74
THE SUPREME COURT
and sacrilege to doubt the constitutional orthodoxy of any decision of theirs, once written on calf skin. But if a Secretary of War can suspend or reverse the decision of the Circuit Judges, why not a drill Sergeant or a black drummer reverse the decision of a jury? Why not abolish at once all our Courts except the Court-martial? and burn all our laws except the Articles of War? … But when those impeachment mongers are asked how any law is to be declared unconstitutional, they tell us that nothing less than a general convention is adequate to pass sentence on it—as if a general convention could be assembled with as much ease as a committee of stock jobbers.
These articles were widely quoted, apparently with approval, by other Anti-Federalist papers.[1] An interesting letter signed "Camden" opposing the action of the Judges and commenting on their "extraordinary conduct" was published in some of the papers:
If the word impeachment has been hackneyed out of Congress, it only indicates the sense of the public on the refusal of public servants to execute duties imposed on them by law; that the word has been hackneyed in Congress is not true; no individuals of that body, it is hoped, are so rash as to have committed themselves on so important a point without much deliberate reflection, and the House went no further than to direct an inquiry into the fact. Although Congress pretend not to infallibility, yet it is not impossible (perhaps even not improbable) that there may be in that body some members as capable of judging what is constitutional or not, as some of the members of the Circuit Court; that there are some as good lawyers, no one will doubt. But while the panegyrist of the Circuit Court refuses to ascribe infallibility to Congress, is he justified in clothing the Circuit Court with that quality? If the cloak of infallibility be torn from the shoulders of Con-
- ↑ National Gazette (Phil.), April 16, 19, 1792; Norwich Packet (Conn.), April 26, May 3, 1792; General Advertiser (Phil.), April 20, 21, 1792; Boston Gazette, April 30, 1792; Salem Gazette, May 1, 1792; some Federalist papers also quoted the National Gazette article, see New York Daily Advertiser, April 21, 25, 1792; Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser, April 20, 1792.
