The Iola register., 1882-04-21
The United states Supreme C.urk

The United St1tes Supreme Csurt
It is not true, the attaches Of the court
say, that any of the Justices have had
gowns made in Paris by Worth. They
are all home made, and have been made
by one family Of people for nearly forty
years. Zach Chandler had very poor
opinion of these gowns, for It IS said Of
him that he once said to Salmon r.
Chase, a former Chief Justice: Salmon,
when you have your old jacket on you
look every inch Judge. There is ne
reason why one of these gowns should
be called jacket. for the skirt reaches
the floor. The gowns are put on the
Justices in what is called the rObe-rO0m,
adjoining the Court, at five minutes to
twelve o'clock, for the Judges never 60
upon the bench until high noon. Then,
after the Marshaps deputy sings his song
about s.God bless the United States and
the Justices of this Court, !" or words to
that effect, the arrival of the Justices
having been previously announced. they
take their seats and are ready for busi-
ueSs.
The Clerkship of the Court is worth
more than the salary of four OF the
Justices, as it is said to frequently pay
over $40, 900 per year. The charges are
simply terrible. 1t costs about dollar
for the Clerk to look at you, and another
dollar to get out of his sight. They have
little talk then of keeping the decisions
back as long as possible, often couple
of months, and, in the meantime. if any
one wants a copy of the decision. it costs
two dollars for each page of one hundred
words. There is no good reason why
the decisions should not be put in type
the day they are delivered. and furnished
as the debates of Congress are furnished,
the day following; but this was not the
practice forty years ago, and they never
do anything about the Court except in
the time-honored but excessively slow
way. This, all agree, would be great
Inconvenience, but it would take S1O.-
600 year out of the fees of the Clerk,
and, of course, it is not done. Several
times bills have been prepared for intro
duction in Congress on the subject, but
somehow nothing was heard of them
afterward. Those who proposed them
were convinced that it was not the Gus
tom, and they let the matter drop. The
Supreme Court has always held that
every bill relating to the Court must first
be sent to them for inspection, and,
strange as it may appear, they have al
ways carried their point in this respect.
When Belva Lockwood, the female
lawyer, applied for admission to prac-
tice before the Court, the Justices were
shocked and the Clerk Mortified. The
Court considered the application. and,
after holding it under advisement for a
month or so, gravely declared against
her, on the ground that it was against
the custom, if not the law. Belva, in
reply, said it was against the custom
once to ride in railroad car, or to light
up house with gas, but these customs
were not in keeping with the progress
of the times. The reply was that there
was no help for her. Belva, being
practical, slipped over to the Senate,
drew bill giving women the right to
practice law, provided they were compe-
tent, and had it introduced. She had q
similar bill introduced in the House,
which body passed it. The Senate in
turn passed it, and, 10! the custom was
a thing of the past. A law took its
place, and she or any other woman is now
perfectly free to get a big fee for appear
ing and arguing case before the Su-
preme Court, provided she is fortunate
enough to get employed.
1t is against the custom, and no one is
allowed to do it under penalty of being
put out of the Courtroom, for anyone.
newspaper reporter or lawyer even, to
write word in the Courtroom. or take
a note of any point in a decision or re-
mark of any of the Judges. This ap-
pears strange, and yet it is fact, and
there are hundreds of newspaper corre-
spondents who know it from being pre-
vented. The custom is to go to The
Clerk, and wait a week or so for him to
make such extracts of an opinion as are
wanted, and to pay him his fees The
only way to get over this is to keep the
points in your head, and write them out
after coming out of the Courtroom,
which has to be done on what is called
decision day.
The opinions of the Supreme Court are
much too long. They go into a history
of every case, and often a person has to
read half-hour or so before the point
of the decision is reached But all this
plays into the hands of the clerk. He
gets wealthy in consequence of it. I'm
agine the readers of paper in these days
of telegraph having to wait three or four
weeks for q decision! The Judges are
too slow. They don't intend to be slow,
but they are, without knowing it. It is
seldom that decision can be had in less
than month after a case has been ar
gued. In similar Courts in England .
decision is given in five minutes after q
case is argued. This is as it should be.
The Judges, in holding off their decis-
ions. without knowing it, are enriching a
certain number of resident attorneys at
the expense of other attorneys, who do
not happen to reside here; for, knowing
tho dolav the exnense of waitinU etc