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Articles 1531 - 1560 of 1615

Full-Text Articles in Supreme Court of the United States

Note And Comment, Edgar N. Durfee, Cyril E. Bailey, Edwin B. Stason, William C. O'Keefe, Clyde Y. Morris Apr 1922

Note And Comment, Edgar N. Durfee, Cyril E. Bailey, Edwin B. Stason, William C. O'Keefe, Clyde Y. Morris

Michigan Law Review

The Basis of Relief from Penalties and Forfeitures - The equitable principle of relief from penalties and forfeitures is so far elementary as almost to defy analysis. Many, perhaps most, of the judicial explanations of the principle have based it upon interpretation or construction, appealing to the doctrine that equity regards intent rather than form. Yet a logical application of this doctrine would lead to results very different from those which have actually been arrived at in the decisions. Thus, a stipulation in a mortgage that the mortgagor waives his equity of redemption can hardly be interpreted as meaning that …


Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell Mar 1922

Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

Cases Arising under the Constitution or Laws of the United States. The question whether a case presents a "federal question," so called, is raised in a number of the controversies in which the asserted federal question was considered and answered. Only a few of these instances need special mention. In Hartford Life Ins. Co. v. Blincoe,3 after reversal by the Supreme Court of a state judgment against a defendant, a second judgment was rendered by the state court on different grounds. These included holding an assessment on an insurance policy to be void for the inclusion of a state tax …


Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell Feb 1922

Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

While the Constitution does not in terms forbid the United States, as it forbids the states, to pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts, the principle has become established that contracts made by the United States may create rights of which individuals may not be divested. This principle is attached to the Fifth Amendment's prohibition against depriving any person of property without due process of law. In applying this principle, United States v. Northern Pacific Ry. Co.2 held that a grant of land to a railroad to induce its construction is a contract, and that provisions for substituting indemnity …


Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell Jan 1922

Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

The difficulty of classifying cases on the police power has not evaporated since the review of decisions for the preceding year. The headings there suggested are used here. Classification on the basis of the objects of the legislation appears too precarious to be attempted with any confidence. It seems safer to work along the line of the subject matters with which the legislation deals. Certain topics are species of a wider genus, and thus the same case may be put in two or more groups. Readers who are dissatisfied with the classification adopted may be assured of the sympathy of …


Ex Post Facto In The Constitution, Oliver P. Field Jan 1922

Ex Post Facto In The Constitution, Oliver P. Field

Michigan Law Review

Any study of the ex post facto clauses of the Constitution NwYh icshtu ddyid onf ott hceo mexm epnocset fwaicthto ac lcaousnessid eorfa titohne oCfo nCstaitludteiro nv'. Bull2 would not conform to good practice. The text writers and the commentators uniformly begin their treatment of ex post facto laws by citing it as the leading case, and setting forth its doctrine. There is singular agreement as to the correctness of the holding of the case.3 The statement given by Cooley is typical: "At an early day it was settled by authoritative decision, in opposition to what might seem the more …


Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell Dec 1921

Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

In a proceeding brought by the United States to restrain the construction of a dam in a stream alleged to be a "navigable river, or other navigable water of the United States," Economy Light & Power Co. v. United States2 held that "a river having actual navigable capacity in its natural state and capable of carrying commerce among the states is within the power of Congress to preserve for future transportation, even though it be not at present used for such commerce, and be incapable of such use according to present methods, either by reason of changed conditions or because …


Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell Nov 1921

Supreme Court's Construction Of The Federal Constitution In 1920-1921, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

This review of Supreme Court decisions on constitutional law during the October Term of 1920 follows the plan of its predecessors.' Its aim is the modest one of exposing the precise points decided and the precise or unprecise reasons given in support of the results reached. A valiant effort is made to refrain from criticism or from adding anything to the contributions of the judges. In the footnotes are assembled references to discussions of the cases reviewed in the text and of other issues of constitutional law considered in recognized law journals from October, 1920, to October, 1921. No effort …


Note And Comment, Edwin C. Goddard, Edson R. Sunderland, George D. Clapperton, Herman A. August Jun 1921

Note And Comment, Edwin C. Goddard, Edson R. Sunderland, George D. Clapperton, Herman A. August

Michigan Law Review

Public Utility Valuations and Rates - In comparing the reports of the public utility commissions with the decisions of the courts on questions of valuation of public utilities, nothing is more striking than this-that as time goes on the commissions are growingly impatient of the cost of reproduction theory, while the courts still insist there is no inflexible method of fixing value, but continue to prefer largely figures as to supposed reproduction cost. This attitude of the commissions is remarkable in view of the fact that every finding may be carried to the courts for review and possible reversal. The …


