Page:State v. Johnson.pdf/27

26 Ark.]  1870.]   Ark. 84; Allis, ex parte, 12 Ark. 102; Crise, ex parte, 16 ib., 195; Goad, ex parte, ib. 411; Jones v. City of Little Rock, 25 Ark. 287.

We concur in the doctrine announced in those cases.

The opinion, by our Chief Justice this morning referred to, in the so-called Confederate court, of the State against Williams, is, by us, regarded of less weight than most learned opinions—not from a want of ability on the part of the distinguished gentlemen who are said to have presided over that tribunal, but from the occasion and circumstances that prcduced what is said to have been their opinion. There was certainly a want of that calm reflection necessary to a judicious opinion upon important questions of constitutional law. We need not resort to our knowledge of that intense prejudice and excitement, seen only in the last convulsions of a desperate war, and which challenze the reason of great act well as smaller minds. But the opinion, upon its face, shows that it was brought forth under a terrible military rule; and that the court's own existence, if not destroyed, was seriously questioned by the war power under which it existed; and the authority it assumed to represent, had dominion over but a small part of the State.

What purports to be their opinion, sets out by declaring that they will only assume jurisdiction in a case "involving the civil rights of the State as sovereign, affecting vitally its character, and the proper administration of the government." These writs, not be issued at the suit of individuals, but only as the State, by her attorney general, may ask; yet, the very case then before them was at the instance of one claiming to be a temporary attorney general, and against the acknowledged attorney general of the State, and the court assumed jurisdiction over the person of the accused, when, according to their own records, he was residing in and protected by a hostile government. With this stretch of jurisdiction, and the language of the Judge who wrote the opinion, pouring out such a mass of bitter invectives against the lawful government, and