Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1873-07-09
Standing BY Decisions.

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Without attempting to justify either side in
all that is said or written in that discussion.
it is perhaps worth while to say that judges
are fallible as we'll as other persons. Per-
haps popular election is not the best forum
in which to settle legal questions but why
should a popular election settle anything =?
We refer the policy that is to control the
government of the country for four years to
popular election, and, in order to carry such
an election, hold conventions, distribute doc
uments, enforce all the rigor of party dsci-
pine, and sometimes, it is said, use money,
often, certainly, official influence and patron
age, to q feet the result. Is not the policy OF
the nation respecting tariffs, taxation, cur
rency and equal rights of more far reaching
Importance than the decision of any lawsuit ::
and why, If the people choose to have opin-
ions and enforce them az the ballos-box in
the one case, may they not do the same in
the other
Perhaps, it may be said, the policy of the
country is public question in its impor-
lance, and the people have common inter-
est in it and therefore ought to have voice
in deciding it, while lawsuits are usually
matters only affecting private interests. This
distinction is, however, more apparent than
real. The bred Scott decision apparently
only decided that the plaintiff, colored per-
SOD, could not bring suit in the United
States courts. In fact, however, it threw out
of court a race of four million human be-
ings: and the people have reversed that de-
cision by an appeal to the tallot- box and
the adoption of the fourteenth amendment
The decision of the court that legal tenders
were not lawful money, affected the whole
people, and not alone the parties to the suit !;
and that decision was over-ruled within two
years, not BY an appeal to the ballot-box to
be sure, but by putting two new judges Oh
the bench. Only the other day United
States court decided that Susan B. Anthony
had committed crime in attem pting to vote,
and such decision affects directly half the
population OF the country, and the whole
people indirectly. The decision of Judge
Lawrence, in Illinois. that law of that
State respecting freights on railroads was
unconstitutional, affected the whole people
of that grain growing State, and the justice
of that decision, and the proper methods of
reversing it, became matter of the first
concern to every property owner and grain
grower in the State and.. why should mt the
people of that State, or of any State, be al
lowed to express an opinion, in an election
even, on Judicial decision affecting rights
of property, as well as to express such an
opinion upon decision affecting the rights
of persons? esp eclally when these rights are
as as much public, and affect the whole
people as directly, as national or state
policy regulating tariffs, or taxation, or cur
rency?
What is legal decision, judgment of a
court, that makes it too sacred thing to be
attacked and overthrown in legitimate way,
at the ballot box? a large octave volume,
(price $3.50, which indicates something of
It's size) is announced as just published with
u.
Reversed, Denied, Doubted, Modified, Limit
ed. Explained, and Distinguished, by the
Courts OF America, England and Ireland -
An Index Of that size would be likely to
and is itself q pretty sharp commentary upon
the infallibility of the courts. The truth is,
the judgment of a court may be right, and
it may be wrong indeed few cases of i'm
porsance are heard by what is called a full
bench, state or national, in whichs the Judge
do not get at loggerheads before decision is
reached, and end with what legislature
would designate as majority and minority
report. Dissenting opinions almost divide
the space in the reports with the argument,
of the court; and often, as in the bred Scott
decision, and in the first legal tender judy
ment, are clearly the better law and the
better reason. 1t is, of course, against pub
lie policy to reverse or overthrow in any way
a righteous decision of any court; it i.
equally against public policy to suffer a
wrong decision to remain, doing injustice il
the particular case, and possibly multiply ing
that injusti,e as it is followed, through IN
reasonable and unreasonirg adherence t.
precedents. for generations; and who shall
decide, ultimately, what is good public polio,
but the people themselves?
: 1t does not follow from these views that
town-meeting or popular election is {
proper tribunal to try lawsuits 1t does fol
low, however, that when a decision of an
court is SO far reaching in it's consequences a
to become matter of public concern. tn
people have the same right to deal with it
and with the judges who made it, as the,
have to deal with any officials whose publ
acts they condemn. If the courts have cor
rectly expounded the law, it may becom
necessary to change the law,-or even if th
difficulty is in the constitution, to chang
l that. Laws, constitutions, and courts at
o human contrivances, and are not, and ough
: rot to be beyond the reach of the people 70
whose benefit they were made, and by whom
they can be righttully changed, as they hav
been rightfully changed whenever the peopl
have demanded such reform. Constitution
are nothing, laws are nothing, courts ar
3 nothing except as they answer the purpose
of justice and secure all the people in thei
. rights. They are instruments not master
& in free government, and whenever show
to be inadequate for their purpose the peopl
have the right and the power to compel ther
s to make way for better methods; and tn
& way to advance such a reform in a fire
Is government is through an expression of tn
% people in an election. The course of th
T people of Illinois in appealing from the de
70 csion of their courts to the ballot box ma
u not bring them the relief they seek, and q aii
likely will not but it will not be wlthou