Sec. 1.-Distribution of Judicial Power-Federal Courts. Jurisdiction can not be conferred on the courts by stipulation of the parties. Chicot County v. Sherwood, 148 U. S. 534. Byers v. McAuley, 149 U. S. 618. Property in custody of the law. The United States courts and the courts of the several States, while they exercise jurisdiction in the same territory, do not exercise it on the same plane. A specific thing, once taken into the jurisdiction of the one, is immediately removed from the judicial power of the other. Covell v. Heyman, 111 U. S. 176. See also Day v. Gallup, 2 Wall. 97. Ex parte Siebold, 100 U. S. 371. In re Barrus, 136 U. S. 586. Shields v. Coleman, 157 U. S. 168. Wabash R. Co. v. Adelbert College, 208 U. S. 38. Ingersoll v. Coram, 211 U. S. 335. Claflin v. Houseman, 93 U. S. 130. Brown v. Clarke, 4 How. 4. Freeman v. Howe, 24 How. 450. Heidritter v. Elizabeth Oilcloth Co., 112 U. S. 294. In re Swan, 150 U. S. 637. Palmer v. Texas, 212 U. S. 118. Peck v. Jenness, 7 How. 612. Pulliam v. Osborne, 17 How. 471. Put in Bay Waterworks, etc., Co. v. Ryan, 181 U. S. 409. The Santissima Trinidad, 7 Wheat. 283. Gumbel v. Pitkin, 124 U. S. 131. The Lottawanna, 20 Wall. 201.. Osborn v. U. S., 91 U. S. 474. Erwin v. Lowry, 7 How. 172. Waterman v. Canal-Louisiana Bank, etc., Co., 215 U. S. 33 Yonley v. Lavender, 21 Wall. 276. Green v. Creighton, 23 How. 90. Moran v. Sturges, 154 U. S. 256. Shelby v. Bacon, 10 How. 56. Peale v. Phipps, 14 How. 368. Earle v. Pennsylvania, 178 U. S. 449. People's Bank v. Calhoun, 102 U. S. 256. Calhoun v. Lanaux, 127 U. S. 634. Leadville Coal Co. v. McCreery, 141 U. S. 475. U. S. Trust Co. v. Wabash R. Co., 150 U. S. 287. Seney v. Wabash R. Co., 150 U. S. 310. Porter v. Sabin, 149 U. S 473. Shields v. Coleman, 157 U. S. 168. Grant v. Buckner, 172 U. S. 232. Erb v. Morasch, 177 U. S. 584. Injunctions by State courts against proceedings in Federal courts.An injunction issued in a State court is inoperative in any manner to affect process or proceedings in the Federal courts. U. S. v. Keokuk, 6 Wall. 514. See also McKim v. Voorhies, 7 Cranch 279. Pennsylvania v. Wheeling, etc., Brdg. Co., 18 How. 421. Amy v. Supervisors, 11 Wall, 136. Central Nat. Bank v. Stevens, 169 U. S. 432. Sec. 1.-Distribution of Judicial Power-Federal Courts. Effect on action in Federal courts of subsequent proceedings in State courts. The jurisdiction of a United States circuit court over a cause properly before it can not be defeated by the institution by one of the parties in a State court, whether civil or criminal, involving the same legal questions. Prout v. Starr, 188 U. S. 537. Wallace v. McConnell, 13 Pet. 136. A Federal court in which is first raised the question of the validity, under the Federal Constitution, of a State statute, has a right to decide that question to the exclusion of the State courts, and may enjoin criminal proceedings subsequently commenced under it in the State court until its duty is performed. Ex parte Young, 209 U. S. 123. Proceedings before State water board to determine rights of claimants to waters of a stream differs so from private suits between a few of the claimants in the Federal court restraining encroachments on rights in stream as to render rule inapplicable that a court of competent jurisdiction first obtaining jurisdiction of the same matter will retain it. Pacific Live Stock Co. v. Lewis, 241 U. S. 440. In Looney v. Eastern Texas R. Co. (247 U. S. 214) it was said that the use of injunctions by Federal courts first acquiring jurisdiction over the parties or the subject matter of a suit for the purpose of protecting and preserving that jurisdiction until the object of the suit is accomplished, is well recognized, and Judicial Code, section 265, prohibiting injunction staying proceedings in State court is not applicable to such proceedings. Once jurisdiction has been granted to the Federal courts, it rests with the courts themselves to determine whether a particular case comes within that jurisdiction. The judicial power resting in courts can not be denied them, and any act which has that effect in prescribing rules of decision is void. New rights and remedies may have the effect of increasing the business of