Court Opinion

ID: 9418632
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:34:23.883104+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:49:47.299226
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice Brandéis
(with whom Mr. Justice • Holmes concurs), dissenting.
I think that the writ of error should be dismissed. The judgment below was entered after the effective date of the Act of February 13, 1925, c. 229, 43 Stat. 936, 937, 942. That Act strutík from § 237 of the Judicial Code the words “ or an authority exercised under any State.”1 The section as so amended limits the right of review by writ of error to cases where the highest court of a State has denied the validity of a treaty or statute of the United States, or has affirmed the validity of a statute of a State, challenged as repugnant to the Constitution, treaties, or laws of the *116United States. . Other cases can be reviewed only if this Court, in the exercise of its discretion, grants a writ of certiorari. Here the challenge was to the validity of an ordinance of a city. I cannot believe that if Congress had intended to maintain our jurisdiction to review judgments sustaining such ordinances on writ of error, it would not have found clearer language in which to express its purpose.
The question before us is the interpretation, not of the word “ laws,” used in the Constitution, but the narrower term “ statute,” employed in the Judiciary Act of 1789, c. 20, § 25,1 Stat. 73, 85. And our task is to construe, not the single word “ statute,” but the phrase “ statute of any State.” Laws or regulations adopted by a municipality are called, in common speech, either ordinances or bylaws, not “ statutes.” 2 In some connections, rules established by an institution are referred to as statutes. -Thus, the rules adopted by a university or its founder are sometimes spoken of as statutes of the university. But no one would call them statutes of the State under whose law the university is incorporated. Nor would any one, in refer*117ring to the laws or regulations adopted by municipal or other corporations, speak of them as “ statutes of the State.” Has the phrase as originally used in § 25 of the Judiciary Act of September 4, 1789, c. 20, 1 Stat. 73, 85, and as reenacted in § 2 of the Act of February 5, 1867, c. 28, 14 Stat. 385, 386, in § 709 of the Revised Statutes, in § 237 of the Judicial Code, and finally in the Act of 1925, acquired a different, conventional, meaning so that it must be held to include municipal ordinances?
Our jurisdiction to review a judgment of a state court sustaining the validity of a municipal ordinance alleged to be repugnant to the Federal Constitution, was first invoked in Weston v. City Council of Charleston, 2 Pet. 449, 463-464. Section. 25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789, which was then in force without amendment, authorized a- review by writ of error in any case “ where is drawn in question the validity of a statute of, or an authority exercised under any State, on the ground of their being repugnant to the constitution, treaties or laws of the United States, and the decision is in favor- of such their validity, or where is drawn in question the construction of any clause of the constitution, or of a treaty, or statute of, or commission held under (the United States, and the decision- is against the title, right, privilege or exemption specially set up or claimed by either party, under such clause of the said Constitution, treaty, statute or commission.” The jurisdiction having been"questioned, because of the nature of. the proceeding, Mr. Chief; Justice Marshall took occasion to specify the clause of § 25. on which he conceived the jurisdiction to rest: . -
“In this casé the city ordinance of Charleston is the. exercise of an,‘authority,under the State of South Carolina/ ‘ the validity of which has been drawn in question on the ground of its being repugnant to the constitution/ and ‘ the decision is in favor of its validity ’.”
*118The jurisdiction then declared was exercised, without question, in the cases involving municipal ordinances that came before the Court during the next half century.3 In 1876 the subject was carefully reconsidered in Home Insurance Co. v. City Council of Augusta, 93 U. S. 116, 121. After stating the possible bases of jurisdiction under § 709 of the Revised Statutes, the Court said:
“ Here there was drawn in question the authority exercised by the city council under the State in passing the ordinance imposing the tax complained of. The question raised was as to its repugnancy to the Constitution of the United States; and the decision was in favor of the validity of the authority so exercised. . A right was also claimed under the Constitution of the United States. The decision was adverse to the claim. The case is, therefore, within two of the categories we have stated. The jurisdictional objection cannot be maintained.”
The Court would hardly have omitted to say that review might also have been had by virtue of the “ statute ” clause if it had been of opinion that a municipal ordinance could be properly so described.
The second of the categories mentioned in Home Insurance Co. v. City Council of Augusta, was eliminated, so far as the right to review by writ of error was concerned, by the Act of September 6, 1916, c. 448, § 2, 39 Stat. 726. In cases where the showing was merely that a title,- right, privilege or immunity guaranteed by the Constitution had been claimed and denied, that Act provided that there could be no review except by certiorari. But as it left unchanged the clause regarding the validity of an authority, on which Mr. Chief Justice Marshall had based the power of this Court to review judgments sustaining-municipal ordinances, our jurisdiction over such judgments remained unaffected. When, in 1925, the “ authority ” clause was *119struck from § 237 of the Judicial Code and our jurisdiction on writ of error under that section; was limited to cases involving the validity of a statute, Congress cannot have been unaware of the difference, for jurisdictional purposes, between-a statute of a State and a municipal' ordinance. For attention had been called to the difference by numerous decisions under several jurisdictional acts — the most recent being of wide public interest.
