Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/555

 CH. XXXVIII.] will never be likely to feel any bias inauspicious to the principles, on which it is founded. It is added, The reasonableness of the agency of the national courts in cases, in which the state tribunals cannot be supposed to be impartial, speaks for it. No man ought certainly to be a judge in his own cause, or in any cause, in respect to which he has the least interest or bias. This principle has no inconsiderable weight in designating the federal courts, as the proper tribunals for the determination of controversies between different states and their citizens.

§ 1677. And here a most important question of a constitutional nature was formerly litigated; and that is, whether the jurisdiction given by the constitution in cases, in which a state is a party, extended to suits brought against a state, as well as by it, or was exclusively confined to the latter. It is obvious, that, if a suit could be brought by any citizen of one state against another state upon any contract, or matter of property, the state would be constantly subjected to judicial action, to enforce private rights against it in its sovereign capacity. Accordingly at a very early period numerous suits were brought against states by their creditors to enforce the payment of debts, or other claims. The question was made, and most elaborately considered in the celebrated case of Chisholm v. Georgia; and the majority of the Supreme Court held, that the judicial power under the constitution applied equally to suits brought by, and against a state. The learned judges, on that