Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/519

 CH. XXXVIII.] States. The questions, whether the fact, alleged as the foundation of the action, be real or fictitious; whether the conduct of the plaintiff has been such as to entitle him to maintain his action; whether his right is barred; whether he has received satisfaction, or has, in any manner, released his claims; are questions, some or all, of which may occur in almost every case; and if their existence be sufficient to arrest the jurisdiction of the court, words, which seem intended to be as extensive, as the constitution, laws, and treaties of the Union, which seem designed to give the courts of the government the construction of all its acts, so far as they affect the rights of individuals, would be reduced to almost nothing.

§ 1645. After adverting to the fact, that there is nothing in the constitution to prevent congress giving to inferiour courts original jurisdiction in cases, to which the appellate power of the Supreme Court may extend, he proceeds: We perceive, then, no ground, on which the proposition can be maintained, that congress is incapable of giving the circuit courts original jurisdiction, in any case, to which the appellate jurisdiction extends. We ask, then, if it can be sufficient to exclude this jurisdiction, that the case involves questions depending on general principles? A cause may depend on several questions of fact and law. Some of these may depend on the construction of a law of the United States; others on principles unconnected with that law. If it be a sufficient foundation for jurisdiction, that the title or right, set up by the party, may be defeated by one construction of the constitution or law of the United