Page:The Supreme Court in United States History vol 1.djvu/219

Rh action of the United States Courts in asserting a jurisdiction to try persons indicted at common law was regarded by the Anti-Federalists as an extension of Federal authority and a prostration of State sover- eignty not to be tolerated. Beyond all else, the upholding of the constitutionality of the Alien and Sedition laws by the Judges on Circuit had aroused the furious indignation of the Anti-Federalists, and had led them to charge that the Judiciary was merely a tool of the Federalist Executive and Legislature. "The Federal Judges were partial, vindictive, and cruel,'* the Anti-Federalist papers stated. "They obeyed the President rather than the law, and made their reason subservient to their passion/' ^ "The Courts in this State (Pennsylvania) and the States Northward and Eastward are stretching the doctrines of treason and sedition to a most extraordinary length," wrote Mason to Monroe. "They seem determined to suppress all political enquiry, conscious that the conduct of their friend J. A. cannot stand a fair scru- tiny.'* The i>olitical charges to the Grand Jiuy indulged in by the Judges had given great offense to the Anti-Federalists ; and the appointments of two Chief Justices on foreign missions had induced a fear lest by this means the Judiciary was being subjected to the direction of the Executive. Moreover, the Anti-Federalists had been justly alarmed at the de- mands for centralization of Government voiced by their opponents in connection with the Judiciary; for since the Presidential campaign of 1800, the Feder- alist newspapers had been filled with articles demand- ing extension of the "protecting powers of the Federal

^Ameriean CUiaen, April 28, 1808; Monroe Papert M88, letter of Steyena ThomBon Mason to James Monroe, April 29, 1800, in which the trial of Thomas Cooper was termed a "cruel and abominable persecution."