The Act of June 18, 1910, c. 309, 36 Stat. 539, 557, § 17 of which was embodied in the Judicial Code as § 266, declared that “ no interlocutory injunction suspending or restraining the enforcement, operation, or execution of any statute of a State by restraining the action of any officer of such State in the enforcement or execution of such statute ” should issue except upon a hearing before three judges as there provided. An unbroken line of decisions, beginning in 1911, has held that a municipal ordinance is not a statute within the meaning of that section. Sperry & Hutchinson Co. v. City of Tacoma, 190 Fed. 682; Cumberland Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. City of Memphis, 198 Fed. 955; Birmingham Water Works Co. v. City of Birmingham, 211 Fed. 497, affirmed, 213 Fed. 450; Calhoun v. City of Seattle, 215 Fed. 226; City of Des Moines v. Des Moines Gas Co., 264 Fed. 506; City of Dallas v. Dallas Telephone Co., 272 Fed. 410. See also Land Development Co. v. City of New Orleans, 13 F. (2d) 898, reversed on the merits, 17 F. (2d) 1016. The principal ground of these decisions, namely, “ that the natural meaning of ‘^statute of a state ’ is a statute or law directly passed by iSte Legislature of the state,' and the natural meaning of ‘ any officer of such state ’ is an officer whose authority extends throughout the state, and is not limited to a small district,” (198 Fed. 955, 957) is, of course, equally applicable to § 237 of the Judicial Code. It cannot have been unknown to Congress. The construction had already been established when the Act of March 4, 1913, c. 160, 37 Stat. 1013, amended § 266 so as to make *120it clearly applicable to suits to enjoin the orders of a state commission.4 The amending Act inserted after the words “ in the enforcement or execution of such statute,” the words “ or in the enforcement or execution of an order made by an administrative board or commission acting under and pursuant to the statutes of such State.” Congress did not.include in the amendment any reference to municipal ordinances. The fact that it did not is significant.5
*121Prior to the Act of 1925, thq difference, for purposes of appellate review, between a statute and a law enacted by a subordinate legislative body, had been called to the attention of Congress also by the cases which settled that the enactments of the legislatures and other lawmaking bodies of the territories and of the District of Columbia are not statutes of the United States within the meaning of legislation governing the jurisdiction of this Court. The question appears to have arisen first under the Act of March 3, 1885, c. 355, § 2, 23 Stat. 443. The phraseology of this statute was similar to that of § 25 of the Judiciary Act .of 1789, and this Court has always recognized that decisions under it and its later reenactments are authoritative with regard to the construction of § 237 of the Judicial Code.6 It permitted *122review of any judgment of the Supreme Court of. a Territory or of the District of Columbia where “ is drawn in question the validity of a treaty or statute of or an authority exercised under the United States.” Thereafter, that provision, as modified by the Act creating the Court of Appeals for the District, February 9, 1893, c. 74, § 8, 27 Stat. 434, 436; District Code, § 233, 31 Stat. 1189, 1227, governed our appellate jurisdiction over the highest courts of the continental territories (other than Alaska) and of the District until the enactment of the Judicial Code, in which it was embodied as § 245 and, with important changes, as § 250. That our appellate jurisdiction over judgments involving the validity of acts of territorial legislatures and of the legislative body of the District, depended on the clause in the Act of 1885 allowing such review where the validity of an authority exercised under the United States had been challenged, was indicated in Maricopa & Phoenix R. R. Co. v. Arizona, 156 U. S. 347, 350-351, and Parsons v. District of Columbia, 170 U. S. 45, 49-50. The subject was fully discussed in'more recent opinions. Thus, in McLean v. Denver & Rio Grande R. R. Co., 203 U. S. 38, 47-48, our jurisdiction to review a judgment of the Supreme Court of New Mexico upholding the validity of a territorial law was sustained on-the ground that “ the validity of an authority exercised under the United States in the passage and enforcement of the law is directly challenged, and the case does in-' volve the validity of an authority exercised under the power derived from the United States.” The right to review on appeal a judgment involving the validity of an ordinance or regulation of the District of Columbia was rested upon, the same ground in Smoot v. Heyl, 227 U. S. 518, 522, although the statute authorizing the District Commissioners to make regulations provided that they should “ have the same force and effect within the District of Columbia as if enacted by Congress.” Act *123of June 14, 1878, c. 194, 20 Stat. 131. See also Walker V. Gish, 260 U. S. 447, 449.
A, similar ruling was made in Board of Public Utility Commissioners v. Manila Electric R. R. Co., 249 U. S. 262, where this Court dismissed an- appeal and a writ of error to review, under § 248 of the Judicial Code, a judgment of the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands. That section, until amended by the Act of September 6, 1916, c. 448, 39 Stat. 726, 727, authorized review by writ of error or appeal, of a judgment of the highest court of the Philippine Islands where either the validity or the construction of a statute of the United States was involved. Reavis v. Fianza, 215 U. S. 16, 21-22; Gsell v. Insular Collector, 239 U. S. 93, 94-96. The Railroad challenged an order of the Commissioners purporting to be made in execution of an Act.of the Philippine Commission authorizing the city of Manila to grant a franchise ordinance passed under the powers thereby granted. This Court dismissed the appeal and writ of error for want of jurisdiction, necessarily holding “ that the mere construction by the court of the franchise ordinance, and its consequent ruling that the duty did not rest on the Railroad Company to give the free transportation which the orders of the Commissioners had directed to be given” did not involve either the construction or the validity of .a statute of the United' States;
Obviously, the statutes of territorial legislatures, the regulations of the Commissioners of the District of Columbia, and the Philippine statutes and ordinances bear á relation to acts of Congress that is wholly comparable .to that borne by municipal ordinances to the statutes passed by the legislature of a.State. Congress cannot have intended that in the Act of 1925, the phrase “ statute of any State ” should be read as including municipal ordinances within a State while, under like circumstances, the phrase “ statute of the United States ” does not include *124the ordinances of the District of Columbia, even where the enabling act provides that the ordinances shall have the same force as if enacted by the Congress of the United States.
