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Page Number: 40.0

8 

SEC v. JARKESY 

GORSUCH, J., concurring 

Crown,”  and  demanded  the  right  to  the  “common  law  of 
England” and the “great and inestimable privilege” of a jury 
trial.  Declaration  and  Resolves  of  the  First  Continental 
Congress,  Oct.  14,  1774,  in  1  Journals  of  the  Continental
Congress,  1774–1789, pp. 68–69  (W.  Ford  1904  ed.).  Two 
years later, the drafters of the Declaration of Independence 
repeated  these  concerns,  admonishing  the  King  for 
“ma[king]  Judges  dependent  on  his  Will  alone,”  ¶11,  and 
“[f]or depriving [the colonists] in many cases, of the benefits 
of Trial by Jury,” ¶20.  By that point, however, the “musket 
fire at Lexington and Concord . . . signaled the end not only 
of the vice-admiralty courts, but of all British rule in Amer-
ica.”  Ubbelohde 190. 

When  the  smoke  settled,  the  American  people  went  to
great lengths to prevent a backslide toward anything like
the vice-admiralty courts.  Erlinger, 602 U. S., at ___–___ 
(slip op., at 5–6).  One product of these efforts was Article 
III  of  the  Constitution.  There,  the  Constitution  provided
that  “[t]he  judicial  Power”—the  power  over  “Cases”  and
“Controversies”—would lie with life-tenured, salary-protected
judges.  §§1–2;  see  Oil  States  Energy  Services,  LLC  v. 
Greene’s  Energy  Group,  LLC,  584  U. S.  325,  346  (2018) 
(GORSUCH, J.,  dissenting).    As  the  Court  has  recognized,
this meant the Executive Branch could “exercise no part of
th[e] judicial power.”  Murray’s Lessee v. Hoboken Land & 
Improvement Co., 18 How. 272, 275 (1856), “no matter how 
court-like [its] decisionmaking process might appear,” Ortiz 
v. United States, 585 U. S. 427, 465 (2018) (ALITO, J., dis-
senting).  Nor could Congress “withdraw from judicial cog-
nizance any matter which, from its nature, is the subject of 
a suit at the common law, or in equity, or admiralty”—the 
traditional scope of the “judicial Power.”  Murray’s Lessee, 
18 How., at 284; see Art. III, §2.

Despite these guarantees, many at the founding thought 
Article III didn’t go far enough.  Yes, it promised a defend-
ant  an  independent  judge  rather  than  one  dependent  on