Potential of Judicial Tyranny Exposed

Again we have Yates, a scholarly judge, continuing his discourse regarding Article III of the 1787 Constitution.  He picks up from his last delivering a one, two – three punch to the way the judiciary can become despotic and tyrannize the Citizenry:

  1. How it will tend to extend the legislative authority.
  2. In what manner it will increase the jurisdiction of the courts.
  3. The way in which it will diminish, and destroy, both the legislative and judicial authority of the United States.

Talk about being able to see into the 20th and 21st centuries!  Yates knew that the judiciary would be the undoing of any national government, the states in particular and enslaving the Citizenry in the end.  He states below: “The courts, therefore, will establish this as a principle in expounding the constitution, and will give every part of it such an explanation, as will give latitude to every department under it, to take cognizance of every matter, not only that affects the general and national concerns of the union, but also of such as relate to the administration of private justice, and to regulating the internal and local affairs of the different parts.”
Study this predictive article to see that the Anti-Federalist got it right!
And wait until Brutus XIII is expounded on…… Whoa to us for not heading the warnings of the Anti-Federalist.  We live the horrors they foresaw!
(Emphasis added to capture your thoughts)
Continuing for Liberty,
Tom Niewulis
Brutus XII
7 February 1788
Continue reading

Will the National Judiciary Trump the Other Two Branches?

Brutus predicted the present dysfunctionality of the Supreme Court in this letter. 

In actuality, Brutus is Robert Yates.  Yates was one of the leading Anti-Federalist and in 1790 he was appointed as the Chief Justice of the N.Y. Supreme Court.  “From the beginning of the struggle for independence, although he did not sign the Albany Sons of Liberty constitution of 1766, he was prominent in the local resistance to the Stamp Act. By 1774, he had joined the Albany Committee of Correspondence and stood among its first members when the committee’s activities became public in 1775… In 1775, Yates was elected to represent Albany in each of the four New York Provincial Congresses. … In 1776-77, he served on the committee that drafted the first New York State Constitution and also was a member of the “Secret Committee for Obstructing Navigation of the Hudson.”  In October 1777, Yates was appointed to the New York State Supreme Court.

“Yates was appointed with John Lansing, Jr. and Alexander Hamilton to represent New York at the Philadelphia convention to revise the Articles of Confederation. Arriving in Philadelphia, Yates and Lansing felt the mood of the convention to produce an entirely new form of government was beyond their authority. After sending a letter to Governor Clinton urging opposition to the new Constitution, they returned home. His personal notes from the Philadelphia convention were published in 1821.”[i]

In every sense, understanding the context of Article III would be right up Yates area of expertise.  The key elements that Yates addressed and predicted regarding the federal Supreme Court are:

1.   Extend legislative authority.

2.   Increase jurisdiction of the courts.

3.   Diminish and destroy both the legislative and judiciary powers of the states.

Yates foresaw judicial tyranny and despotism.  He writes below that the system:

1.   “…authorize(s) the courts, not only to carry into execution the powers expressly given, but where these are wanting or ambiguously expressed, to supply what is wanting by their own decisions.”

2.    “…that they will operate to a total subversion of the state judiciaries, if not, to the legislative authority of the states”

3.   “…the courts are to give such meaning to the constitution as comports (def. – behaves) best with the common, and generally received acceptation of the words in which it is expressed, regarding their ordinary and popular use, rather than their grammatical propriety.”

4.   “And in their decisions they will not confine themselves to any fixed or established rules, but will determine, according to what appears to them, the reason and spirit of the constitution. The opinions of the supreme court, whatever they may be, will have the force of law…”

5.   “The judicial power will operate to effect, in the most certain, but yet silent and imperceptible manner, what is evidently the tendency of the constitution: — I mean, an entire subversion of the legislative, executive and judicial powers of the individual states.”

6.   “the same principle will influence them to extend their power, and increase their rights; this of itself will operate strongly upon the courts to give such a meaning to the constitution in all cases where it can possibly be done, as will enlarge the sphere of their own authority…”

7.   “…they will have precedent to plead, to justify them in it. It is well known, that the courts in England, have by their own authority, extended their jurisdiction far beyond the limits set them in their original institution, and by the laws of the land.”

As you can see, Yates has predicted that which we have experienced since the late 19th century and worsened in the 20th century. Judicial tyranny has always been a part and possibility of the Constitution of 1787 and although there were these types of warnings; not a single amendment was accepted at that time to put more restrictions on the judiciary.

(all emphasis added to bring your attention to these factors)

Commentary by: Tom Niewulis

Brutus XI

 

31 January 1788

  Continue reading