The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-12-13


should have been more indignant at this ASST
nine appelation if Mr.. Train had not allowed
himself TO have been diddled out of $2650 by
the World. AS it is, we fear that mankind
will think his ears just an inch or 80 longer
than they should be.
CONGRESS AND THE SUPREME COURT.
From the NJ T. World.
The usurpations of Congress have for a
long time attracted the attention of thought
full men, who have any regard for the Consti-
tuition One after another, within the past
five or six years, the constitutional functions
of the executive and judicial departments
have been absorbed by the Legislative branch;
and now there comes a bill, reported by Sena-
tor Trumbull, the purpose of which is to de-
stroy the power of the Supreme Court to
afford redress TO any person who may have
been injured in his personal rights by any
acts done under the Reconstruction laws by
those who were charged with their execution.
The fundamental idea that lies at the basis of
this bill is that there is q power in our Gov
ernment-namely, the military power-that is
independent of all control; that, whenever
Congress sees fit to put that power into exer-
else, Congress can make 1T supreme over all
the personal rights guaranteed by the Consti-
tuition, and can annul every particle of Judi
cial authority to take cognizance, in any civil
or rcriminal proceeding, of the question whether
the constitutional rights of the citizen have
been invaded. Thepeople of the United States,
or that portion of them who may look to us
for defense of constitutional principles, shall
have q dispassionate but truthful and search
ing analysis of this bill; and it shall not be
our fault if they do not perceive that it in
wolves exactly what we have attributed to it.
There is q certain class of lawyers and pub
lie men in the radical party who, ever since
the late war began, have professed the doc
trine that the 'war power" enables Congress
to subject civil rights to military jurisdiction
at its pleasure. 1t is upon this doctrine that
the reconstruction acts are founded. The
best and the conclusive proof of this is that
the present Attorney y-General-who is a repre-
sentative of the class to which we have
alluded-has officially rested the justification
of those acts upon the theory that the war
was not ended when either the first of them
or any of its supplements were passed, and that
the power to annul, or suspend, or disregard
the constitutional rights of individuals
is the eCar p0ocer. Upon this theory Mr..
Hoar undertook to justify trials by military
commission of citizens not belonging to the
army or navy for offenses which, if commit
ted, were offenses against the civil laws of
the land, and not against any laws of war or
military power. Nothing can be clearer.
therefore, than the fact to which we have ad-
verted-that there exists among the radical
politicians and lawyers of our time doctrine
that within our Constitution there lies q
power by which Congress can at any time
annul the practical operation of all those con.
stitutional provisions which secure trial by
jury; the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus.
and the right to be protected by ''due process
of law in life, liberty, and property. This
doctrine has been acted upon, more or less,
ever since the war began. 1t lies at the root
of the whole scheme by which the Southern
States have been governed since all hostilities
: and every species of resistance to Federal
authority ceased not only in respect to the
corporate and political rights Of those States
as public bodies, but in respect to the civi
rights of their individual inhabitants
Mr. Trumbulrs new bill-falsely denomi.
mated "a bill to define the jurisdiction of tn,
Supreme Court in certain cases. whereas il
fact it is bill to destroy the constitutions
function of the judicial power in certain
cases-is the bright consummate flower" o.
the military doctrine. The first section
which is harmless declaration of principle
that nobody disputes-least of all do the
judges of the Supreme Court dispute it-tha
the judicial power embraces no jurisdiction
over political questions, which belong exclu
sively to the political department of the Govern
ment. Ihe supreme Court has itself so oftel
asserted and acted upon this principle, from
the earliest times down to the present day
that it is quite superhuous for Congress t,
undertake to give it the force O
law by Congressional enactment. 1t is
truism in our constitutional system, to tn
adornment of which Congress cannot ''ad
one hair, white or black, or zone eubit" t
the strength and dignity of its ''stature.
But then the second section of Mr. Trun
bulls bill, starting from this unquestionabl
premise, proceeds to invade the constitutions
power of the court to determine when que'
ton IS political and when it is judicial, and t
shut up that question within the breast
Congress itself, thereby precluding the citize
from all protection at the hands of the jud
cial power, IN cases where the deprivation {
his civil rights gives rise to the inquil
whether the acts done to him were an exc
else of power that Congress could constitl
tionally WELD. This, as we have said, is NJ
to define the jurisdiction of the Suprem
Court but it is to override that jurisdictio
as it is defined by the Constitution. We sha
make this perfectly plain before we have dor
with the bill.
THE RELEASE OF THE GUNBOATS.
FROM the NJ Y. Times.