Moreover, if municipal ordinances are deemed to be statutes of a State within the meaning of § 237 (a) of the Judicial Code, legislative orders of state commissions, boards, and officials must be also. Prior to the Act of 1925, judgments sustaining the validity of such orders were reviewable on writ of error as fully as judgments sustaining the validity of states and ordinances. Betwedn the effective date of the Act. of 1916 and that of the Act of 1925, this Court wrote opinions in 21 cases in which a judgment of the highest court of a State involving the validity of an order of a commission was reviewed on writ of error.7 In none of the opinions was it stated that jurisdiction existed because an order is a statute of a State.8 OnUhe other hand, in Lancaster v. McCarty, 267 *125U. S. 427, 430, where our jurisdiction was invoked to review, on writ of error, the judgment of a state court denying the validity of ah order of the Interstate Commerce Commission, the jurisdiction was sustained on the ground that the order “ is an authority exercised under the United States which by the contention of the shippers was drawn in question,, and its validity denied by the state court.” Can it be that, while our power to review on writ of error a judgment of a state court denying the validity of an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission rested on the “ authority ”. clause, our power to review a judgment sustaining the validity of an order of a state commission did not?9 . ,
The difference between a statute and an ordinance for purposes of appellate review — a difference which rests wholly on expediency — had been acted upon by Congress half a century earlier, when it undertook to deal with the congestion of business in this Court by regulating the *126priority of hearings in revenue cases. Act of June 30, 1870, c. 181, 16 Stat. 176; Davenport City v. Dows, 15 Wall. 390, 392.10 It was reaffirmed when Congress, in 1925, withdrew the right to a direct appeal from the District Court in cases involving the validity of municipal ordinances, though allowing such an .appeal in certain cases involving the validity of statutes and orders of commissions. On the other hand, the essential identity of statutes; ordinances, and orders, where the question concerns substantive rights, has always been recognized. Since all regulations established by competent authority are laws, the comprehensive term “ laws ” has been used when it was desired to include all forms of legislative action.11 Thus, as the enactments, of a subordinate body exercising legislative authority are a part of the laws of a State, an ordinance or an order is a law within the meaning of the contract clause and is state action within the prohibitions of the Fourteenth Amendment. North *127American Cold Storage Co. v. Chicago, 211 U. S. 306, 313; Grand Trunk Ry. Co. v. Railroad Commission, 221 U. S. 400, 403; Ross v. Oregon, 227 U. S. 150, 162-163; Lake Erie & Western R. R. Co. v. Public Utilities Commission, 249 U. S. 422, 424; Standard Scale Co. v. Farrell, 249 U. S. 571, 577. For, as this Court has pointed out in New Orleans Water works Co. v. Louisiana Sugar Refining Co., 125 U. S. 18, 30, 31; “ it is not strictly and literally true, that a law of a State, in order to come within the constitutional prohibition, must be either in the form of a statute enacted by the legislature in the ordinary course of legislation, or -in the form of a constitution established by the people of the State ,as their fundamental law.”12
Prior to the Act of 1925, final judgments of a district or circuit court involving the constitutional validity of a municipal ordinance could be brought directly to this Court by writ of error or appeal under § 5 of the Court of Appeals Act, Act of March 3, 1891, c. 517, 26 Stat. 826, 827-828, and § 238 of the Judicial Code, because such review was authorized “ in' any case that involves the construction or-application of the Constitution. of the United States,” and “in any case in which the constitution or law of a State is claimed to be .in contravention of the Constitution of the United States.” Davis & Farnum Manufacturing Co. v. City of Los Angeles, 189 U. S. 207, 216; Boise Artesian Water Co. v. Boise City, 230 U. S. 84, 90; see Standard Scale Co. v. Farrell, 249 U. S. 571, 577. And likewise a case involving the constitutional validity of an: *128ordinance could be brought here on writ of error to or on appeal from the Circuit Court of Appeals if the jurisdiction of the district or circuit court had been invoked in part on constitutional grounds. City of Vicksburg v. Henson, 231 U. S. 259, 267. But in 1925 Congress amended § 238 so as to confine the right to a direct appeal in cases involving the validity of state .action to those which fell within the provisions of § 266&wkey;provisions Which had already been construed as not including municipal ordinances. Unless the phrase “ statute of any State” as used in §§ 237(a) ,and 240(b) of the Judicial Code as amended, includes municipal ordinances, no case from any lower court' involving only the validity of a municipal ordinance can now be reviewed by this Court otherwise than upon certiorari.
When it is borne in mind that the severe limitations upon the right of review by this Court imposed by the Act of 1925 were made solely because the increase of the Court’s business compelled, the reasons why Congress should have taken away the right to a review by writ of error to the highest court of a state in cases involving the validity of ordinances, while leaving unaffected the right in cases involving the validity of statutes, becomes clear. There are only 48 States. In. 1920 there were 924 municipalities in the United. States of more than 8,000 inhabitants.13 The validity of ordinances of even smaller municipalities had come to this Court for adjudication.14
*129The increasingly complex conditions of urban life have led, as this Court noted in Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., 272 U. S. 365, 386-387, to a corresponding increase in municipal police legislation. Recently, two classes of municipal ordinances, new in character — those relating to zoning and those relating to motor vehicles— had become the subject of many controversies. The constitutionality of these ordinances can rarely be determined simply by applying a general rule. ! The Court must consider the effect of the ordinance as applied. As the validity of the particular ordinance depends ordinarily upon special facts,15 these must be examined whenever there is jurisdiction. Dahnke-Walker Milling Co. v. Bondurant, 257 U. S. 282. Though no burdensome factual inquiry is involved, the controversy may often be of trifling significance, as in the case at bar. Thus, persuasive reasons existed why Congress should have denied, in 1925, review by writ of error in cases which involved only the validity of a municipal ordinance.
