What was worcester v. georgia yahoo

Georgia, herself, has furnished conclusive evidence that her former opinions on this subject concurred with those entertained by her sister States, and by the Government of the United States.

Various acts of her legislature have been cited in the argument, including the contract of cession made in the year , all tending to prove her acquiescence in the universal conviction that the Indian nations possessed a full right to the lands they occupied until that right should be extinguished by the United States, with their consent; that their territory was separated from that of any State within whose chartered limits they might reside by a boundary line, established by treaties; that, within their boundary, they possessed rights with which no State could interfere; and that the whole power of regulating the intercourse with them was vested in the United States.

A review of these acts on the part of Georgia would occupy too much time, and is the less necessary because they have been accurately detailed in the argument at the bar. Her new series of laws, manifesting her abandonment of these opinions, appears to have commenced in December, In opposition to this original right, possessed by the undisputed occupants of every country; to this recognition of that right, which is evidenced by our history, in every change through which we have passed; is placed the charters granted by the monarch of a distant and distinct region, parceling out a territory in possession of others whom he could not remove and did not attempt to remove, and the cession made of his claims by the treaty of peace.

The actual state of things at the time, and all history since, explain these charters; and the King of Great Britain, at the treaty of peace, could cede only what belonged to his Crown. These newly asserted titles can derive no aid from the articles so often repeated in Indian treaties, extending to them, first, the protection of Great Britain, and afterwards that of the United States. These articles are associated with others recognizing their title to self-government.

The very fact of repeated treaties with them recognizes it, and the settled. A weak State, in order to provide for its safety, may place itself under the protection of one more powerful without stripping itself of the right of government and ceasing to be a State. At the present day, more than one state may be considered as holding its right of self-government under the guarantee and protection of one or more allies.

The Cherokee Nation, then, is a distinct community occupying its own territory, with boundaries accurately described, in which the laws of Georgia can have no force, and which the citizens of Georgia have no right to enter but with the assent of the Cherokees themselves, or in conformity with treaties and with the acts of Congress. The whole intercourse between the United States and this Nation, is, by our Constitution and laws, vested in the Government of the United States.

The act of the State of Georgia, under which the plaintiff in error was prosecuted, is consequently void, and the judgment a nullity. Can this Court revise, and reverse it? If the objection to the system of legislation lately adopted by the Legislature of Georgia in relation to the Cherokee Nation was confined to its extraterritorial operation, the objection, though complete so far as respected mere right, would give this Court no power over the subject.

But it goes much further. If the review which has been taken be correct, and we think it is, the acts of Georgia are repugnant to the Constitution, laws, and treaties of the United States. They interfere forcibly with the relations established between the United States and the Cherokee Nation, the regulation of which, according to the settled principles of our Constitution, are committed exclusively to the government of the Union.

They are in direct hostility with treaties, repeated in a succession of years, which mark out the boundary that separates. The forcible seizure and abduction of the plaintiff in error, who was residing in the nation with its permission and by authority of the President of the United States, is also a violation of the acts which authorise the chief magistrate to exercise this authority.

Will these powerful considerations avail the plaintiff in error? He was seized while performing, under the sanction of the chief magistrate of the Union, those duties which the humane policy adopted by Congress had recommended.

He was apprehended, tried, and condemned under colour of a law which has been shown to the repugnant to the Constitution, laws, and treaties of the United States. Had a judgment, liable to the same objections, been rendered for property, none would question the jurisdiction of this Court.

It cannot be less clear when the judgment affects personal liberty, and inflicts disgraceful punishment, if punishment could disgrace when inflicted on innocence. This point has been elaborately argued and, after deliberate consideration, decided, in the case of Cohens v.

The Commonwealth of Virginia , 6 Wheat. Worcester to hard labour in the penitentiary of the State of Georgia for four years was pronounced by that Court under colour of a law which is void, as being repugnant to the Constitution, treaties, and laws of the.