Constitutional Decisions By A Bare Majority Of The Court, Robert Eugene Cushman Jun 1921

Constitutional Decisions By A Bare Majority Of The Court, Robert Eugene Cushman

Michigan Law Review

In December, 1823, the legislature of Kentucky, in a blaze of resentment against a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States invalidating a Kentucky statute,' petitioned Congress "so to organize the Supreme Court of the United States that no constitutional question * * * involving the validity of State laws, shall be decided by said Court unless two-thirds of all the members belonging to said court shall concur in such decision." 2 At the same time a United States senator from Kentucky was demanding that Congress- require for such decisions the concurrence of seven judges out of a …


Note And Comment, Henry M. Bates, Lewis H. Mattern, Paul W. Gordon, Jean Paul Thomas May 1921

Note And Comment, Henry M. Bates, Lewis H. Mattern, Paul W. Gordon, Jean Paul Thomas

Michigan Law Review

Freedom of Press and Use of the Mails - Strangely enough, the First Amendment to the Federal Constitution, although it guarantees against federal attack highly important and fundamental rights, has received very little authoritative interpretation by our courts. It remained for the Gr&t War and conditions following in its train to bring before that tribunal almost the first really important controversies relating to freedom of press and of speech. The case of U. S. ex rel. Milwaukee Social Democratic Publishing Company, Plaintiff in Error, v. Postmaster-General Albert S. Burleson, decided March 7, 192i, is the- latest of a series of …


States And Foreign Relations, John M. Matthews May 1921

States And Foreign Relations, John M. Matthews

Michigan Law Review

The conduct of a nation's foreign relations may be affected to a considerable extent by its internal governmental organization. Generally speaking, a more energetic and effective foreign policy is possible for a nation whose government is characterized by unity and coherence. This is true not only with reference to the relations between the -departments of the central government, but also with reference to the relations between the central government and the local or state governments. In countries whose government is based on the federal plan, therefore, an important question to be considered is that as to the extent, if any, …


Recent Important Decisions, Michigan Law Review Apr 1921

Recent Important Decisions, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Adverse Possession - Color of Title - Written Instrument. - Where the defendant under a parol gift of an entire tract of land, but without any "paper" titlq took actual possession of only a part of the tract, but claimed title up to its well-defined boundaries for the statutory period, it was held, in an action by the heirs of the donor, that the defendant had acquired title to the whole tract. Nelson v. Johnson (Ct. of App., Ky., r92o), 226 S. W. 94.


Note And Comment, Horace Lafayette Wilgus, Edson R. Sunderland, Carl G. Brandt, A George Bouchard Apr 1921

Note And Comment, Horace Lafayette Wilgus, Edson R. Sunderland, Carl G. Brandt, A George Bouchard

Michigan Law Review

Boycott - Clayton Act - In Duplex Printing Press Company v. Deering et al. (January 3, 192I) 41 S. Ct. 172, the facts were: The plaintiff, a Michigan corporation, manufactures at Battle Creek, and sells throughout the United States, especially in and around New York City, and abroad, very large, heavy and complicated newspaper printing presses. Purchasers furnish workmen, but ordinary mechanics alone are not competent to do this, and so they are supervised by specially skilled machinists furnished by plaintiffs. The plaintiffs have always operated on the "open shop" plan, without discrimination against union or non-union labor, either at …


Does The Constitution Protect Free Speech, Herbert F. Goodrich Mar 1921

Does The Constitution Protect Free Speech, Herbert F. Goodrich

Michigan Law Review

Many thoughtful men and women, witnessing the suppression of speech, by means both judicial and extra-judicial, in the period through which we have just passed, have reluctantly concluded that our hard won ight of freedom of speech has been lost, swept away in the flood tide of war enthusiasm. They point to the example of the recent candidate for the presidency, Eugene Debs, who is still confined in a federal prison for words he uttered during the war. They call attention to the fact that the fate of Mr. Debs is no worse than that of scores of other persons, …


Constitutional Law In 1919-1920, Iii, Thomas Reed Powell Jan 1921

Constitutional Law In 1919-1920, Iii, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

Five of the corporations which fought in vain against exercises of the police power profited nothing from their grasp at the obligation-of-contracts clause. In Milwaukee Electric Ry. & Light Co. v. Wisconsin2 the contract relied on was a clause in the charter of a street railroad imposing on it the duty to keep the space between and near its tracks in good repair "with the same material as the city shall have last used to pave or repave these spaces and the street previous to such repairs, unless the railway company and the board of public works of said city …


