alter them as they see fit." Accordingly, when the Territory of Michigan was so organized, by the election of such council, Legislature, or General Assembly," they proceeded at once to have a code or digest of the laws reported for the future government of the Territory, and they adopt, reject, alter, and add to, the former laws as they saw fit.' After the promulga tion of their code, that of the Governor and judges is entirely supplanted, and has no longer any force or effect whatever. Those who look for the rule of action which is to govern them, seek it no longer in the code which has been abrogated, and having effected its temporary purpose, has become obsolete and null, but in that which has the sanction of their own Legis lature. The declaration of the legislative will is to be sought from documents originating with them, or published by their sanction. The original documents reported by the judges may be the best evidence of what statutes they in tended temporarily to adopt, and what was their will and intention, but cannot be received as any evidence of the will and intention of a Legislature ordaining a new and permanent system of laws under powers delegated to them by Congress and the people of the Territory. It may well be presumed, that the Legislature had no knowledge of this newly discovered erasure in the original, and supposed interpolation in the printed copy of the laws, reported by the judges in 1820; and that they adopted the law as they found it in the copy-printed by authority, and distributed to the people of the Territory." They certainly had power to do so, and having done so, it would be folly to say that they intended to adopt some other words as the expression of their will, to be found only in a document reposing in the crypts of the secretary's office, and which they had probably never seen. But if we assume that they had seen this document, and were aware of its discrepancy from the published law, then their adoption of the latter would be conclusive. On either hypothesis, this original document can furnish no evidence of the intention or will of the Legislature. It must be remembered that there is no allegation or pretense, that the Acts published by authority of the Legislature differ from the original reported to them and adopted by them. That is the only original, if there be any such in existence, by which the printed copy could be corrected or amended. But to correct or amend the declared will of the Legislature, as published under their authority, by the words of a document which did not emanate from them, which it is most probable they never saw, or if seen, they did not see fit to adopt where it differed from the published statutes, would be, in our opinion, judicial legislation and arbitrary assumption. The only argument which has been urged, which could lead us to doubt the justness of this conclusion, is, that the Supreme Court of Michigan have, it is said, come to a different decision on this question. We entertain the highest respect for that learned court, and in any question affecting the construction of their own laws, where we entertained any doubt, would be glad to be relieved from doubt and responsibility by reposing on their decision. There are, it is true, many dicta to be found in our decisions, averring that the courts of the United States are bound to follow the decisions of the state courts on the construction of their own laws. But although this may be a correct, yet a rather strong expression of a general rule, it cannot be received as the enunciation of a maxim of universal application. Accordingly, our reports furnish many cases of exceptions to it. In all cases where there is a settled construction of the laws of a state, by its highest judicature, established by admitted precedent, it is the practice of the courts of the United States to receive and adopt it with out criticism or further inquiry. But when this court have first decided a question arising under state laws, we do not feel bound to surrender our convictions, on account of a contrary subsequent decision of a state court, as in the case of Rowan v. Runnels, 5 How., 139. When the decisions of the state court are not consistent, we do not feel bound to follow the last, if it is contrary to our own convictionsand much more is this the case, where, after a long course of consistent decisions, some new light suddenly springs up, or an excited public opinion has elicited new doctrines, subversive of former safe precedent. Cases may exist, also, when a cause is got up in a state court for the very purpose of anticipating our decision of a question known to be pending in this court. Nor do we feel bound in any case in which a point is first raised in the courts of the United States, and has been decided in a circuit court, to reverse that decision contrary to our own convictions, in order to conform to a state decision made in the mean time. Such decisions have not the character of established precedent declarative of the settled law of a state. Parties who, by the Constitution and laws of the United States, have a right to have their controversies decided in their tribunals, have a right to demand the unbiased judgment of the court. The theory upon which jurisdiction is conferred on the courts of the United States, in controversies between citizens of different states, has its foundation in the supposition that, possibly, the state tribunal might not be impartial between their own citizens and foreigners. The question presented in the present case is one in which the interests of citizens of other states come directly in conflict with those of the citizens of Michigan. The territoial law in question had been received and acted upon for for thirty years, in the words of the published statute. It had received a