As this case involves principles of the highest importance, and may lead to consequences which shall have an enduring influence on the institutions of this country, and as there are some points in the case on which I wish to state distinctly my opinion, I embrace the privilege of doing so. On this indictment, the defendant was arrested, and, on being arraigned before the Superior Court for Gwinnett County, he filed, in substance, the following plea:.

He admits that, on the 15th of July , he was, and still continued to be, a resident in the Cherokee Nation, and that the crime, if any were committed, was committed at the town of New Echota, in said nation, out of the jurisdiction of the Court. That he is a citizen of Vermont, and that he entered the Indian country in the capacity of a duly authorised missionary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, under the authority of the President of the United States, and has not since been required by him to leave it.

That he was, at the time of his arrest, engaged in preaching the gospel to the Cherokee Indians, and in translating the sacred Scriptures into their language, with the permission and approval of the Cherokee Nation, and in accordance with the humane policy of the Government of the United States, for the improvement of the Indians. He then States, as a bar to the prosecution, certain treaties made between the United States and the Cherokee Indians, by.

The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the defendant was sentenced by the court to be kept in close custody by the sheriff of the county until he could be transported to the penitentiary of the State, and the keeper thereof was directed to receive him into custody and keep him at hard labour in the penitentiary during the term of four years.

Another individual was included in the same indictment, and joined in the plea to the jurisdiction of the Court, and was also included in the sentence, but his name is not adverted to, because the principles of the case are fully presented in the above statement. To reverse this judgment, a writ of error was obtained which, having been returned with the record of the proceedings, is now before this Court. The first question which it becomes necessary to examine is whether the record has been duly certified, so as to bring the proceedings regularly before this tribunal.

A writ of error was allowed in this case by one of the justices of this Court, and the requisite security taken. A citation was also issued, in the form prescribed, to the State of Georgia, a true copy of which, as appears by the oath of William Patten, was delivered to the Governor on the 24th day of November last, and another true copy was delivered on the 22d day of the same month to the Attorney General of the State.

The record was returned by the clerk, under the seal of the Court, who certifies that it is a full and complete exemplification of the proceedings and judgment had in the case, and he. Is it necessary, in such a case that the record should be certified by the judge who held the Court? Hunter's Lessee, which was a writ of error to the Court of appeals of Virginia, it was objected that the return to the writ of error was defective because the record was not so certified, but the Court in that case said,.

The record, in this case, is duly certified by the clerk of the Court of appeals, and annexed to the writ of error. The objection, therefore, which has been urged to the sufficiency of the return, cannot prevail. In 22 U. Ingle and Others, which was a writ of error to the Circuit Court for the District of Columbia, a certiorari was issued upon a suggestion of diminution in the record which was returned by the clerk with another record, whereupon a motion was made for a new certiorari on the ground that the return ought to have been made by the judge of the court below, and not by the clerk.

The writ of certiorari, it is known, like the writ of error, is directed to the Court. Mr Justice Washington, after consultation with the judges, Stated that, according to the rules and practice of the Court, a return made by the clerk was a sufficient return. To ascertain what has been the general course of practice on this subject, an examination has been made into the manner in which records have been certified from State courts to this Court, and it appears that, in the year , six causes were certified, in obedience to writs of error by the clerk under the seal of the Court.

In the year , two were so certified, one of them being the case of M'Culloch v. The State of Maryland. In the year , three cases were so certified, and in the year , there was one. In , there were five, and in the ensuing year, seven. In the year , there were eight causes so certified, in five of which a State was a party on the record. There were three causes thus certified in the year , and five in the present year.

During the above periods, there were only fifteen causes from State courts where the records were certified by the court or the presiding judge, and one of these was the case of Cohens v. The State of Virginia. The power of the Court to adopt this rule cannot be questioned, and it seems to have regulated the practice ever since its adoption.

In some cases, the certificate of the court, or the presiding judge, has been affixed to the record, but this Court has decided, where the question has been raised, that such certificate is unnecessary. So far as the authentication of the record is concerned, it is impossible to make a distinction between a civil and a criminal case.

