128 F. 826 | 8th Cir. | 1904
Nathan Levin was indicted, tried, convicted, and sentenced to imprisonment for the term of five years by the United "States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, for aiding, abetting, counseling, advising, and procuring aliens who were not entitled to naturalization to obtain certificates of citizenship from the St. Louis Court of Appeals by means of fraud and false statements, in violation of sections 5425 and 5427 of the Revised Statutes [U. S. Comp. St. 1901, pp. 3669, 3670]. He challenges the judgment against him upon the ground that these acts constituted no offense, because the St. Louis Court of Appeals had no jurisdiction to naturalize qualified aliens.
By section 2165 of the Revised Statutes [U. S. Comp. St. rpoT, p. [329], “a court of record of any of the states having common law jurisdiction and a seal and clerk” is expressly authorized by the Congress to naturalize qualified aliens, and to issue to them certificates of citizenship. The Constitution of the United States provides that the Congress shall have power "to establish a uniform rule of naturalization * ⅜ ⅜ to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for canying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States or in any department or officer thereof” (article 1, § 8), and that “this Constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof ⅜ ⅜ shall be the supreme law of the land and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby anything, in the Constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding” (article 6). The constitutional grant of power to do an act or to attain an end is an implied grant of plenary authority to select and use the appropriate means to accomplish the purpose contemplated. McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 413, 422, 4 L. Ed. 579; Prigg v. Pennsylvania, 16 Pet. 536, 618, 619, 10 L. Ed. 1060. A thoughtful reading of diese clatises of the Constitution, iu the light of the familiar canon of construction to which reference has been made, suggests no lack of authority in the legislative department of the nation to grant, or in the courts of the states to accept and to exercise, the power to naturalize aliens bestowed upon them by tlie act of Congress.
Counsel for the plaintiff in error, however, contends with much cogency and ingenuity that a court of a state has no jurisdiction to admit aliens to citizenship (1) because Congress had no- power under the Constitution to grant this authority to such a court; and (2) because, if it had that power, a court of common-law jurisdiction created by a state has no authority to accept or to exercise this power in -the absence of legislative permission so to do from the state which established it. His argument in support of his first position runs in this
These propositions and arguments of the counsel for the plaintiff in error are plausible and cogent. They might well have challenged debate — possibly they might have changed the course of legislation and of action — if they had been presented to the Supreme Court 100 years ago. 'At this late day, however, after the courts of the states have for more than a century, with the uniform acquiescence and consent of all the departments of the national government and of the state governments, • exercised this authority to naturalize aliens granted to them by the acts of Congress, there is one answer which is equally fatal to both the propositions which counsel for the plaintiff in error here pre
Nor are the conclusions which contemporaneous construction, tinie, and practice have adopted without cogent reasons to support them. While it is true that Mr. Justice Story, speaking for the Supreme Court, declared in 1816, in Martin v. Hunter’s Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 328-333, 4 L. Ed. 97, that the Congress could not vest any portion of the judicial power of the nation in courts which it did not itself ordain and .establish, and this statement has since been repeated, the fact is that he was then thinking and speaking of the judicial power granted by section 1, and defined by section 2, of article 3 of the Constitution. The better opinion now is that the judicial power granted by the former
Nor does the contention that the courts of the state of Missouri having common-law jurisdiction are without authority to accept or to exercise the judicial power to naturalize aliens conferred upon them by Congress, because the state which established them has never hy any legislative action empowered or permitted them to do so, commend itself to our judgment. The suggestion is noted that the Legislature of a state might prohibit its courts from exercising the power to naturalize aliens, and that this prohibition would be fatal’ to the devolution-of the congressional authority. No such inhibition, however, has been imposed upon the courts of Missouri, and it is unnecessary and would he injudicious to consider and determine in this case what the effect of such legislation might be. That question is not here for consideration. The state of Missouri was admitted to' the Union and became a part of this nation in the year 1820. More than 30 years before its admission the Constitution of the United States had empowered Congress to- establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and to make all laws necessary to carry that authority into execution. In the exercise of this power, Congress had enacted laws which conferred upon certain courts of the states and territories .the judicial power to issue certificates of citizenship to qualified aliens. The Constitution provided that “this Constitution and flic laws which shall be made in pursuance thereof * ⅜ ⅜ shall be the supreme law of the land and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution and laws of the state to the contrary notwithstanding.” When the United States offered admission to the Union to the people of Missouri, it made this offer subject to the patent condition that the Constitution of the United States, and the laws that had been made and should be made by Congress in accordance with its provisions, should become the supreme law of the new state, .binding alike upon all its inhabitants, whether laymen or lawyers, citizens or judges. The people of Missouri accepted this offer and its condition, and became a part of the nation. Thereupon the Constitution of the United States, and the laws
Finally it is insisted that section 2x65 of the Revised Statutes did not confer jurisdiction upon the St. Rouis Court of Appeals, because it is a court of appellate, and not of original, jurisdiction, and because it is not a court having common-law jurisdiction. The act of Congress does not limit its grant to courts of original jurisdiction, but extends it to all courts of r-ecord which have common-law jurisdiction, seals, and clerks. As Congress did not except appellate courts from the beneficiaries of this grant, it is neither the province nor the duty of the courts to do so. The remaining question is, has the St. Rouis Court of Appeals common-law jurisdiction? Courts having common-law jurisdiction, within the meaning of this section, are those which have the power to punish offenses, to enforce rights, or to redress wrongs recognized by the common law, or which, in the determination of the causes which they decide, are governed by the principles, rules, and usages of that law. The term “having common-law jurisdiction” is used to distinguish these courts from those which have no jurisdiction save in equity, in admiralty, or in matters not involving offenses or rights under the common law. U. S. v. Lehman (D. C.) 39 Fed. 49, 50; Parsons v. Bedford, 3 Pet. 446, 447, 7 L. Ed. 732; In the Matter of Martin Conner, 39 Cal. 98, 101, 2 Am. Rep. 427; People ex rel. v. McGowan, 77 Ill. 644, 20 Am. Rep. 254. Courts which have some common-law jurisdiction are courts having common-law jurisdiction, and it is not indispensable to the qualification of a court under this act of Congress' that it should have all the common-law jurisdiction, or even that it should have general common-law jurisdiction. Ex parte Tweedy, 22 Fed. 84; In the Matter of Martin Conner, 39 Cal. 98, 101,