Due Process Of Law In Procedure, Edson R. Sunderland Jan 1921

Due Process Of Law In Procedure, Edson R. Sunderland

Articles

There are two classes of cases which may arise under the "due process" provisions of the 5th and 14th Amendments of the United States Constitution, so far as rules of procedure are concerned. One embraces cases of new remedial processes which may be criticized as too radical. The other consists of cases of old processes which may be criticized as obsolete and out of harmony with prevailing conceptions of justice. Due process may thus be said to fill the wide space between those innovations which carry us so far away from established methods as to remove the safeguards which are …


The Newberry Case, Ralph W. Aigler Jan 1921

The Newberry Case, Ralph W. Aigler

Articles

Senator Newberry of Michigan and sixteen others were convicted in the United States District Court on the charge that they "unlawfully and feloniously did conspire, combine, confederate, and agree together to commit the offense [in the Newberry indictment] on his part of wilfully violating the act of Congress approved June 25, 1910, as amended, by giving, contributing, expending, and using and by causing to be given, contributed, expended and used in procuring his nomination and election at said primary and general elections, a greater sum than the laws of Michigan permitted and above ten thousand dollars," etc. The Act of …


Constitutional Law In 1919-1920 Ii, Thomas Reed Powell Dec 1920

Constitutional Law In 1919-1920 Ii, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

Two important cases sustained objections to applications of the federal income tax. In each there was vigorous dissent. Evans v. Gore2 held that the constitutional provision that the federal judges shall receive "a compensation which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office" applies to diminution by inclusion of that compensation in the assessment of the general federal tax on net income. The case at bar involved a tax on the i918 compensation of a judge appointed in 1899. While not directly qualified by anything in the opinion, the decision would seem to have no application to judges appointed …


Constitutional Law In 1919-1920, Thomas Reed Powell Nov 1920

Constitutional Law In 1919-1920, Thomas Reed Powell

Michigan Law Review

This review aims to include all the decisions on constitutional questions rendered by the Supreme'Court of the United States during the October Term of court which began in October, i919, and ended in June, i92o.1 The treatment for the most part contents itself with exposition. The footnotes give references to articles and editorial notes in recognized law journals commenting on the cases here reviewed and on the more important constitutional decisions of other courts.2 The classification of the cases and the arrangement of topics are not satisfactory, but no alternative seems distinctly superior. A classification on the basis of the …


Verdicts, General And Special, Edson R. Sunderland Jan 1919

Verdicts, General And Special, Edson R. Sunderland

Articles

The most remarkable thing about this case of Georgia v. Brailsford is that a matter of such elementary importance in the daily administration of the law, after being announced in so dramatic a way by the Supreme Court of the United States at the very threshold of its career, could have dropped into oblivion for a hundred years only to be repudiated in a way hardly less dramatic by a sharply divided court. The controversy here disclosed goes to the very heart of the jury system as it has been developed by the common law and is still almost universally …


The 'Source Of Law' In The Panama Canal Zone, Joseph H. Drake Jan 1919

The 'Source Of Law' In The Panama Canal Zone, Joseph H. Drake

Articles

A case just decided in the Supreme Court of the United States, coming to that court from the Canal Zone, shows the great difficulties under which our courts labor when they are called on to interpret and administer the law in our extra-continental possessions. The courts have apparently had the most difficulty in amalgamating the Roman law and the common law in cases involving questions of delictual liability. In the case of Fernandez v. Perez (1906), 202 U. S. 80, the procedural question was presented as to the validity of an action on the case for the wrongful levy of …


Federal Incorporation, Myron W. Watkins Nov 1918

Federal Incorporation, Myron W. Watkins

Michigan Law Review

Since the beginning of our national history the Constitution, which is essentially the source of the law rather than its framework, has with more or less promptitude fulfilled the function of sanctioning new rules of action which will permit a fairly symmetrical institutional development in the face of the changing conditions of the environment in which the people live and think and act. Always the habits of the people are changing, always the situation facts are being modified, and the Constitution in its widest and truest meaning but provides the means whereby thru this flux the body of the people …


Stock Dividends As Income, Robert E. More Jan 1918

Stock Dividends As Income, Robert E. More

Michigan Law Review

In the case of Towne v. Eisner, the United States Supreme Court has recently held that under the Income Tax Law of 1913, the stock dividends received by a shareholder during the year 1914 could not be taxed upon their full par value, where the corporate surplus thus distributed all accrued prior to January I, 1913. The Treasury Department subsequently announced that the decision is not applicable to the Income Tax Law of 1916.1 It is the purpose of this article to review the case of Towvne v. Eisner,2 and then to discuss the soundness of the position taken by …


Public Utility Valuation - Going-Concern Value In Rate Making, Edwin C. Goddard Jan 1918