What may be sufficient to authenticate the proceedings in a civil case must be equally so in a criminal one. The verity of the record is of as much importance in the one case as the other. This is a question of practice, and it would seem that, if any one point in the practice of this Court can be considered as settled, this one must be so considered. In the progress of the investigation, the next inquiry which seems naturally to arise is whether this is a case in which a writ of error may be issued.

Doubts have been expressed whether a writ of error to a State court is not limited to civil cases. These doubts could not have arisen from reading the above section. Is not a criminal case as much a suit as a civil case? What is a suit but a prosecution, and can anyone suppose that it was the intention of Congress, in using the word "suit," to make a distinction between a civil prosecution and a criminal one?

It is more important that jurisdiction should be given to this Court in criminal than in civil cases under the twenty-fifth section of the Judiciary Act. Would it not be inconsistent, both with the spirit and letter of this law, to revise the judgment of a State court, in a matter of controversy respecting damages, where the decision is against a right asserted under the Constitution or a law of the United States, but to deny the jurisdiction in a case where the property, the character, the liberty and life of a citizen may be destroyed, though protected by the solemn guarantees of the Constitution?

But this is not an open question; it has long since been settled by the solemn adjudications of this Court. The above construction, therefore, is sustained both on principle and authority. The provisions of the section apply as well to criminal as to civil cases, where the Constitution, treaties, or laws of the United States come in conflict with the laws of a State; and the latter is sustained by the decision of the Court.

This is undoubtedly true so long as a State court, in the execution of its penal laws, shall not infringe upon the Constitution of the United States or some treaty or law of the Union. Suppose a State should make it penal for an officer of the United States to discharge his duties within its jurisdiction, as, for instance, a land officer, an officer of the customs, or a postmaster, and punish the offender by confinement in the penitentiary; could not the Supreme Court of the United States interpose their power, and arrest or reverse the State proceedings?

Cases of this kind are so palpable that they need only to be stated to gain the assent of every judicious mind. And would not this be an interference with the administration of the criminal laws of a State? This Court have repeatedly decided that they have no appellate jurisdiction in criminal cases from the Circuit Courts of the United States; writs of error and appeals are given from those Courts only in civil cases.

But, even in those Courts, where the judges are divided on any point in a criminal case, the point may be brought before this Court under a general provision in cases of division of opinion. Jurisdiction is taken in the case under consideration exclusively by the provisions of the twenty-fifth section of the law which has been quoted.

These provisions, as has been remarked, apply, indiscriminately to criminal and civil cases wherever a right is claimed under the Constitution, treaties, or laws of the United States, and the decision by the State court is against such right. In the present case, the decision was against the right expressly set up by the defendant, and it was made by the highest judicial tribunal of Georgia.

To give jurisdiction in such a case, this Court need look no further than to ascertain whether the right, thus asserted, was decided against by the State court. The case is clear of difficulty on this point. The name of the State of Georgia is used in this case because such was the designation given to the cause in the State court.

No one ever supposed that the State, in its sovereign capacity in such a case, is a party to the cause. The form of. Under a rule of this Court, notice was given to the Governor and Attorney General of the State because it is a part of their duty to see that the laws of the State are executed.

In prosecutions for violations of the penal laws of the Union, the name of the United States is used in the same manner. Whether the prosecution be under a federal or State law, the defendant has a right to question the constitutionality of the law.

Can any doubt exist as to the power of Congress to pass the law under which jurisdiction is taken in this case? Since its passage in , it has been the law of the land, and has been sanctioned by an uninterrupted course of decisions in this Court, and acquiesced in by the State tribunals, with perhaps a solitary exception, and whenever the attention of the national legislature has been called to the subject, their sanction has been given to the law by so large a majority as to approach almost to unanimity.

The Constitution of the United States was formed not, in my opinion, as some have contended, by the people of the United States, nor, as others, by the States, but by a combined power, exercised by the people, through their delegates, limited in their sanctions, to the respective States. Had the Constitution emanated from the people, and the States had been referred to merely as convenient districts by which the public expression could be ascertained, the popular vote throughout the Union would have been the only rule for the adoption of the Constitution.

