Page:The Supreme Court in United States History vol 1.djvu/108

82 great question, therefore, of the power of the Judiciary with respect to the validity of Federal statutes was postponed for consideration until a later date. As pointed out above, however, the striking fact about the episode is that this first refusal by Supreme Court Judges on Circuit to acknowledge the validity of an Act of Congress seems to have been heartily supported by the adherents of the political party which favored a strict construction of the Constitution and to have been opposed by the party which was devoted to Nationalist theories. A review of the contemporary writings and journals from 1789 to 1802 clearly demonstrates that it was frequently the Anti-Federalists who supported the right of the Court to pass upon the constitutional validity of legislation, because they felt that it was the great guarantee of protection to State and individual rights against Congressional invasion, and that only in this manner would the power of the Federal Government be curbed; they welcomed the Court as a needed check upon Congress; and it was in the writings of two strong Federalists, Zephaniah Swift of Connecticut and Richard Dobbs Spaight of North Carolina,