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1 The Supreme Court of the United States: Speech of Roscoe Conkling, of New York 1 (1860)

handle is hein.slavery/spctussk0001 and id is 1 raw text is: THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. ,0 SPEECH OF ROSCOE CONKLING, OF NEW YORK, -0- Delivered in the House of 1epresentiatiVes, April 16, 1860. The THouse being in CoiMittee of:the Whole, and having I ings. The citizenship of the plaintiff' was un.ler consideration the annual meusage of the President.- Cthe only point in judgment, and that being Mr. CONKLING said: determined adversely to him, the case was at Mr. CHMAIRMA: I purpose to remark upon an end. Nevertheless, the opinions swell into that part of themessage wherein the President a museum of discussion, which, however dis. informs us that the fate of all the Territories of tinguished the debaters, deserves no reverence the Republic has been irrevocably sealed by the as law. , - action of a court of law.' But the formal want of authority in these The announcement is a very extraordinary disquisitions is practically important only in one; it could never have been made, had our so far as it gives pause to events, and affords institutions been purely elective. Objectiona- time calmly to determine constitutional rights bl as such a system may have appeared to our and limitations. 'That this interval will belong, fathers, it would have preserved the American cannot be expected. An occasion must soon Congress forever from such a greeting as the arise for imparti ng the forms of law to these present Executive has sent us. premonitorymanifestoes. Should it arise during With no powers or agencies save those con- the existence of the present bench, it will no ferred directly by the people, and these deprived doubt be eagerly embraced, and then will be of the element of growth by provisions uproot- presented a question, perhaps the gravest of the ing them at frequent intervals, an age of the kind the present generation will be called upon Government would not have come when a judi- to:solve. cial tribunal would attempt, in the sense im- In its first approach, it will seem a question plied by the President, a final settlement of of slavery or freedom ; but it will tur out to great political questions. Certainly no, such be a conflict of rerogatives and powers, a col. attempt would have been based upon theories lision ,of forces,:in the Goveramtnt, affecting falsifying the history of the country, and calcu- more or less the fate of every popular right A lated to enthrone barbarism in every TerritorialL powerful party will ,be, found in the country, possession, if not in the States themselves. But, maintaining that the Supreme Court of the sir, the checks and balances adjusted by our United States is clothed with authority to say fathers have proved inadequate to. avert so what laws Congress may, and what laws Cor strange a contingency. The Government had gress shall not, enact,; and that, whenever not reached tixe'allotted years of man, when its this authority has been exercised, neither the judicial' department attempted all that I hav Executive nor Congress may overstep the limits stated. In a case presenting the simple ques- iti has preseribed. On the other hand, organ- tion-of one poor plaibitiff's right to maintain his izations, policies, and eternal principles will cry action, the Supreme C0urt has undertaken to out against imperial assumptions, and the iswue fix forever the most sacred rights of milliuns. will stretch flr beyond even the undiscoverable The step, to be sure, was premature. Ample confines of the one pervading question of human in jurisdiction, and impatient to exercise it, that sl1very. august trfbunal was unvilling to turn a black Should the court party prevail, and the Conn man from its doors without excessive reason- stitution be held to endow the Judiciary with Reproduced with permission from the University of Illinois at Chicago

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