Public Utility Valuation - Going-Concern Value In Rate Making, Edwin C. Goddard

Articles

What is the effect of a city ordinance which proposes to a public utility company the terms on which it may dispose of its product to the users, but which is rejected by the company? As to a company not yet doing business it is clear that the ordinance when rejected becomes a mere legal nullity. It never was more than an offer that might ripen into a binding contract by acceptance. That it is by no means a nullity as to a utility actually operating in the city after the expiration of its franchise and as a mere tenant …


Power Of The U.S. Supreme Court To Enforce Judgments Against States, Henry M. Bates Jan 1918

Power Of The U.S. Supreme Court To Enforce Judgments Against States, Henry M. Bates

Articles

Four and one-half centuries later the "sovereign state" of Virginia sued the "sovereign state" of West Virginia to recover a sum of money alleged to be due upon the agreement of West Virginia to assume its proportionate share of the debt of the old state of Virginia. The suit was brought in the Supreme Court of the United States, which after prolonged consideration rendered judgment for the plaintiff. No execution or other compulsory process was issued, however. But now after delays for various reasons and pretexts urged by West Virginia the court is compelled to face the problem of what …


The National Army Act And The Administration Of The 'Draft', Henry M. Bates Jan 1918

The National Army Act And The Administration Of The 'Draft', Henry M. Bates

Articles

In Arver v. U. S., and five similar cases attacking the validity of the so-called National Army Act of May 18, 1917, Public Statutes, No. 12, 65th Congress, c. -, - Stat. -. ) the Supreme Court unanimously sustained the validity of the Act so far as attacked. The contention that compulsory military service as provided in the Act is contrary to our fundamental conception of the nature of citizenship, and that such compulsion is repugnant to a free government and in conflict with the guaranties of the Constitution as to individual liberty, the Court disposed of summarily and completely …


Race Segregation Ordinance Invalid, Henry M. Bates Jan 1918

Race Segregation Ordinance Invalid, Henry M. Bates

Articles

The opinion in Buchanan v. Warley reflects the confusion and difficulty of that troublesome problem, the place of the negro race in the United States, with which the case and the segregation ordinance of Louisville discussed therein are essentially concerned. The decision by a unanimous court reverses the holding of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, and declares that the ordinance violates the Fourteenth Amendment. This result is reached by one of those anomalous and objectionable devices which characterize our methods of solving fundamental constitutional questions. The case arose upon a bill for specific performance of a contract, whereby the plaintiff, …


Full Faith And Credit And Jurisdiction, Willard T. Barbour Jan 1918

Full Faith And Credit And Jurisdiction, Willard T. Barbour

Articles

The judgment of a sister state, when assailed by collateral attack, is often said to occupy a position intermediate between foreign and domestic judgments. Though the older American cases were inclined to examine into the merits of any foreign judgment, the present tendency is toward the adoption of the English view according to which a foreign judgment may be attacked collaterally only for want of jurisdiction or fraud. Dicey, Conflict of Laws (ed. 2) Ch. XVII; see note to Tremblay v. Aetna Life Insurance Co., 97 Me. 547, in 94 Am. St. Rep. 521, 538. But whereas any statement of …


Inducing Breach Of Agreement By Employees Not To Join A Labor Union, In Order To Compel Unionization Of Plaintiff's Business, Horace Lafayette Wilgus Jan 1918

Inducing Breach Of Agreement By Employees Not To Join A Labor Union, In Order To Compel Unionization Of Plaintiff's Business, Horace Lafayette Wilgus

Articles

In Hitchnan Coal & Coke Compazy v. John Mitchell, et al., (Dec. 10, 1917), 38 Sup. Ct. 65, the novel question was presented to the Supreme Court of the United States, as to whether or not members of a labor Union could be enjoined from conspiring to persuade, and persuading, without violence or show of violence, plaintiff's employees, not members of the Union,-and who were working for plaintiff not for a specified time, but under an agreement not to continue in plaintiff's employment if they joined the Union, this agreement being fully known to defendants,-secretly to agree to join the …


Insurance Policies As Assets In Bankruptcy, Evans Holbrook Jan 1918

Insurance Policies As Assets In Bankruptcy, Evans Holbrook

Articles

The Supreme Court of the United States, in the recent case of Cohen v. Samuels, 38 Sup. Ct. 36, has put an end to a method, approved by some of the lower Federal Courts, whereby a person could create a fund which would be completely under his control but which would nevertheless be protected against any claim on the part of his trustee in bankruptcy. The circumstances in the principal case were as follows: Samuels had taken out ordinary life insurance policies, with the usual provisions as to loan and surrender values, payable to certain of his relatives as beneficiaries, …