PART 1.

The chief justice added, that he did "not understand these propositions to be disputed;" and he proceeded at length to deduce from them a conclusion the opposite of that at which a majority of his brethren had arrived. It was perfectly clear, he said, that if the ship had been seized by common law process from a court of the United States for a debt due from the owner, the possession of the marshal under that process would have been superseded by process from the admiralty upon a preferred maritime lien; and the fact that in the case before the court the process was from a common law court of a state, and served by its own officer, could make no difference. A state court has no more right to impede the admiralty in the exercise of its legitimate powers, than a common law court of the United States. The sheriff as the ministerial officer of the court can have no greater power over the vessel than the court whose process he executes. He seizes what the court has a right to seize, and has no possession beyond it. If the interest over which the court has jurisdiction is secondary and subordinate to the interest over which the admiralty has exclusive jurisdiction, his possession is secondary and subordinate in like manner, and subject to the process on the superior and paramount claim. The circumstance that the processes were respectively served by officers of different courts was wholly immaterial. In the case of The Flora (1 Hagg., 298), the vessel had been seized by a sheriff on process from the king's bench. She was afterwards while in possession of the sheriff, arrested on process from the admiralty on a prior maritime lien, and was sold by the marshal while the sheriff still held her any claims upon the ship or other property proceeded against, are permitted, and are by public notice, to be invited, to appear in court, and not only to claim any surplus that may remain after satisfying the maritime lien, but also, if they see fit, to contest its validity.

under the common law process; and the sale was CHAP. 13. held valid by the king's bench.

That court did not seem to have supposed that there was any conflict of jurisdiction in the case, or that its officer had been improperly interfered with by the marshal; nor did the king's bench hold that there was any incongruity in the possession of the sheriff and the marshal at the same time. On the contrary it was conceded that the possession of the sheriff was no obstacle to the arrest by the marshal, nor any impediment to the exercise by the court of admiralty, of its appropriate and exclusive jurisdiction, in enforcing claims prior and superior to that of the attaching creditor. Between that case and the case before the court, the chief justice said he could discern no substantial difference.

Precisely the same question, moreover, he added, had been decided by the circuit court for the district of Massachusetts, twenty years ago, in the case of Certain Logs of Mahogany, Thomas Richardson, Claimant (2 Sumner, 589), and also by the district court for the district of Maine, thirty years ago, in the case of Poland et al. v. The Freight and Cargo of The Spartan, Weare's R., 143.

In both of these cases the question was fully considered by the court; and in both it was held that a previous seizure under process of attachment from a state court could not prevent the admiralty from proceeding in rem, to enforce the preferred liens of which it has exclusive jurisdiction.

After pointing out what he conceived to be the broad and palpable distinctions between the case in judgment and that of Hagan v. Lucas, and a brief notice of some of the deplorable consequences to which the novel principle adopted by the court, if followed out to its legitimate results would inevitably lead,

PART 1. Mr. Chief Justice TANEY concluded his opinion with an instructive and highly significant reference to the protracted and impassioned controversy in England relative to the extent of the admiralty jurisdiction. Commending this remarkable case to the examination and impartial meditations of the reader, I here dismiss it.

PART II.

OF THE PRACTICE OF THE SEVERAL COURTS OF THE UNITED STATES IN THE EXERCISE OF THEIR ORIGINAL AND APPELLATE JURISDICTION, IN CIVIL ACTIONS AT COMMON LAW.

CHAPTER I.

OF THE PRACTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT IN SUITS ORIGINALLY COMMENCED THEREIN.

The original jurisdiction of the supreme court as already shown, is defined in the constitution, and is limited to cases in which a state is a party, and to cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls: and we shall now see, that so far as this branch of its jurisdiction is concerned, congress has done little more than merely to organize the court; having omitted, with the exception of a few very general provisions, to regulate its proceedings.

The authority conferred by the judicial act of 1789, to issue writs, to make all rules necessary for the orderly conducting of business, to administer oaths, to grant new trials, and to punish for contempt, has already been stated in treating of the jurisdiction of this court.

By the same act, the courts of the United States are empowered in certain cases, "to require the parties to produce books or writings in their possession

PART 2.

or power, which contain evidence pertinent to the issue." These provisions are applicable to the supreme court as well as to the circuit and district courts. But their particular consideration will be deferred until the practice of these latter courts comes to be treated of.

By the act of September 29, 1789, passed, it will be remarked, a few days after the judiciary act, entitled "An act to regulate processes in the courts of the United States," it is enacted "that all writs and processes, issuing from the supreme or circuit court, shall bear teste of the chief justice of the supreme court; and if from a district court, shall bear teste of the judge of such court, and shall be under the seal of the court from whence they issue; and signed by the clerk thereof. The seals of the supreme and circuit courts to be provided by the supreme court, and of the district courts, by the respective judges of the same.2

These two acts (excepting one other, fixing the compensation of the judges) are the only laws passed at the first session of congress relating to the judiciary: and the scanty provisions above referred to, are the only ones to be found in them relative to the practice of the supreme court, in the exercise of its original jurisdiction.

Under this state of the law, the court held its first session (at New York, then the seat of government), in February, 1790, where the following RULES (together with two others only, regulating the admission of attorneys and counselors), were "declared and established.”

Ordered, That the seal of the court shall be the arms of the United States, engraved on a piece of 'Act of 24 Sept., 1789, ch. 20, § 15: 1 Stat. at Large, p. 73. 'Ch. 21, § 1: id., p. 93.