This course was not pursued; and in this fact, it clearly appears that our fundamental law was not formed exclusively by the popular suffrage of the people. The vote of the people was limited to the respective States in which they resided. So that it appears there was an expression of popular suffrage and State sanction, most happily united, in the adoption of the Constitution of the Union. Three coordinate branches of the government were established; the executive, legislative, and judicial.

These branches are essential to the existence of any free government, and that they should possess powers, in their respective spheres, coextensive with each other.

If the executive have not powers which will enable him to execute the functions of his office, the system is essentially defective, as those duties must, in such case, be discharged by one of the other branches. This would destroy that balance which is admitted to be essential to the existence of free government by the wisest and most enlightened Statesmen of the present day.

It is not less important that the legislative power should be exercised by the appropriate branch of the government than that the executive duties should devolve upon the proper functionary. And if the judicial power fall short of giving effect to the laws of the Union, the existence of the Federal Government is at an end. It is in vain, and worse than in vain, that the national legislature enact laws, if those laws are to remain upon the statute book as monuments of the imbecility of the national power.

It is in vain that the executive is called to superintend the execution of the laws if he have no power to aid in their enforcement. Such weakness and folly are in no degree chargeable to the distinguished men through whose instrumentality the Constitution was formed. The powers given, it is true, are limited; and no powers which are not expressly given can be exercised by the Federal Government; but, where given, they are supreme.

Within the sphere allotted to them, the coordinate branches of the General Government revolve unobstructed by any legitimate exercise of power by the State governments. The powers exclusively given to the Federal Government are limitations upon the State authorities.

But, with the exception of these limitations, the States are supreme, and their sovereignty can be no more invaded by the action of the General Government than the action of the State governments in arrest or obstruct the course of the national power. It has been asserted that the Federal Government is foreign to the State governments, and that it must consequently be hostile to them.

Such an opinion could not have resulted from a thorough investigation of the great principles which lie at the foundation of our system. The Federal Government is neither foreign to the State governments nor is it hostile to them. It proceeds from the same people, and is as much under their control as the State governments.

Where, by the Constitution, the power of legislation is exclusively vested in Congress, they legislature for the people of the Union, and their acts are as binding as are the constitutional enactments of a State legislature on the people of the State. If this were not so, the Federal Government would exist only in name. Instead of being the proudest monument of human wisdom and patriotism, it would be the frail memorial of the ignorance and mental imbecility of its framers.

In the discharge of his constitutional duties, the Federal Executive acts upon the people of the Union the same as a Governor of a State, in the performance of his duties, acts upon the people of the State. And the judicial power of the United States acts in the same manner on the people.

It rests upon the same basis as the other departments of the Government. The powers of each are derived from the same source, and are conferred by the same instrument. They have the same limitations and extent. The Supreme Court of a State, when required to give effect to a statute of the State, will examine its Constitution, which they are sworn to maintain, to see if the legislative act be repugnant to it; and if a repugnancy exist, the statute must yield to the paramount law.

The same principle governs the supreme tribunal of the Union. No one can deny that the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land; and consequently, no act of any State legislature, or of Congress, which is repugnant to it can be of any validity.

Now if an act of a State legislature be repugnant to the Constitution of the State, the State court will declare it void; and if such act be repugnant to the Constitution of the Union, or a law made under that Constitution, which is declared to be the supreme law of the land, is it not equally void?

And, under. It is sometimes objected, if the federal judiciary may declare an act of a State legislature void because it is repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, it places the legislation of a State within the power of this Court. And might not the same argument be urged with equal force against the exercise of a similar power by the Supreme Court of a State. Such an argument must end in the destruction of all Constitutions, and the will of the legislature, like the acts of the Parliament of Great Britain, must be the supreme and only law of the land.