settled construction by the courts of the United Sates as well as those of the State. It had entered as an element into the contracts and business of men. On a sudden, a manuscript statute differing from the known public law, is disinterred from the lumber room of obsolete documents; a new law is premulgated by judicial construction, which, by retroaction, destroys vested rights of property of citizens of other states, while it protects the citizens of Michigan from the payment of admitted debts. We think that such a case peculiarly calls upon us not to surrender our clear convictions and unbiased judgment to the authority of the new State decision, and to render a judgment in favor of the plaintiff; which we do by affirming the judgment of the Circuit Court. Dissenting, Mr. Justice Campbell and Mr. | roll, will bar the plaintiff's claim, and that he Justice Daniel. Mr. Justice Campbell, dissenting: The decision of this case depends upon the following facts: The territorial government of Michigan was organized under the Ordinance of 1787, for the government of the Northwest Territory. The Governor and judges of that Ter ritory" were authorized to adopt and publish such of the laws of the States, criminal and civil, as may be necessary and best suited to the circumstances of the Territory, and report them to Congress from time to time; which laws shall remain in force until the organization of the General Assembly therein, unless disapproved by Congress. In 1820, the Statute of Limitations of Vermont was adopted by the council. That Statute contains an exception which reads, " persons imprisoned, or beyond seas, without the United States. The copy filed by the judges, and now found in the archives of Michigan, reads. persons imprisoned or without the United States," the words beyond seas being erased in that copy. It is apparent that the two statutes are to the same effect. is within the exception contained in the printed laws. The question for the court is, what is the evidence on which it should depend to prove the existence of the statute of a state? The Act of Congress of the 26th of May, 1790, to prescribe the mode in which the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings in each state shall be authenticated, so as to take effect in every other state, provides that the Acts of the Legislatures of the several states shall be authenticated by having the seal of their respective states affixed thereto." 66 This court, in The United States v. Amedy, 11 Wheat., 392, said, no other or further formality is required; and the seal itself is supposed to import perfect verity. In Patterson v. Winn, 5 Pet., 233, the court said of the exemplification of a grant, that it is admissible in evidence, as being record proof of as high nature as the original. It is a recognition, in the most solemn form, by the government itself, of the validity of its own grant, under its own seal, and imports absolute verity as matter of record." We have before us an exemplified copy of the Act of Michigan, and from that evidence we learn what is preserved in her archives as the Act adopted by the Governor and judges in 1820, and referred to in the subsequent reports and Acts of her Legislature as "An Act for the limitation of suits on penal statutes, criminal prosecutions, and actions at law, adopted May 15, 1820." The authorities are explicit to the effect that this evidence is the highest that can be offered of a statute. That the seal of the State, when properly affixed, is conclusive evidence of the existence of a statute, is the result of several state authorities. United States v. Johns, 4 Dall., 412; Henthorn v. Day, 1 Blackf., 157; State v. Carr, 5 N. H., 367. The Supreme Court of Michigan have had this subject under consideration, and after repeated arguments and great deliberation, have decided that this printed statute does not form a part of the laws of that State, but that the original roll must be received as the exact record of the legislative will. The question is so entirely of a domestic character, and belongs so particularly to the constituted authorities of the State to determine, that I cannot bring myself to oppose their conclusion on the subject. The copy, as it is now found in the archives of Michigan, was reported to Congress. The printed publication of the laws was as follows: persons imprisoned or beyond seas, or without the United States." This error has been continued through the various publications of the laws of Michigan until the present time. But I have not been able to find that the Statute, as published, has ever received the sanction of the Legislative Department of the govern ment. The Act, in the various reports and references of the Legislature, has been described as an Act of a particular title, or as included in the general term "of laws in force," without identifying it as the Act published in any of the compilations which have been circulated through the State. I have no evidence of any series of decisions of the courts of Michigan in this subject; none was produced on the argument; and the public opinion that may exist in Michigan as to what makes its statute law, must be a most fallible rule of judgment. The statute laws of a state exist in a permanent form, and are unchangeable, except by public authority, and are not to be ascertained from any popular impression on the subject. If any mischief has arisen from the vicious publications, it belongs to the legislative authority of the State to afford the indemnity. It is admitted that the Statute, as contained in the original 228. See 18 How. In my opinion the judgment of the Circuit Court is erroneous, and should be reversed. 2 Abb. U.S., 300; 10 Bank. Reg., 228; 3 Wall., Jr., Cited-19 How., 563, 604; 1 Wall., 393; 11 Otto, 129; 521 END OF VOLUME 59. |