If, by striking out from § 237 of the Judicial Code the clause “ or an authority exercised under any State,” Congress did not exclude from review by writ of error cases involving the validity of municipal ordinances and commission orders, it wholly failed to accomplish what, .in view of the statements made to it in regard to the *130effect of the amendment,16 must be deemed to have been its purpose in so amending the section. That is, to relieve this Court, in many cases, of the burden of obligatory review. For, other than these, there had been considered by this Court, in the nine years between the effective dates of the Jurisdictional Acts of 1916 and 1925, and decided with opinions, not more than eight cases involving the validity of an authority exercised under a State or under the United States.17 On the other hand the forty cases in which judgments of state courts sustaining municipal ordinances or commission orders had been reviewed on writ of error, had entailed a burden out of all proportion to their number. The evidence introduced to establish the facts in cases involving the validity either of orders or of municipal ordinances is often both, volum*131inous and conflicting.18 Condensation of the evidence is not required, as in cases coming from the lower federal courts. See Equity Rule 75 (b), 226 U. S. Appendix 23; Rule 7 (2), 266 U. S. 657-658. Compare Barber Asphalt Paving Co. v. Standard Asphalt & Rubber Co., 275 U. S. 372. Although the evidence is often conflicting, findings of fact are not required. Compare Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry. Co. v. Tompkins, 176 U. S. 167, 179; Lincoln Gas & Electric Light Co. v. Lincoln, 223 U. S. 349, 364; City of Hammond v. Schappi Bus Line, 275 U. S. 164, 171. Congress must have had the threatening volume and the heavy burden of this litigation in mind when it struck from § 237 of the Judicial Code the words “ or an authority exercised under any State.”
From the decision of Weston v. City Council of Charleston, 2 Pet. 449, 463-464, in which Mr. Chief Justice Marshall rested the jurisdiction of this Court to review the judgments of state courts involving the validity of municipal ordinances upon the clause “ or an authority exercised under any State,” to the passage of the Act of 1925, ninety-six years elapsed. During that period the Court wrote opinions in a multitude of cases in which that specific jurisdiction was exercised. In only two'of them has there been found any statement that the jurisdiction could be sustained on the ground that a municipal ordinance is a statute of a State, within the meaning of § 25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 or its later reenact*132ments. These two opinions were written at successive terms by the same member of the Court. Atlantic Coast Line R. R. Co. v. Goldsboro, 232 U. S. 548, 555; Reinman v. Little Rock, 237 U. S. 171, 176. An examination of the record and briefs in the two cases seems to make it clear that the statements were obiter and were made inadvertently. No question of the jurisdiction of this Court under § 237 of the Judicial Code was raised or discussed by counsel in either case; and this Court could not, under the legislation then in force, have entertained a doubt as to the existence of the jurisdiction. Neither opinion of the Court refers to Weston City. Council of Charleston, 2 Pet. 449, 463-464, or to Home Insurance Co. v. City Council of Augusta, 93 U. S. 116, 121 — the cases which, on full consideration, had settled that the basis of our jurisdiction was the clause relating to the validity of an authority. Neither refers to McLean v. Denver & Rio Grande R. R. Co., 203 U. S. 38, 47-48, or to Smoot v. Heyl, 227 U. S. 518, 522 — the cases which had recently confirmed that ruling. There was obviously no intention to overrule these cases.
The only authority cited in support of the statement in the Goldsboro and Little Rock cases, Williams v. Bruffy, 96 U. S. 176, 183, furnishes no basis for them. That case involved an act of the Congress of the Confederate States — • a body whose legislation would obviously be described in common speech, as “ statutes.” It- was conceded that the particular act was a “ statute.” . The question was whether it was a statute “ of any State.” 19 The Court *133held that since the enactment had been given the force of law in Virginia, it was as much the action of that State as if it had been originally passed by an authorized legislative body. In being so adopted by Virginia the enactment clearly did not lose the quality which it had had from its inception, namely, that of being a “ statute.” It was in this connection that Mr. Justice Field said: “Any enactment, from whatever source originating, to which a State gives the force of law is a statute of the State, within the meaning of the clause cited relating to the jurisdiction of this court.” This language was used with reference to the acts of an irregular legislative body whose enactments would be commonly described as “ statutes'!” It had no reference to the acts of a regular legislative body whose enactments would never be characterized as statutes, in ordinary speech. That Mr. Justice Field would not so have applied it, is clear. For in the term of Court preceding that in which Williams v. Bruffy was decided, he had participated in the decision in Home Insurance Co. v. City Council of Augusta, 93 U. S. 116, 121, in which the Court had plainly indicated that a municipal ordinance was not a “ statute of any State.”
The dicta concerning our jurisdiction in Atlantic Coast Line R. R. Co. v. Goldsboro, and in Reinman v. Little *134Bock, have never been repeated in any later case dealing with municipal ordinances, even where the decisions.in the two cases have been relied upon. Some care seems to have been taken not to repeat the expression that a municipal ordinance was a statute of a State. See Thomas Cusack Co. v. Chicago, 242 U. S. 526, 529; Zucht v. King, 260 U. S. 174, 176. To construe the phrase “ statute of any State ” as applying to a municipal ordinance disregards the common and appropriate use of the words; ignores decisions which for nearly a century have governed our jurisdiction to review judgments of state courts sustaining the validity of such ordinances; and tends to defeat the general purpose of the Act of 1925 “ to relieve this Court by .limiting further the absolute right to a review by it.” Moore v. Fidelity & Deposit Co., 272 U. S. 317, 321; Smith v. Wilson, 273 U. S. 388, 390.20 It completely frustrates the particular purpose which-Congress must have had in striking from § 237 the clause “ of an authority exercised under any state.” 21 The trival character of the substan*135tive question presented by this case — in which a writ of certiorari, if applied for, would plainly not have been granted — illustrates the wisdom of Congress in limiting our jurisdiction on writ of error.

