The home journal. (Winchester, Tenn.) 1858-188?, 1868-01-30
The Supreme Court,

From the New Orleans P%icayunc.] I,t
Tie Supreme Court Of the Uld n
States is now composed of eight JUG y
tile Chief Justice and seven As \
ciates.
Two-thirds Of eight cannot be lea
than sly, which is also three-tourtha
A bill requiring the concurrence o
two-thirds of the court in a decision
against the constitutionality Of a law
is equivalent, under the circumstances
to the requiring of three fourths. Thrc,
Of the eight judges will be investc;
! with the power to override five, q
Desperate indeed must be the con
dition of a party which can entertain
the project Of rcsorting to such an ex
pedient in order to establish thcmselve.
in power. After disarming and fetter-
ing the Executive, they find another
obstacle in the Judiciary, which mus
first be fundamentally altered befor,
they can proceed.
This is the more remarkable becaus,
five of the eight judges were appointed
from the Republican party.
When Mr.. Lincoln came into power
the Supreme Court consisted of nine
members. 1t was afterwards increased
to ten, in order to add the circuit for
the Pacific States. Mr.. Lincoln hat
the appointment Of the new Judge
Four other vacancies occurred, and he
had the appointment of five in all, viz
Chief Justice Chase, and Justices Da.
Wis, Swayne, Miller and Field.
This made one-half Of the court the
appointments ola Republican admins
tration. Judge Catron died. 1t was
the executive right Of Mr.. Johnson to
nominate the successor. lie delayed
until he and the Senate were at con
flict. When he sent in the name OF
Mr.. Stanberry, now the Attorney Gen.
eral, Congress seized the opportunity
and frustrated the nomination by re-
ducing the number of judges. They
had increased 1t when q Republican
judge was to be added. They reduced
it when a man of Conservative opinions
died, and might be. succeeded by anoth.
er of the same sort. ~
A general law was passed, making
further reductions, by providing that
no appointments should be made to
vacancies until the number should be
reduced to seven. The political part
of this calculation was this: The abol-
ishing of the ~judgeship, putat their dis
posal by the death of Judge Catron,
would give the appointces of Mr.. Lin.
coin q majority Of the bench. Yhe
four minority judges were all old men,
and, in the course of nature, every
succeeding vacancy would increase the
majority. The calculation has, proved
successful thus Tar. One other death,
that of Judge Wayne, has reduced the
number of judges to eight. or these,
five are Republican appointments, and
three appointed by old Administrations
before the Republican party exist.
cd
Ofthe judges who were on the bench
at the time the famous bred Scott de.
cision was pronounced, only two re.
nain-Justces Nelson aad Grier.
Judge Clifford, the third of the surviv.
ing old judges, was appointed to sue
coed Judge Curtis, who resigned his
seat after the decision was made.
The majority Of the existing bench
to t~hree-being Republican ap-
pointments, the project for legislaHna
50 40 to prevent q judicial judgment
against the laRfalness OF the congress.
sional scheme Of reconstruction exhib.
its the very curious political phenome.
non Of the Radicals of 1858 fortifyins