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![handle is hein.slavery/ussccases0400 and id is 1 raw text is: Dec. 1866.]
EX PARTE GARLAND.
888
Syllabus.
Ex PARTE GARLAND.
1. The act of Congress of January 24th, 1865, providing that after its pas-
sage no person shall be admitted as an attorney and counsellor to the
bar of the Supreme Court, and, after March 4th, 1865, to the bar of any
Circuit .r District Court of the United States, or Court of Claims, or be
allowed to appear and be heard by virtue of any previous admission, or
any special power of attorney, unless he shall have first taken and sub-
scribed the oath prescribed in the act of July 2d, 1862-which latter act
requires the affiant to swear or affirm that he has never voluntarily
borne arms against the United States since he has been a citizen thereof;
that he has voluntarily given no aid, countenance, counsel, or encour-
agement to persons engaged in armed hostility thereto; that he has
neither sought nor accepted, nor attempted to exercise the functions of
any office whatever, under any authority or pretended authority in hos-
tility to the United States; and that he has not yielded a voluntary sup-
port to any pretended government, authority, powet, or constitution
within the United States, hostile or inimical thereto-operates as a
legislative decree excluding from the practice of the law in the courts
of the United States all parties who have offended in any of the par-
ticulars enumerated.
2. Exclusion from the practice of the law in the Federal courts, or from
any of the ordinary avocations of life for past condact is punishment
for such conduct. The exaction of the oath is the mode provided for
ascertaining the parties upon whom the act is intended to operate.
3. The act being of this character partakes of the nature of a bill of pains
and penalties, and is subject to the constitutional inhibition against the
passage of bills of attainder, under which general designation bills of
pains and penalties are included.
4. In the exclusion which the act adjudges it imposes a punishment for some
of the acts specified which were not punishable at the time they were
committed, and for other of the acts it adds a new punishment to that
before prescribed, and it is thus within the inhibition of the Constitu-
tion against the passage of an e epostfacto law.
5. Attorneys and counsellors are not officers of the United States; they are
officers of the court, admitted as such by its order upon evidence of their
possessing sufficient legal learning and fair private character.
6. The order of admission is the judgment of the court that the parties pos-
sess the requisite qualifications and are entitled to appear as attorneys
and counsellors and conduct causes therein. From its entry the parties
become officers of the court, and are responsible to it for professional
misconduct. They hold their office during good behavior, and can only
be deprived of it for misconduct ascertained and declared by the judg-
ment of the court after opportunity to be heard has been afforded. Their
admission and their exclusion are the exercise of judicial power.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.slavery/ussccases0400&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)