 The Act of 1925 also struck out the words “ or an authority exercised under the United States.”

 These are the terms employed in the charters of American cities and towns both before and since the adóption 'of the Constitution. They have been continuously employed apparently by all text-writers on municipal corporations and government. “ Local laws of a municipal corporation, duly enacted by the proper authorities, prescribing general, uniform and permanent rules of conduct, relating to the corporate affairs of the municipality, are, in this country, generally designated as ordinances. ‘ By-laws ’ or''- bye-laws ’ ,was the original designation.” MeQuiUin, Municipal Ordinances, § 1; 2 McQuillin, Municipal Corporations, § 632. “ The result of legislative action by a municipal council or assembly is a local law usually denominated an ordinance.” 2 Abbott, Municipal Corporations, § 514. See also Dillon, Municipal Corporations, 1 ed., p. 270; Munro, Municipal Government and Administration, p. 209; Reed, Municipal Government, p. 173. No instance has been found where such writers have used.the word “ statutes ” in referring to municipal ordinances,

 Waring v. The Mayor, 8 Wall. 110; Woodruff v. Parham, 8 Wall. 123; Osborne v. Mobile, 16 Wall. 479; Cannon v. New Orleans, 20 Wall. 577. Compare Barron v. Baltimore, 7 Pet. 243, 245-246.