a court; but that in no proper sense increases its jurisdiction. To give jurisdiction to a Federal court it is sufficient that the jurisdiction may be found in the Constitution or the law, but the two must cooperate, the Constitution as the fountain and the laws of Congress as the streams which convey the jurisdiction to the court. U. S. v. Peters, 5 Cranch 136. Ableman v. Booth, 21 How. 506. Freeman v. Howe, 24 How. 459. In re Tyler, 149 U. S. 164. Missouri Pac. R. Co. v. Fitzgerald, 160 U. S. 582. Klein's case, 7 Ct. Cl. 240. Buford . Holley, 28 Fed. 680. United Copper, etc., Co. v. Amalgamated Copper Co., 244 U. S. 26-1. Sec. 1.-Distribution of Judicial Power-Federal Courts. Withdrawal of jurisdiction.-Congress may not withdraw from judicial cognizance any matter which from its nature is the subject of a suit at common law or in equity or admiralty. Murray v. Hoboken Land, etc., Co., 18 How. 284. Congress, under its power over Indians and to control Federal courts, could take away even as to pending cases as it did by act of June 25, 1910, jurisdiction of the Federal district courts to establish equitable title of heirs of an Indian allottee and vest the power of ascertaining heirs in the Secretary of the Interior. Hallowell v. Commons, 239 U. S. 506. It is questionable whether Congress can, under the Constitution, abrogate the power of Federal judges as defined by the common law in the submission of cases and the control of the deliberation of juries. Liverpool, etc., Ins. Co. v. Friedman, 133 Fed. 713. Ex parte Robinson, 19 Wall. 505. Termination of jurisdiction.-Termination of proceedings brought in a Federal court to foreclose mortgage on railroad property terminates jurisdiction of that tribunal, and purchaser is not immune from suit in State court relating to management of property on theory that Federal court was only proper forum having jurisdiction. Writs International, etc., R. Co. v. Anderson County, 246 U. S. 424. In general. Congress may invest inferior courts with power to issue mandamus, but it can not empower a commissioner to commit a person for an alleged contempt. The Federal courts. have power to issue writs only when necessary in aid of their jurisdiction in a pending case, and they can apply the writ of habeas corpus to a person in jail only when he is confined under and by the authority of the United States. In such case the Federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction, and habeas corpus can not issue from a State court. Congress may provide for the appointment of a board of land commissioners to settle private land claims. Kendall v. U. S. 12 Pet. 626. Ex parte Doll, Fed. Cas. No. 3968. Ex parte Everts, 1 Bond 178. Coleman v. Tennessee, 97 U. S. 519. Duncan v. Darst, 1 How. 308. U. S. v. Ritchie, 17 How. 530. See also In re Burns, 136 U. S. 590. Robb v. Connolly, 111 U. S. 639. Control of executive officers by mandamus or injunction. The judiciary can not properly interfere with executive action when the executive officer is authorized to exercise his judgment or discretion; it is only in cases where the executive officer has to per Sec. 1.-Distribution of Judicial Power-Federal Courts. form a purely ministerial act that the courts, either by a proceeding in mandamus or injunction, can direct or control the performance of such ministerial act. Dudley v. James, 83 Fed. 345. Gaines v. Thompson, 7 Wall. 347. The President can not be restrained by injunction from carrying into effect an act of Congress alleged to be unconstitutional. Mississippi v. Johnson, 4 Wall. 475. New Orleans v. Paine, 147 U. S. 261. Controlling Effect of Decisions In General It is a maxim not to be disregarded that general expressions in every opinion are to be taken in connection with the case in which those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case they may be respected but ought not to control the judgment in a subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision. Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 399. See also Watson v. St. Louis, etc., R. Co., 169 Fed. 942; judgment affirmed, People v. Tax Comrs.. 67 N. E. 69; affirmed in Metropolitan Street Brooks v. Marbury, 11 Wheat. 