It is impossible to guard an investiture of power so that it may not, in some form, be abused; an argument, therefore, against the exercise of power because it is liable to abuse would go to the destruction of all governments. The powers of this Court are expressly, not constructively, given by the Constitution, and, within this delegation of power, this Court are the Supreme Court of the people of the United States, and they are bound to discharge their duties under the same responsibilities as the Supreme Court of a State, and are equally, within their powers, the Supreme Court of the people of each State.

When this Court are required to enforce the laws of any State, they are governed by those laws. So closely do they adhere to this rule that, during the present term, a judgment of a Circuit Court of the United States, made in pursuance of decisions of this Court, has been reversed and annulled because it did not conform to the decisions of the State court in giving a construction to a local law.

But while this Court conforms its decisions to those of the State courts on all questions arising under the statutes and Constitutions of the respective States, they are bound to revise and correct those decisions if they annul either the Constitution of the United States or the laws made under it. It appears, then, that on all questions arising under the laws of a State, the decisions of the courts of such State form a rule for the decisions of this Court, and that, on all questions arising under the laws of the United States, the decisions of this Court.

Is there anything unreasonable in this? Have not the federal as well as the State courts been constituted by the people? Why then should one tribunal more than the other be deemed hostile to the interests of the people? Text mentions his indictment for breaking Georgian law that prohibits outsiders for residing within Cherokee Territory.

Worcester argued that where he resided in Georgia should not matter to the U. He refers to various treaties where the Cherokee people had sovereign rule over their territory. His sentence was to serve four years of hard labor. The pamphlet overviews the argument to allow for the release of Worcester.

Samuel A. The end result would be to reduce the court to nothing more than the plaything of the political branches. Many on both sides see the justices as merely politicians in robes. Some, mostly on the Left but increasingly on the Right, as well, even prefer that the court be openly political, so long as it means their side comes out on top.

This sort of noble, institutionalist sentiment explains in part why liberals are so angry at Breyer for refusing to retire and yield his seat to a younger, more ideological replacement. But if Breyer is correct, it also explains why they would eventually become just as angry at whoever followed him.

Judges dedicate their lives to the law, not to politics. That is not a failing of the judges but a reflection of the truth that what the law says is not completely in accord with what any ideological faction wants it to say. None of this should be controversial, and to this point in the book, Breyer has said little that Samuel Alito or Neil Gorsuch would not endorse.

But the book closes with a section on constitutional interpretation that clearly sets him apart from the majority of the court. Breyer reads in some overriding themes to the Constitution that add an extra-textual dimension to how he rules. To say that a thing was designed to be workable is almost a tautology.

How does this look in practice? Congress had passed a temporary eviction moratorium for properties backed by federal loans or assistance. But when the ban expired and Congress declined to renew it, the CDC and the Biden administration did so by decree.

But here, the mutable nature of capital-J justice shows itself. Is this what a workable system looks like? Would not a democracy be deemed unworkable where the executive ignores the legislature? Encarta: Sequoyah. Wikipedia: Sequoyah. InfoPlease: Sequoyah. New Georgia Encyclopedia: Sequoyah. Google Directory: Sequoyah. Open Directory Project: Sequoyah. Wikipedia: Major Ridge. New Georgia Encyclopedia: Major Ridge.

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Yahoo Directory: Andrew Jackson. Andrew Jackson on the Web. Sequoyah By Grant Foreman. Alumni Volunteers The Boardroom Alumni. Curriculum Materials. Add Event. Main Menu Home. The white invaders sang about their hopes: All I want in this Creation Is a pretty little wife and a big plantation Way up north in the Cherokee Nation.

For Discussion and Writing 1. Form small groups to discuss the six policies. Try to reach a consensus on the best policy. Each group should then report its choice and reasons for it to the class. Policy Choices A. Senate, April 15—17, Gen. Worcester v. Georgia Encyclopedia Articles: Wikipedia: Worcester v. Georgia Answers. Georgia New Georgia Encyclopedia: Worcester v. Georgia Oyez: Worcester v.