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UNITED STATES v. VAELLO MADERO 

GORSUCH, J., concurring 

people,  McCulloch  v.  Maryland,  4  Wheat.  316,  404–405 
(1819),  and  is  empowered  to  act  only  in  accord  with  the 
terms of the written Constitution the people have approved, 
Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 176–177 (1803).  Em-
pires  and  duchies  in  Europe  may  have  subscribed  to  the
“doctrine . . . that the people were made for kings, not kings 
for the people.”  The Federalist No. 45, p. 289 (C. Rossiter 
ed. 1961) (J. Madison).  “Monarchical and despotic govern-
ments” may possess the power to act “unrestrained by writ-
ten constitutions.”  Downes, 182 U. S., at 380 (Harlan, J., 
dissenting).  But our Nation’s government “has no existence 
except by virtue of the Constitution,” and it may not ignore
that charter in the Territories any more than it may in the
States.  Id., at 382. 

The  Insular  Cases’  departure  from  the  Constitution’s 
original  meaning  has  never  been  much  of  a  secret.    Even 
commentators at the time understood that the notion of ter-
ritorial incorporation was a thoroughly modern invention.1 
The Insular Cases deviated, too, from this Court’s prior and 
longstanding understanding of the Constitution.  In 1898, 
the  very  same  year  as  the  Spanish-American  War,  a  lop-
sided  majority  of  this  Court  judged  it  “beyond  question”
that  the  Constitution’s  jury-trial  guarantees  reached  “the 
territories  of  the  United  States.”  Thompson  v.  Utah,  170 
U. S. 343, 346–347 (1898) (Harlan, J.).  Nearly 80 years be-
fore that, the Court held that the Constitution’s Tax Uni-
formity  Clause  constrained  legislation  governing  the  Dis-
trict  of  Columbia.    Loughborough  v.  Blake,  5  Wheat.  317, 
319 (1820) (Marshall, C. J.).  In between, this Court reached 

—————— 

1 See C. Littlefield, The Insular Cases, 15 Harv. L. Rev. 169, 169–170 
(1901); F. Coudert, The Evolution of the Doctrine of Territorial Incorpo-
ration, 26 Colum. L. Rev. 823, 832 (1926) (Coudert); see also M. Ramsey, 
Originalism and Birthright Citizenship, 109 Geo. L. J. 405, 435 (2020);
Lawson & Seidman 196–197.