 See the debate in the Senate at the preceding-session, 48 Cong. Rec. 8120-8123. The House Committee on the Judiciary was “ of the opinion that the statute should be broadened, so as to prevent this kind of interference (i. e., by a single judge) 'with State officials who are performing their duties under the provisions of a statute enacted by the legislature of a State.” House Report, 62d Cong., 3d Sess., No. 1584, p. 2. Mr. Clayton, who was in charge of the bill in the House, said that' its purpose was “ to put the order of a State railroad commission upon an equality with a statute of a State; in other words, to give the same force and effect to the order of a State railroad commission fixing rates as is accorded under existing law to a State statute.” 49 Cong. Rec. 4773.

 This Court has not passed expressly on the construction to be given § 266 in this respect. Until amended by the Act of February 13, 1925, § 266 did not require the presence of three judges at the final hearing; and on appeal, to this Court from the final decree .the propriety of the action of the single judge in granting or denying a temporary .injunction was not strictly in issue. Shaffer v. Carter, 252 U. S. 37, 44. But if this Court had doubted the power of a District Judge to act in such cases, it would hardly have mentioned without comment the fact that such a judge had granted or denied a temporary injunction. This it has done in a number, of cases. See United Railroads v. San Francisco, 249 U. S. 517, 519; Southern Iowa Electrfic Co. v. Chariton, 255 U. S. 539, 541; Galveston Electric Co. v. Galveston, 258 U. S. 388, 390; Paducah v. Paducah Ry. Co., 261 U. S. 267, 271; St. Cloud Public Service Co. v. St. Cloud, 265 U. S. 352, 355. Since the effective' date of the Act of 1925, this Court has decided; on certiorari to Circuit Courts of Appeals, a number ¡of cases in which an application, for a temporary injunction against the enforcement of a municipal ordinance had been heard before, and the final decree rendered by, a- single district judge. See Hammond v. *121Schappi Bus Line, 275 U. S. 164; Hammond v. Farina Bus Line & Transportation Co., 275 U. S. 173; Delaware, Lackawanna & Western R. R. Co. v. Morristown, 276 U. S. 182. If a municipal ordinance had been a statute within § 266, the decrees of the district judges in these c^sps would have been void for want of jurisdiction.

 See Ireland v. Woods, 246 U. S. 323, 328, citing and following Champion Lumber Co. v. Fisher, 227 U. S. 445, 451; Erie R. R. Co. v. Hamilton, 248 U. S. 369, 372, citing and following Baltimore & Potomac R. R. Co. v. Hopkins, 130 U. S. 210, District of Columbia v. Gannon, 130 U. S. 227, and United States v. Lynch, 137 U. S. 280, 285; Jett Bros. Distilling Co. v. City of Carrollton, 252 U. S. 1, 6, citing and following Baltimore & Potomac R. R. Co. v. Hopkins, 130 U. S. 210, and Champion Lumber Co. v. Fisher, 227 U. S. 445, 450, 451; Schaff v. Famechon Co., 258 U. S. 76, 81, citing and following Baltimore & Potomac R. R. Co. v. Hopkins, 130 U. S. 210; Zucht v. King, 260 U. S. 174, 177, citing and following Taylor v. Taft, 203 U. S. 461, and Champion Lumber Co. v. Fisher, 227 U. S. 445; Lancaster v. McCarty, 267 U. S. 427, 430, citing and following Champion Lumber Co. v. Fisher, 227 U. S. 445, 451. The significance of decisions under the Act of 1885 is confirmed by the "legislative history of ~the Act, which shows, as seemed probable from its language, that the provision with respect to “ a treaty or statute of of an authority exercised under the United States,” was derived, like § 237 of.the Judicial Code, from § 25 of the Judiciary Act- of 1789. See 16 Cong. Rec. 670-671.

 In Live Oak Water Users Association v. Railroad Commission, 269 U. S. 354, the Court, while asserting its jurisdiction over judgments sustaining such orders, dismissed a writ of error, as the judgment below rested on adequate non-federal grounds.

 The jurisdiction was first challenged in Bluefield Water Works & Improvement Co. v. Public Service Commission, 262 U. S. 679. The .Court said at p. 683: “ The prescribing of rates is a legislative act. The commission is an instrumentality of the State, exercising delegated-powers. Its order is of the same force as would be a like enactment by the legislature. If, as alleged, the prescribed rates are confiscatory, the order is void. Plaintiff in error is entitled to bring the case here on 'writ of error and to have that question decided by this Court.” In Northern Pacific Ry. Co. v. Department of Public Works, 268 U. S. 39, 42, jurisdiction was assumed on the authority of the Bluefield case. In Live Oak Water Users Association v. Railroad Commission, 269 U. S. 354, 356, the Court said that "for jurisdictional purposes the order of the Commission must be treated as though an Act of the Legislature.” This- was said, of course, with reference to the situation under the Act of 1916, for the judgment under review was entered October 23, 1923.

