, passed an act which was, in substance, a cancellation of that judgment on the ground that the federal court was without jurisdiction. Such an act would be unthinkable to any modern lawyer or in any legislature to-day, but it is an admirable example of the hostility and jealousy existing toward the federal courts for a long period after their inception, until, under the strong hands of Marshall and his successors, they became an integral part of the business system of the country. And the case is alike remarkable as illustrating the need of the federal courts to establish a consistent and just system of admiralty law among the states.

The case arose on an application for a writ of mandamus commanding Judge Richard Peters, judge of the District Court for the Pennsylvania District, to order process to issue to enforce obedience to the judgment in a civil cause between one Olmstead and others, which had seemed obnoxious to the Pennsylvania legislature. This Judge Peters had refused to do because he could not or dared not, for reasons that cogently appear from a note that is attached to the report of the case. That note reads as follows:

"On Saturday, March 5th, 1808, upon the affidavit of Olmstead, a rule was granted that Judge Peters should show cause by the next Saturday, why a mandamus should not issue. On Saturday,

March 12th, a letter was received by one of the counsel for Olmstead, from Judge Peters, acknowledging service of the rule; and stating that an act of the legislature of Pennsylvania had commanded the governor of that state to call out an armed force to prevent the execution of any process to enforce the performance of the sentence. That such being the state of things he should not direct process to issue unless he should be so ordered by this court; whereupon a mandamus nisi was granted, returnable at the next term."

The United States

V.

Judge Peters.

[5 Cranch, 135.]

1809.

The facts appear sufficiently in the opinion. Rodney (Attorney General), Lewis, and F. S. Key of counsel for Olmstead and others submitted the return of the mandamus to the consideration of the court without argument.

February 20. Marshall, Ch. J., delivered the opinion of the court as follows:

With great attention, and with serious concern, the court has considered the return made by the judge for the District of Pennsylvania to the mandamus directing him to execute the sentence pronounced by him in the case of Gideon Olmstead and others v. Rittenhouse's Executrixes, or to show cause for not so doing. The cause shown is an act of the legislature of Pennsylvania, passed subsequent to the rendition of his sentence. This act authorizes and requires the governor to demand, for the use of the

state of Pennsylvania, the money which had been decreed to Gideon Olmstead and others; and which was in the hands of the executrixes of David Rittenhouse; and, in default of payment, to direct the Attorney General to institute a suit for the recovery thereof. This act further authorizes and requires the governor to use any further means he may think necessary for the protection of what it denominates "the just rights of the state," and also to protect the persons and properties of the said executrixes of David Rittenhouse, deceased, against any process whatever, issued out of any federal court in consequence of their obedience to the requisition of the said act.

*136

If the legislatures of the several states may, at will, annul the judgment of the courts of the United States, and destroy the rights acquired under those judgments, the constitution itself becomes a solemn mockery, and the nation is deprived of the means of enforcing its laws by the instrumentality of its own tribunals. So fatal a result must be deprecated by all; and the people of Pennsylvania, not less than the citizens of every other state, must feel a deep interest in resisting principles so destructive of the Union, and in averting consequences so fatal to themselves.

The act in question does not, in terms, assert the universal right of the state to interpose in every case whatever; but assigns, as a motive for its interposition in this particular case, that the sentence, the execution of which it prohibits, was rendered in a cause over which the federal courts have no jurisdiction.

If the ultimate right to determine the jurisdiction of the courts of the Union is placed by the constitution in the several state legislatures, then this act concludes the subject; but if that power necessarily resides in the supreme judicial tribunal of the nation, then the jurisdiction of the District Court of Pennsylvania, over the case in which that jurisdiction was exercised, ought to be most deliberately examined; and the act of Pennsylvania, with whatever respect it may be considered, cannot be permitted to prejudice the question.

In the early part of the war between the United States and Great Britain, Gideon Olmstead and *others, citizens of Connecticut, who say

*137 they had been carried to Jamaica as prisoners, were employed as part of the crew of the sloop Active, bound from Jamaica to New York, and laden with a cargo for the use of the British army in that place. On the voyage they seized the vessel, confined the captain, and sailed for Egg Harbor. In sight of that place, the Active was captured by the Convention, an armed ship belonging to the state of Pennsylvania, brought into port, libeled and condemned as prize to the captors. From this sentence Gideon Olmstead and others, who claimed the vessel and cargo, appealed to the Court of Appeals established by Congress, by which tribunal the sentence of condemnation was reversed, the Active and her cargo condemned as prize to the claimants, and process was directed to issue out of the Court of Admiralty, commanding the marshal of that court to sell the