to a release from imprisonment under an execution issued upon a judgment for a debt due to the United States. U. S. v. Wilson, 8 Wheat. 253; Duncan v. Darst, 1 How. 301; Glenn v. Humphreys, 4 Wash. 424; Sadlier v. Fallon, 2 Curt. 190.

No State can annul the judgment of a Federal court or destroy the rights acquired under it. U. S. v. Peters, 5 Cranch, 115; U. S. v. Bright, Brightley, 19.

A State court has jurisdiction of a proceeding to foreclose a mortgage, although the Government has purchased the land to secure a debt due to itself. Elliott v. Van Voorst, 3 Wall. Jr. 299.

If property is seized under process issued out of a Federal court, it can not be taken from the possession of the marshal under any process issued from a State court. Freeman v. How. 24 How. 450.

A State court has no jurisdiction to issue a writ of mandamus against an officer of the Government employed in disposing of the public land. M'Clung v. Silliman, 6 Wheat. 598.

A State court has no jurisdiction to enjoin proceedings on a judgment in a Federal court. M'Kim v. Voorhies, 7 Cranch, 279.

A State legislature can not regulate the modes of proceeding in suits in Federal courts, or the conduct of their officers in the service of executions issuing out of those courts. Wayman v. Southard, 10 Wheat. 1; Bank v. Halstead, 10 Wheat. 51; Homer v. Brown, 16 How. 354; Beers v. Houghton, 9 Pet. 329.

The several courts of the United States are domestic courts, and their respective seals prove themselves in the State courts. Adams v. Way, 33 Conn. 419; Pepoon v. Jenkins, 2 Johns. Cas. 119; Williams v. Wilkes, 14 Penn. 228; Womack v. Dearman, 7 Port. 513.

Power of Courts.

The courts have the power to declare an act of the legislature unconstitutional and void. Dawson v. Shaver, 1 Blackf. 204; Grimball v. Ross, T. U. P. Charlt. 175; Houston 7. Moore, 5 Wheat. I; S. C. 3 S. & R. 169; Eakin v. Raub, 12 S. & R. 330; Green v. Biddle, 8 Wheat. 1; Dausin v. Champlin, 7 Conn. 244; Baily v. Gentry, I Mo. 164; Winter v. Jones, 10 Geo. 190; Ableman v. Booth, 21 How. 506; s. c. 3 Wis. 145, 157; Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137.

The question whether a law be void for its repugnancy to the Constitution, is at all times a question of much delicacy, which ought seldom, if ever, to be decided in the affirmative in a doubtful case. The court, when impelled by duty to render such a judgment, would be unworthy of its station could it be unmindful of the solemn obligations which that station im

poses. But it is not on slight implication and vague conjecture that the legislature is to be pronounced to have transcended its powers, and its acts to be considered as void. The opposition between the Constitution and the law should be such that the judge feels a clear and strong conviction of their incompatibility with each other. Fletcher v. Peck, 6 Cranch, 87; Grimball v. Ross, T. U. P. Charlt. 175; Houston v. Moore, 5 Wheat. 1; S. C. 3 S. & R. 169; Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 4 Wheat. 518; Trustees v. Bradbury, 11 Me. 118; Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge, 24 Mass. 344; S. C. 23 Mass. 376; 11 Pet. 420; Eakin v. Raub, 12 S. & R. 330; Lapsley v. Brashears, 4 Litt. 47; Jones v. Crittenden, 1 Car. L. Rep. 385; Strong v. State, 1 Blackf. 193; Regents v. Williams, 9 G. & J. 365; Baugher v. Nelson, 9 Gill, 299; Butler v. Pennsylvania, 10 How. 402; Hartford Bridge Co. v. Union Ferry Co. 29 Conn. 210; Metropolitan Bank v. Van Dyck, 27 N. Y. 400.

No law will be declared to be void, except in a clear case. Bull, 3 Dall. 386; s. c. 2 Root, 350.

Calder v.

No court ought, unless the terms of an act render it unavoidable, to give a construction to it which will involve a violation of the Constitution. Parsons v. Ballard, 3 Pet. 433; Payne v. Baldwin, 11 Miss. 661; Bailey v. Railroad Co. 4 Harring. 389.

The presumption is in favor of every legislative act, and the whole burden of proof lies on him who denies its constitutionality. Brown v. State, 12 Wheat. 419; Hylton v. U. S. 3 Dall. 171; Planters' Bank v. Sharp, 6 How. 301; S. C. 12 Miss. 28; Metropolitan Bank v. Van Dyck, 27 N. Y. 400.

The respect that is due from one branch of the Government to another will always lead the judiciary to decline to express an opinion on the subject of the constitutionality of a law in a case not requiring such a decision. Crandall v. State, 10 Conn. 339; Ex parte Randolph, 2 Brock. 447.

It is incumbent on those who affirm the unconstitutionality of an act of Congress to show clearly that it is in violation of the provisions of the Constitution. It is not sufficient for them that they succeed in raising a doubt. Legal Tender Cases, 12 Wall. 457.

Where there is a reasonable doubt as to the unconstitutionality of an act of Congress, the law should be sustained. In re Robert D. Bogart, 2 Saw. 396.

An act of Congress can not be declared invalid, merely because the court may think its provisions harsh and unjust. Legal Tender Cases, 12 Wall. 457.