 Since tbe effective date of the Act of 1925, no judgment of a state court has been reviewed by this Court on writ of error, where the sole claim was that, a commission order' was unconstitutional. In the following cases, governed by the Act of 1925, in which this Court reviewed on writ of error a judgment of a state court sustaining the validity of a commission order, the validity of the underlying statute as well as of the order was attacked: Frost & Frost Trucking Co. v. Railroad Commission, 271 U. S. 583; Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry. Co. v. Railroad Commission, 272 U. S. 605; Miller Lumber Co. v. Floyd, 273 U. S. 672 (Per Curiam); Fox River Paper Co. v. Railroad Commission, 274 U. S. 651; Pierce v. Barker, 274 U. S. 718 (Per Curiam); Stimson Lumber Co. v. Kuykendall, 275 U. S. 207; International Great Northern R. R. Co. v. Railroad Commission, 275 U. S. 503 (Per Curiam). In Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry. Co. v. Public Utilities Commission, 274 U. S. 344, and in Aetna Insurance Co. v. Hyde, 275 U. S. 440, the review was by certiorari. In Aetna Insurance Co. v. Baker, 276 U. S. 628, certiorari was denied. Compare Phillips v. Oklahoma, 274 U. S. 721 (Per Curiam); Phillips v. Okla homa, 275 U. S. 489 (Per Curiam); Missouri v. Public-Service Commission, 275 U. S. 489 (Per Curiam),

 Mr. Chief Justice Chase explained why the Act should be construed as applying only to statutes and not to municipal ordinances: “ This preference, is givei^ plainly enough, because of the presumed importance of such cases to the administration and internal welfare of the States, and because of their dignity as equal members of the Union.' The reasons for preference do not apply to municipal corporations, more than to railroad and many other corporations.” p. 392.

 Iri procedural matters — which; like jurisdiction, rest upon considerations of expediency — the difference betweeii statutes and ordinances has been observed, in some instances even when in the legislation the more comprehensive term “ laws ” was used. Such was the case in Davenport City v. Dows, supra. Again, while municipal ordinances .are “ laws of the several states ” within the meaning of • § 34 of the Judiciary Act of 1789, 1 Stat. 73, 92, and § 721 of the Revised Statutes, théy will not be judicially noticed in the federal courts; for “ an ordinance is not. a public statute, but a mere municipal regulation.” Robinson v. Denver Tramway Co., 164 Fed. 174, 176. Compare Garlich v. Northern Pacific Ry. Co., 131 Fed. 837, 839; Choctaw, O. & G. R. R. Co. v. Hamilton, 182 Fed. 117, 121.

 It was on tbis statement of Mr. Justice Gray’s that the Court 'relied in North American Cold Storage Co. v. Chicago, 211 U. S. 306, 313, where it answered a contention that a bill alleging-only municipal legislative action presented no constitutional question sufficient to sustain the jurisdiction of the circuit court, by saying: “In this case the ordinance in question is to be regarded as in effect a statute, of' the' State, adopted under a power granted it by the state legisla ,íé, and hence it is an act of the State within the Fourteenth'Amendment.”

 Fourteenth Census of the United States (1920), vol. I, table 27. ,

 See, e. g., Brennan v. Titusville, 153 U. S. 289; Wabash R. R. Co. v. Defiance, 167 U. S. 88; Wilson v. Eureka City, 173 U. S. 32; Skaneateles Water Co. v. Skaneateles, 184 U. S. 354; Western Union Telegraph Co. v. New Hope, 187 U. S. 419; Williams v. Talladega, 226 U. S. 404; Pierce Oil Corporation v. Hope, 248 U. S. 498. In Village of Terrace Park v. Errett, 273 U. S. 710, and Village of University Heights v. Cleveland Jewish Orphans Home, 275 U. S. 569, the Court denied petitions for certiorari in cases .where Circuit Courts of Ap*129'peals had held the zoning ordinances of small suburban districts to be unconstitutional as applied to the respondents. If ordinances are statutes of a State, these cases could have been brought here by'writ, of error under § 240(b). In Gorieb v. Fox, 274 U. S. 603, a judgment of a state court sustaining a zoning ordinance was reviewed by certiorari. Compare Township of Maplewood v. Margolis, 276 U. S. 617, certiorari'denied; Nectow v. City of Cambridge, post, p. 183.

 The Court has noted this dependence with respect both to zoning ordinances and to bus regulations. See Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., 272 U. S. 365, 395; Hammond v. Schappi Bus Line, 275 U. S. 164, 170,

 See Hearing before a Subcommittee of the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate, 68th Cong., 1st Sess., on S. 2060, p. 35; Hearing before the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives, 68th Cong., 2d S'ess., on H. R. 8206, p. 13.

