Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/556

540 The appellate jurisdiction as to law and fact, notwithstanding the ingenuity of gentlemen, still, to me, carries those terrors which my honorable friend described. This does not include law, in the common acceptation of it, but goes to equity and admiralty, leaving what we commonly understand by common law out altogether. We are told of technical terms, and that we must put a liberal construction on it. We must judge by the common understanding of common men. Do the expressions "fact and law" relate to cases of admiralty and chancery jurisdiction only? No, sir, the least attention will convince us that they extend to common-law cases. Three cases are contradistinguished from the rest. "In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers, and consuls, and those in which a state shall be a party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact." Now, sir, what are we to understand by these words? What are the cases before mentioned? Cases of common law, as well as of equity and admiralty. I confess I was surprised to hear such an explanation from an understanding more penetrating and acute than mine. We are told that the cognizance of law and fact is satisfied by cases of admiralty and chancery. The words are expressly against it. Nothing can be more clear and incontestable. This will, in its operation, destroy the trial by jury. The verdict of an impartial jury will be reversed by judges unacquainted with the circumstances. But we are told that Congress are to make regulations to remedy this. I may be told that I am bold; but I think myself, and I hope to be able to prove to others, that Congress cannot, by any act of theirs, alter this jurisdiction as established. It appears to me that no law of Congress can alter or arrange it. It is subject to be regulated, but is it subject to be abolished? If Congress alter this part, they will repeal the Constitution. Does it give them power to repeal itself? What is meant by such words in common parlance? If you are obliged to do certain business, you are to do it under such modifications as were originally designed. Can gentlemen support their argument by regular or logical conclusions? When Congress, by virtue of this sweeping clause, will organize these courts, they cannot depart from the Constitution; and their laws in