Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/597

 CH. XXXVIII.] have assigned all such cases. It is most true, that this court will not take jurisdiction, if it should not: but it is equally true, that it must take jurisdiction, if it should. The judiciary cannot, as the legislature may, avoid a measure, because it approaches the confines of the constitution. We cannot pass it by, because it is doubtful. With whatever doubts, with whatever difficulties, a case may be attended, we must decide it, if it be brought before us. We have no more right to decline the exercise of jurisdiction, which is given, than to usurp that, which is not given. The one or the other would be treason to the constitution. Questions may occur which we would gladly avoid; but we cannot avoid them. All we can do is, to exercise our best judgment, and conscientiously to perform our duty. In doing this, on the present occasion, we find this tribunal invested with appellate jurisdiction in all cases, arising under the constitution and laws of the United States. We find no exception to this grant, and we cannot insert one.

§ 1715. To escape the operation of these comprehensive words, the counsel for the defendant has mentioned instances, in which the constitution might be violated without giving jurisdiction to this court. These words, therefore, however universal in their expression, must, he contends, be limited, and controlled in their construction by circumstances. One of these instances is, the grant by a state of a patent of nobility. The court, he says, cannot annul this grant. This may be very true; but by no means justifies the inference drawn from it. The article does not extend the judicial power to every violation of the constitution, which may possibly take place; but to "a case in law or equity," in which a right, under such law, is asserted