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16 

JONES v. HENDRIX 

Opinion of the Court 

jurisdiction.  Rather, the cases he cites mostly involve com-
mitments by justices of the peace,6 a distinction reflected in 
Watkins itself.  See id., at 208 (discussing Ex parte Burford, 
3 Cranch 448, 453 (1806), where the Court examined on ha-
beas the sufficiency of a warrant of commitment by justices
of the peace while noting that no judgment of a federal court 
was in question).  At common law, justices of the peace were
not  courts  of  record  and  did  not  possess  general  criminal 
jurisdiction.  Capital Traction Co. v. Hof, 174 U. S. 1, 16–17 
(1899); see also  United States v.  Mills, 11 App. D. C. 500, 
507 (1897).  As such, their commitments were “not placed
on the same high ground with the judgments of a court of
record,” and the fact that superior courts sometimes used
habeas  to  examine  commitments  by  such  inferior  magis-
trates furnishes “no authority for inquiring into the judg-
ments of a court of general criminal jurisdiction.”  Watkins, 
3 Pet., at 209. 

Jones  also  appeals  to  Bushell’s  Case,  Vaugh.  135,  124 
Eng.  Rep.  1006  (C. P.  1670),  which  has  long  been  under-
stood as a case about the independence of criminal juries in 
determining questions of fact.  Clark v. United States, 289 
U. S. 1, 16–17 (1933); see also Sparf v. United States, 156 
U. S. 51, 90–93 (1895); 1 J. Stephen, A History of the Crim-
inal Law of England 375 (1883) (Stephen).  There, a judge
fined and imprisoned the members of a jury for acquitting 
William Penn and William Mead on indictments for “assem-
bling  unlawfully  and  tumultuously,”  a  verdict  ostensibly 
against the “manifest evidence.”  Vaugh., at 137, 124 Eng.
Rep., at 1007.  A juror refused to pay the fine, applied to the 

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6 See Rex v. Brown, 8 T. R. 26, 101 Eng. Rep. 1247 (1798); Rex v. Hall, 
1 Cowp. 60, 98 Eng. Rep. 967 (1774); Rex v. Hall, 3 Burr. 1636, 97 Eng. 
Rep.  1022  (1765);  Rex  v.  Collier,  1  Wils.  K.  B.  332,  95  Eng.  Rep.  647
(1752).  The cursory report in Rex v. Catherall, 2 Str. 900, 93 Eng. Rep.
967 (1730), is silent as to the authority under which the petitioner was 
convicted, and so cannot help Jones overcome Watkins.