Page:The Supreme Court in United States History vol 1.djvu/572

538 the Bank ceased; and since the resolutions received mdorsement from no other State except Virginia and Kentucky, and no attention whatever from the Con- gress of the United States, excitement over the case in Ohio gradually died away, with the return of busi- ness prosperity. When, after many delays attendant upon its argument in the Court, the case was finally decided in 1824, it had become almost wholly a dead issue.^

Meanwhile, the Court itself had been neither in- timidated, dismayed nor deterred by the clamor raised against its decisions in cases appealed from State Courts under the Twenty-Fifth Section of the Judiciaiy Act ; but while it continued to exercise to the fullest ex- tent such jurisdiction in all cases properly before it on writ of error to State Courts, it was, nevertheless, ex- ceedingly careful to avoid taking jurisdiction unless the record clearly showed a state of facts warranting its exercise. By this display of a wise caution, it avoided considerable friction with the States. An interesting illustration of this appeared in Miller v. NichoUsy 4 Wheat. 311, decided in 1819, a few days after the McCvJhch Case. This case, which involved a serious contest between Pennsylvania and the Federal Govern- ment, had been pending in the Court for nine years without action. A writ of error to the State Supreme Court had been filed in 1809, but the State officials had disregarded it and had taken possession of the fund in controversy. One Nicholls, a United States revenue collector, had executed a mortgage to the United States on which a judgment had been obtained, and levied on, and the proceeds deposited in the State Court; later, the State had obtained a judgment,

^For the most accurate, thorough and discriminating account off this Ohio controversy, see Taxation qf the Second Bank of the United Stalee by Ernest L. Bogart, Amer. But. Em. (1912), XVH.