32 F. 309 | U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York | 1887
I am constrained, by the weight of authority, to decline to entertain this proceeding by mandamus. A long line of decisions of the supreme court has affirmed the broad doctrine that the circuit court has no jurisdiction to issue a writ of mandamus as an original proceeding, hut only as ancillary to some other proceeding or right of which it has iurisdietion.
Without considering, therefore, in what cases, or to what extent, a review of the decision of the postmaster or of the assistant postmaster general, as respects the determination of a question of fact upon which the rating of postal matter depends, is either reviewable at all, or under a proceeding by mandamus, (see Carrick v. Lamar, 116 U. S. 423, 6 Sup. Ct. Rep. 424,) I must dismiss the application upon the ground first stated.