78. In courts organized under the common law no opinion can be relied on as binding authority unless the case called for its expression. Its weight of reason must depend on what it contains; but it can not be said that a case is not authority on one point because although that point was properly presented and decided in the regular course of the consideration of the case, something else was found in the end which disposed of the whole matter. Carroll v. Carroll, 16 How. 275. Florida Cent. R. Co. v. Schutte, 103 U. S. 118. Mast, Foos & Co. v. Stover Mfg. Co., 177 U. S. 485. Where there are two grounds upon either of which an appellate court may rest its decision, and it adopts both, the ruling on neither is obiter dictum, but each is the judgment of the court and of equal validity. A long-standing decision of a doubtful question which has become a rule of property affecting many land titles should not be disturbed. United States v. Title Ins. Co., 265 U. S. 472. A decision on demurrer is the law of the case until a different rule is laid down by the Supreme Court, although such decision was rendered by another judge than the one trying the case finally. Wakelee v. Davis, 44 Fed. 532; decree affirmed in Davis v. Wakelee, 156 U. S. 680. Decisions by Divided Court Where three judges of the Supreme Court who were in the minority on a general question concurred in an opinion of one of the four in majority in relation to another question the prin Sec. 1.-Distribution of Judicial Power-Controlling Effect of Decisions. ciples established therein may be considered no longer open for controversy, but as the settled law of the court. Boyle v. Zacharie, 6 Pet. 348. An affirmance in the Supreme Court on equal division of opinion is not an authority for the determination of other cases, either in that court or in the inferior Federal courts. Hertz v. Woodman, 218 U. S. 205. Decisions of the Supreme Court In general.—A question repeatedly decided in the Supreme Court is settled beyond further discussion. Wright v. Sill, 2 Black 544. McCullough v. Virginia, 172 U. S. 102. Where the questions arising on demurrer in a case brought from the circuit court to the Supreme Court had been decided, so far as they affected the merits of the case, in a case previously argued at the same term between other parties, the court declined to hear an argument upon the technical questions, and remanded the case to the circuit court. Smith v. Ely, 15 How. 137. A decision of the Supreme Court affirming a decision of a State court that upheld a State statute of limitation, the constitutional validity of which was dependent on the existence of some precedent or coincident remedy, must be regarded as expressly deciding that such remedy exists, and can not be disregarded as a precedent in a later case on writ of error to a lower Federal court on the theory that the existence of such remedy was merely assumed by the United States Supreme Court in the former case because it was bound in that particular to follow the decision of the State court, but is not so bound in a case arising in a Federal court. Saranac Land, etc., Co. v. Roberts, 177 U. S. 318. The authority of a decision of the Supreme Court upholding a rule of a court of the District of Columbia is not lessened by the former court's failure to give the grounds for its decision, as this omission does not give rise to an inference that it had doubts as to the validity of the rule, but rather that it regarded the grounds of challenge to such validity as without foundation. Fidelity & Deposit Co. v. U. S., 187 U. S. 315. Constitutional questions.-The right and duty of the Supreme Court to decide whether or not an act of Congress was repugnant to the Constitution and therefore void was first decided in the early case of Marbury v. Madison (1 Cranch, 137), in which Chief Justice Marshall said: It is, emphatically, the province and duty of the judicial department, to say what the law is. Those who apply the rule to particular cases, must of necessity expound and interpret that rule. If two laws conflict with each other, the courts must decide on the operation of each. So, if a law 1 See also "Power of United States courts to declare acts of Congress unconstitutional," p. 409. |