New-York daily tribune., 1856-03-01
ATROCIOUs JUDGES.

upon Win cOnslderuDie emphdeis tnot " Is aOsuft
to compare the atrocious judges Of our times with
| those Of the era of Charles H. and James H., or
| TO think for moment Of CHASING our Klnes,
| Griers, Curtises Ingrahsms Mlilers and Pendery
with the Jeffreys, the ScrOggses, the Norths, the
| Hydes. Heaths and Kellyngs OF that dark period
| of English history. The idea of the journals
above referred to seems to be- that while the afro
| cous Judges of the times If the latter Stuarts
We re horrible and bloody monsters who, without
apy regard 10 the restraints of law and justice.
sought to promote the tyraDnical designs of the
masters to whom they owed their appointments
The atrocous judges of our day are, after all very
nice, good -Dstured amiable Well-ntending gentle
men, little extravagant perhaps in some of their
notions. but notwithstanding, men of the best in
tentons, from whom the country need spprehend
no danger.
This is a view in which We cannot join. On
the contrary, it seems to US in the highest de-
gree false, delusiye and dangerous. We are fully
of Jeffersons opinion, so often and so earnestly
repeated throughout his entire correspondence,
that the great danger TO the demOcratical nsti-
"tutions of this country is from the courts and the
L" lawyers"-a danger never so great as it has been
for the last four five years, and still il this
moment. because never before have We been
cursed with judges so fanaticsl in their devotion
to tyranny and 30 constantly impelled to the ut
most stretch of effort BY an Executive Government
as hostile to humanity and its rights themselves
men many of whom were placed on the bench
for the very reason that they were known to be
ready TO exert the utmost stretch OF their legal in
genuity, and TO devote all the treasures of their
legal learning Chose of them who have amy to the
naturalization if not the determination of the rights
of man and the rights of the States.
There is moreover, another circumstance of
great importance to this argument, aud by which
the danger of legal usurpations and expressions is
greatly aggravated In Jefierson's time, 80 far as
the Federal Government was concerned, it was
only the Judges of the Supreme Court of the
United States against whose usurpations the cOun-
try had to guard. 1t was from those judges sitting
together as the Supreme Court, or sitting separ-
ately in their respective circuits, upon whom alone
it was necessary to keep an eye-they alone being
in position 10 prostitute the law to the purposes
apprehended from this quarter-and the cOnstitu-
ton of the Supreme Court of the United States at
this moment is by no means such as 10 command
the entire confidence of the friends of Liberty and
State Rghts-the recent legislation of Congress
has studded the country all over with host, as ii
were. Of judicial mercenaries, whose ignorance and
stupidity, in the case of many of them are hardly
less to be dreaded than their fanatcal malice.
First came the miserable attempt to exc out our
present insufficient Judicial system by comforting
upon the District Judges the right to hold Circuit
Courts. A tribunal composed of a single Judge,
originally instituted chiefly for the trial of cases
relating to the collection of the revenue, and of
which the criminal jurisdiction was restricted to
trihiDg cases, and even as to them subject to an
appeal to the Circuit COurt-was thus converted
into court for the trial of all criminal cases
whatever, even those of life and death, trial of
which there can be no revision or reexaminati0n-
the Supreme Court of the United States having
most unaccOuntably directed that in criminal
cases no writ of error lies to them.
But this is not the worst of it. The kidnapping
act of 1850 has elevated to the rank of judges
and Judges, too, without revision or appeal-a
whole host of Commissioners, whose appointment
ard tenure of Office depend entirely on the pleasure
OF fayortism of the Circuit Judges--Ofhcers origin
ally appointed for the humble ministerial duty Of
taking afiidavis and acknowledgements of bail, but
authorized by the kidnapping act of 1850 to exer-
else jurisdiction and to give judgment absolute and
without appeal-as Mr. Commissioner Pendery is
doing at this moment at Cincinnati-upon questions
involving not only the highest personal rights but
the incest points of Federal jurisdiction and State
authority points upon which these ten-dollar,
pettfogging unconstitutional Judges are author.
lied BY that infamous act to set at defiance the
State Courts and the State authorities, less
than the principles of the Declaration of Indepen-
dence and the sentiments OF universal humanity
and to spend any amount of the public money in
hiring backguard cutthroats 70 assist them and
the Marshal in doing it.
In what respect, we should like to know, can
any real distinction be pointed out between the
atrocous Judges of Charles H. and his brother and
the atrocious Judges Of the times of Fillmore and
Pierce In the former times cOnvulsiye effort was
made TO reestablish the English people that ab
solute dominion shaken and for q time prostrated
and overturned by the growing wealth, intelligence
and religious sentiment of the productive classes
In our times like effort is making to reestablsh
and to extend the slaveholding domination, which
the growing intelligence and improved cOnscien-
ciousness of the North bad begun to shake Off The
cry in those days Of the fanatics of absolute power
was-the monarchy and the church in dagger
The cry of the Pro Slavery fanatics of our day is
the IIninn in danf err and as then sn nnu tha