Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 7.djvu/667

 IN EB OANADA NORTHERN RT. 655 �legislative poweT to any othisr authority, nor could it coufer jurisdictiou upon this court to exercise aoy butjudicial func- tions; and if the aet in question, in atiy of ita provisions, con- travenes these maxims of constitutional law as to those pro- visions, it is inoperative. But the act is not obnoxiousi to these objections. It devolves upon tMs oOurt simply the judicial functions of determining the rights of parties ■when they may be brought into controversy. �The rights are created and established bythe act; andthia is the office of the legislative departaient. The power to aidjudicate npon. these rights, to ascertaia, when controversy airises, their extent and value, and apply the appropriate remedy for their protection, is oonferred upon the court; andi this is the peculiar province of the judicial department. �It is argued that the act attempts to confer upon the court the power to fix the rate of tolls which the International Bridge Company may charge^ and that this is a legislative and not a judicial function. If cbngrees had uxed the rate of tolls, as it had the right to prescribe the conditions: upon Mrhich the franchise might be enjoyed, no other auth'ority could have intervened to change these, conditions. But sup- pose the act had, in terms, pifovided that the bridge company might charge reasonable tolls, would not this; have been a complete exercise of the legislative power, and would it not have remained for the judicial departirent to decide, rwhen controversy should arise, what were or were not reasonable: tolls? And if the act had provided forisueh a determiuation by a judicial tribunal, would this have been unconstitutial ? It seems to me, clearly not. It is no less the exercise of judi- cial functions to prescribe a rule bf co»dlict or proteoti the- existence of a right during a future period.than it istb deter-. mine whether the right has be^n invaded in tho pasti, It is. one of the common offices of a court ofequity to do this', �It is said that that which distinguishes a judicial. from a legislative act is that the one is a deterjpaination of what the. existing lavr is in relation to someeKisting thing already.done' or happened, while the other : is a predeterminStibn' jof wtot the law shall be for the regulation of all future cases olalling ��� �