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REPORT

Of the Committee of the Law Association of Philadelphia, appointed December 5, 1882, " To consider the subject of the Delays to Suitors in the Supreme Court of the United States, and the various plans for the Relief of that Court which have been suggested."

To the Law Association of Philadelphia:

Your committee, after many meetings and much discussion, have decided to suggest certain legislation, in support of which they beg leave to offer the following reasons:

Under existing law, every case decided by the Circuit or District Court of the United States, in which the amount involved, exclusive of costs, equals or exceeds the sum of $5,000, may be taken to the Supreme Court; and patent and copyright cases, cases upon the construction of the civil rights bills, and cases in which the judges of the lower courts will certify that they differ in opinion, and that the point involved is of sufficient importance to require the decision of the Supreme Court, may be taken up irrespective of the amount involved; to this court are also brought all appeals and writs of error from the decisions of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, in cases where the amoun involved is $1,000, those from the supreme courts of the territories where the amount involved is $1,000 or more, except Washington Territory, where the limit is $2,000, and all appeals from the Court of Claims; in addition to these cases are the appeals from the supreme courts of all the states, irrespective of amount, in certain cases involving the con

struction of the Constitution, or a law or treaty of the United States; besides all this there is an occasional exercise of original jurisdiction.

It should also be observed that in all cases between $500 and $5,000 the decisions of the circuit courts are final.

The mischief resulting from this state of the law is twofold.

1. The Supreme Court has on its calendar at the beginning of each session not less than twelve hundred cases, out of which it can annually hear and decide not more, on an average, than three hundred and sixty; so that since the cases take their position on the calendar in the order in which they go up, every case has about twelve hundred cases ahead of it; and, with an average of three hundred and sixty removed annually, more than three years must elapse before it can be reached for argument. The result is to the suitors, in many cases, a practical denial of justice, and to the country frequently a continually annoying uncertainty and consequent increase of litigation on many points of United States constitutional or statutory law.

2. The second evil resulting from the present state of the law is the inability on the part of suitors in the district and circuit courts, whose cases are under $5,000, to obtain any real review of the decision of the judge who tries or hears the cause. The trial in the district court is held by the district judge; and if appealable to the circuit court, is nearly always heard before the same judge sitting with the circuit judge, whose opinion is prone to coincide with that of his brother judge, and the latter rarely has the counteracting influence of the opinion of the circuit justice to sustain him in reversing; while in the review of the circuit court decisions, the circuit and district judges sitting together are still less likely to overturn each other's rulings.

To meet these existing evils, two bills or sets of bills were presented for our consideration. We will briefly state what we believe to be the merits and defects of each of the schemes, and show how we have endeavored to combine the merits while omitting the defects of both.

The Davis bill proposes in brief:

1. The appointment of two additional circuit judges in each of the nine judicial circuits.

2. The three circuit judges, with the associate justice of the Supreme Court, allotted to a given circuit, and two of the district judges to be designated by the order of the court at each term, shall constitute a court of appeals for each circuit. This court shall have appellate jurisdiction from the circuit and district courts within the circuit :

(a) Whenever an appeal or writ of error now lies from a final judgment or decree of said courts.

(b) Whenever the amount claimed, or value of the property in controversy exceeds $500.

(c) Whenever a circuit or district judge shall certify that the action involves a question of general importance.

(d) Whenever, within thirty days, an appeal is taken from an interlocutory decree of the circuit or district court, granting or refusing an injunction, provided an appeal would lie on final decree.

(e) Whenever, within ninety days of the judgment, a writ of error is allowed by a judge of the court of appeals in any criminal case.

The decision of this court of appeals will be final on all questions of fact, and on questions of law, except:

1. Where the value or sum of $10,000 is in controversy.

2. Where a question upon the construction of the Constitution, a law of the United States, or the validity of a treaty is involved.

3. Where the court certifies that the case involves a legal question of sufficient importance to require the final decision of the Supreme Court. In the two last-mentioned cases, the specific question only shall be certified to, and finally decided by the Supreme Court; and

4. In patent and copyright cases without regard to amount; Provided, That the court shall certify that the question is of sufficient importance to require the decision of the Supreme Court, which may then review both the law and facts.

This bill unquestionably possesses certain decided merits. First. By the high limit of appeal it effectually cuts off from the Supreme Court a very large proportion of the cases which now reach it, and so relieves it of possibly as much as two-thirds of all its labor.

Second. It provides a competent review, not only for those cases which now reach the Supreme Court, and are thus cut off, but for all of those civil cases between $500 and $5,000, and for criminal cases which have now no competent review, and this within easy reach of every suitor.

Third. It secures a review of the judgments of the courts of appeals in all cases over $10,000, and cases involving the construction of the Constitution, or the construction or validity of a treaty or a law of the United States, and all other cases irrespective of amount, provided the court shall certify their importance; and

Fourth. It is a scheme which, as regards the courts of appeal, admits of indefinite expansion, should it in the future be found necessary.

The defects of the scheme, however, are in our opinion serious.

First. It divides the country into sections, co-terminous with the boundaries of the circuits, and thus creates sources of local influence which are neither the separate states nor the general government, the only two bases of political division recognized in our Constitution and laws.

Second. It creates nine courts, each of which is for the majority of cases before it a final court of appeal, but without the dignity of such a court, and liable, especially in the common law cases, to be affected by local prejudice or influThe chances for possible increase of litigation, with such conflicting decisions, are obvious.

ence.

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