If Congress, or any State legislature, shall pass a law within the general scope of their constitutional power, the court can not pronounce it to be

void, merely because it is, in their judgment, contrary to the principles of natural justice. The ideas of natural justice are regulated by no fixed standard. The ablest and the purest men have differed upon the subject. All that the court could properly say in such an event would be that the legislature, possessed of an equal right of opinion, had passed an act which, in the opinion of the court, was inconsistent with the abstract principles of natural justice. Calder v. Bull, 3 Dall. 386; S. c. 2 Root, 350.

The power to make a law is all that the courts can judge of. They have no right to judge of its expediency. The legislative body exercises its powers at its own discretion, and is responsible only to the people to whom it owes its existence. Houston v. Moore, 5 Wheat. I; S. C. 3 S. & R. 169; Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge, 24 Mass. 344; S. C. 23 Mass. 376; 11 Pet. 420; Bennett v. Boggs, Bald. 60.

A statute is judicially held to be unconstitutional because it is not within the scope of legislative authority. It may either propose to accomplish some object prohibited by the Constitution, or to accomplish some lawful and even laudable object by means repugnant to the Constitution. Comm. v. Clapp, 71 Mass. 97.

The courts of one State have the right to decide upon the validity and constitutionality of an act of assembly of another State. Stoddart v. Smith, 5 Binn. 355.

A statute may be void in part and valid in part. If some of the provisions of a statute violate the Constitution, while others are consistent with it, the latter will be maintained if they can be separated from and stand without the unconstitutional and void parts of the law. Mobile R. R. Co. v. State, 29 Ala. 573; Kneedler v. Lane, 45 Penn. 238; S. C. 3 Grant, 465; Comm. v. Clapp, 71 Mass. 97.

If the parts held respectively constitutional and unconstitutional are so mutually connected with and dependent on each other as conditions, considerations and compensations for each other as to warrant a belief that the legislature intended them as a whole, and if all could not be carried into effect the legislature would not pass the residue independently, all the provisions which are thus dependent, conditional, or connected with the unconstitutional parts, must fall with them. State v. Perry Co. 5 Ohio St. 497.

When the principal part of a statute is void, the subordinate parts which are adjuncts of and dependent upon the main theory are also void. People v. Commissioner, 9 C. L. N. 270.

The constitutionality of a law can not be called in question on a summary motion. Brien v. Clay, 1 E. D. Smith, 649.

Although a charter may contain one unconstitutional feature, yet it can not be deemed entirely void at the instance of a person who may call it in

question collaterally. Rar. & Del. R. R. Co. v. Del. & Rar. Canal Co. 18 N. J. Eq. 546.

After a statute has been repealed, the court will not pass upon its constitutionality simply to dispose of a question of costs. Burbanks v. Williams, Phillips, 37

An unconstitutional law affords no justification to a State officer for an act injurious to an individual. Astrom v. Hammond, 3 McLean, 107.

A purchaser at a sale under an execution issued upon a judgment rendered under an unconstitutional law, obtains a good title. Webster v. Reid, Morris, 467; S. C. 11 How. 437.

Who may object.

The debtors of a bank incorporated under the laws of a State can not raise the objection that the charter of the bank is a violation of the Constitution. After having borrowed the paper of the institution, both public policy and common honesty require that the borrowers shall repay it. Snyder v. Bank of Ill. I Ill. 122.

If parties having conflicting claims to a ferry enter into an agreement to submit their rights to the legislature, they can not afterwards object to the constitutionality of the act determining their rights. Walker v. Tipton, 3 Dana, 3.

This obligation is imperative upon the State judges in their official, and not merely in their private capacities. From the very nature of their judicial duties they would be called upon to pronounce the law applicable to the case in judgment. They were not to decide merely according to the laws or Constitution of the State, but according to the Constitution, laws and treaties of the United States, the supreme law of the land. Martin v. Hunter, I Wheat. 304; S. C. 4 Munf. 1.

3. The senators and representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several State legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution : but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

The acts of the members of the legislature are not made void for a failure to take the oath to support the Constitution. The provision is merely directory, and the omission to take the oath does not affect the validity of their legislation. Hill v. Boyland, 40 Miss. 618; contra, White v. McKee, 19 La. Ann. III; Thomas v. Taylor, 42 Miss. 651.

ARTICLE VII.

1. The ratification of the conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the same.

Done in Convention, by the unanimous consent of the States present, the seventeenth day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the twelfth. In witness whereof, we have hereunto subscribed our names.

GEORGE WASHINGTON, President,

and deputy from Virginia.

New Hampshire.-John Langdon, Nicholas Gil

man.

Massachusetts.-Nathaniel Gorham, Rufus King.
Connecticut.-William Samuel Johnson, Roger

Sherman.

New York.-Alexander Hamilton.

New Jersey.-William Livingston, David Brearly, William Patterson, Jonathan Dayton.

Pennsylvania.-Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Mifflin, Robert Morris, George Clymer, Thomas Fitzsimons, Jared Ingersoll, James Wilson, Gouverneur Morris. Delaware.-George Read, Gunning Bedford, jr., John Dickinson, Richard Bassett, Jacob Broom.

Maryland.-James McHenry, Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, Daniel Carroll.

Virginia.-John Blair, James Madison, jr.

North Carolina.-William Blount, Richard Dobbs Spaight, Hugh Williamson.

South Carolina.-John Rutledge, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, Charles Pinckney, Pierce Butler. Georgia.-William Few, Abraham Baldwin.

Attest:

WILLIAM JACKSON, Secretary.