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386 state versus federal authority Chisholm v. Georgia james wilson 1793 U.S. Constitution, Eleventh Amendment 1787 In 1792, the executors of the estate of Alexander Chisholm, a citizen of South Carolina, sued the state of Georgia for failing to pay debts owed to Chisholm. Georgia refused to appear in court, claiming that, as a sovereign state, it could not be sued without its own consent. The Supreme Court held for Chisholm on the ground that the Constitution’s Article 3, section 2, clearly said that states could be sued by citizens of other states. But the issues raised by Chisholm go beyond the language of the Constitution to the nature of the union. The federal government did not see itself as liable to being sued by just anyone at his own pleasure. It regulated when, how, and for what reasons it could be sued. In so doing, it followed the practice in Great Britain, where the king could be “sued” only in special courts that heard pleas as a favor or special grant. States extended federal practice in regard to suits from their own citizens. In his opinion in Chisholm, Justice Wilson emphasized the sovereignty, not of any government, but of the people. According to Wilson, the real power in any free, republican government rested with the people themselves. And this included the right to give whatever powers they liked to whatever branch or level of government they saw fit. According to Wilson, it was selfevident that the people had not given states the power to refuse to be sued. When the Chisholm Court came to the conclusion that the states were less than sovereign parts of a sovereign union, the result was swift action in Congress and by the States—passing and ratifying the Eleventh Amendment in less than a year. This amendment revoked that constitutional language, reestablishing , for a time, the sovereignty of the states. Chisholm v. Georgia (2 US 419) Wilson, Justice.1 This is a case of uncommon magnitude. One of the parties to it is a State; certainly respectable, claiming to be sovereign. The question to be determined is, whether this State, so respectable, and whose claim soars so high, is amenable to the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of theUnited States? This question, important in itself, will depend on others, more important still; and may, perhaps, be ultimately resolved into one, no less radical than this— “do the people of the United States form a Nation?” A cause so conspicuous and interesting, should be carefully and accurately viewed from every possible point of sight. I shall examine it; 1st. By the principles of general jurisprudence. 2d. By the laws and practice of particular States and Kingdoms. From the law of nations little or no illustration of this subject can be expected. By that law the several States and Governments spread over our globe, are considered as forming a society, not a nation. It has only been by a very few comprehensive minds, such as those of Elizabeth and the Fourth Henry, that this last great idea has been even contemplated. 3dly. and chiefly, I shall examine the important question before us, by the Constitution of the United States, and the legitimate result of that valuable instrument. I. I am, first, to examine this question by the principles of general jurisprudence. What I shall say upon this head, I introduce by the observation of an original and profound writer, who, in the philosophy ofmind, and all the sciences attendant on this prime one, has formed an aera not less 1. Justice Iredell issued what is now generally termed the opinion of the Court; Justice Wilson’s more famous opinion was written separately but in concurrence with Iredell’s.—B. F. Chisholm v. Georgia 387 remarkable, and far more illustrious, than that formed by the justly celebrated Bacon, in another science, not prosecuted with less ability, but less dignified as to its object; I mean the philosophy of matter. Dr. Reid, in his excellent enquiry into the human mind, on the principles of common sense, speaking of the sceptical and illiberal philosophy , which under bold, but false, pretentions to liberality, prevailed in many parts of Europe before he wrote, makes the following judicious remark: “The language of philosophers , with regard to the original faculties of the mind, is so adapted to the prevailing system, that it cannot fit any other; like a coat that fits the man for whom it was made, and...

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