 In only three cases in which opinions were written,, aside from those' involving municipal ordinances and commission orders, does jurisdiction appear to have been exercised under the clause in the Act of 1916 allowing a writ of error in cases where the validity of an authority exercised under a State has been challenged and sustained: Schwab v. Richardson, 263 U. S. 88; Love v. Griffith, 266 U. S. 32; Appleby v. Delaney, 271 U. S. 403. Possibly, under the view announced by the Court,.even such state action as was involved in these cases amounts to “ a statute of a state.” In' five cases jurisdiction seems to have been based on the clause allowing a writ of error' where the validity of an authority exercised, under the United States has been denied: American Express Co. v. Caldwell, 244 U. S. 617; Northern Pacific Ry. Co. v. North Dakota, 250 U. S. 135; Dakota Central Telephone Co. v. South Dakota, 250 U. S. 163; Davis v. Newton Coal Co., 267 U. S. 292; Lancaster v. McCarty, 267 U. S. 427. The first and the last of this group concerned orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission which, presumably, must be held to be statutes of. the United States if the orders of staté commissions are statutes of a state. Perhaps the other three as well were statutes of the United States under the view now taken by the Court.

 Thus, in Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission, 262 U. S. 276, the record was 685 pages in length. In Bluefield Water Works & Improvement Co. v. Public Service Commission, 262 U. S. 679, the record extended over 1398 pages. The record in Northern Pacific Ry. Co. v. Department of Public Works, 268 U. S. 39, contained 1131 pages in addition to numerous exhibits. In Hammond v. Schappi Bus Line, 275 U. S. 164, and Hammond v. Farina Bus Line & Transportation Co., 275 U. S. 173, the Court found itself compelled to remand to the District Court in order for that court to make proper findings of fact.

 That the sole question discussed was whether the act of the Congress of the Confederate States was an act of “ any State ” appears from the briefs on file in the office of the Clerk. See Supplemental Brief of Enoch Totten for the Plaintiff in Error, pp. 10-11; Brief of Henry W. Garnett for the Defendant in Error, p. 3; Brief of William A. Maury, as amicus curiae, pp. 4, 5, 7. The question was thus stated by Mr. Maury on p. 5 of his brief; “ Upon what ground, then, can it *133be maintained that a statute of, or authority exercised under, the hostile de facto Government of Virginia was the statute of or' authority of a State, in the sense of the law which is this Court’s commission to take cognizance of appeals from the state tribunals? (5. How., Scott vs. Jones).” The case cited by Mr. Maury, 5 How. 343, 376, held that the statutes of an unorganized political body were not stat-. utes “ of a State ” within .the meaning of § 25 of the Judiciary Act, although that body later became a State. In Miners Bank v. Iowa, 12 How. 1, a territorial statute was held not to be a statute “ of a State ” within § 25; though the Territory had since become a State. The language ip Ford v. Surget, 97 U. S. 594, 603, 604, and Stevens v. Griffith, 111 U. S. 48, 50, also makes clear the exact point of the decision in Williams v. Bruffy.

 Much weight was given to this purpose in construing earlier acts reducing our jurisdiction. Compare McLish v. Roff, 141 U. S. 661, 666; Robinson v. Caldwell, 165 U. S. 359, 362; American Sugar Refining Co. v. New Orleans, 181 U. S. 277, 281, all construing the Circuit Court of Appeals Act, March 3, 1891; c. 517, 26 Stat. 826; American Security & Trust Co. v. District of Columbia, 224 U. S. 491, 495, construing § 250 of the Judicial Code; Inter-Island Steam Navigation Co., Ltd., v. Ward, 242 U. S. 1, construing § 246 of the Judicial Code, as amended by .the Act of January 28, 1915, c. 22, 38 Stat. 803. ' - "

 Since the effective date of the Act of -1925,.judgments of state courts sustaining the validity of municipal ordinances have been reviewed on writ of error in a number of cases. Beery v. Houghton, 273 U. S. 671 (Per Curiam); Ohio ex rel. Clarke v. Deckebach, 274 U. S. 392; Angelo v. Winston-Salem, 274 U. S. 725 (Per Curiam); Bloecher & Schaaf v. Baltimore, 275 U. S. 490 (Per Curiam); Kresge Co. v. Dayton, 275 U. S. 505 (Per Curiam). Compare Natchez v. McNedy, 275 U. S. 502 (Per Ciiriam). But in none of them did *135counsel question the jurisdiction of this Court, or call to our attention the significance of the amendment of § 237 made by the Act of 1925. It is well settled that the exercise of jurisdiction under such circumstances is not to be deemed a precedent when the question is finally brought before us for determination. United States v. More, 3 Cranch, 159, 172; Snow v. United States, 118 U. S. 346, 354; Cross v. Burke, 146 U. S. 82, 86; Louisville Trust Co. v. Knott, 191 U. S. 225, 236; Arant v. Lane, 245 U. S. 166, 169.