Mr. JOHNSON. I am as well satisfied that the Supreme Court are unable now to dispose of the business brought before them as any member of the Senate can be; but I think they will be relieved very much, and perhaps sufficiently relieved, by the bill which is upon your table, if the right of appeal is given in all cases where the amount in controversy is over $5,000. The same section which contains the limit of $10,000 also makes the decision of the court below conclusive upon the facts. I think I am safe in saying that at least 1/2 the cases in the Supreme Court are more or less trouble some because of their obligation to examine into the facts. That is almost solely the case in equity causes. The records are generally very large, the testimony being generally very volumine us, and as the court is obliged, as the law now stands, to examine into the whole record in order to pass judgment upon the facts as well as the law, it takes 11 a great deal of their timc. The same remurt is applicable to cases in admiralty. During the war which has just passed and I believe all the prize causes are now disposed of the principal ditheulty the court ha was, not in the law applicable to cases ofthut description, but in the facts. What was the character of the cargo, what was the purpose of the voyage, whether it was intended to run the blockade or not all of those matters of course were matters in pais, and required the investigation which the court was obliged to give them, and it took up a great deal of their time. This bill and it is not proposed, as I understand, to alter that feature of it in the section under consideration, makes the judgment of the court of appeals conclusive of the facts; and, as I understand it, it is conclusive not only in cases of common law, but in cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, and cases in equity. According to my impression, the effect of that will be to relieve the Supreme Court of at least 1/3rd of the labor to which they are now subjected. If you retain that fea ture of the bill, and make the limit of $10,000 as the limit which is to give a right of appeal, there will be hardly any business in the Su [ preme Court. In nearly all the eastern States, except so far as the cities are concerned and in all the western States, exceptin cases where there are disputes about large tracts of land, the large majority of cases will be found to be under 810.000. If you make $5,000 the limit, you will get clear, as I think, of a majority of the cases that are now brought to the Supreme Court: and if you make the judgment of the court below conclusive upon the facts, you rid the Supreme Court of at least 1/2 of the labor to which it is now subjected; and as it is very desirable, as I think, to give to the citizen a right to come to the Supreme Court in all cases where it can be done consistently with the public good, I should prefer that the limitation should be less than $10,000; if not $5,000, $6,000, or $7.000. There is another practical inconvenience arising from this bill. I shall vote for it because it does relieve the Supreme Court to some extent and will, I think, be productive of public good. It is all important that the law of the U.S. should be uniform in the courts of the U.S. To have one system of laws in one circuit and another system in another circuit is very much to be eprecated. The effect of authorizing an appeal to the SCOTUS is to produce that uniformity; and one of the principal advantages of that tribunal has been not only that it has settled the constitutional questions which from time to time have arisen, but that it has settled the commercial law of the country, and settled the common law of the country as far as questions existing under the common law have cen brought to the SCOTUS But now we are about to constitute ten separate courts of appeal, and they are to have exclusive jurisdiction in all cases under $10,000. I can readily see, such is the pride of opinion, and such is our frailty, if frailty it may be called, that there will be found, in the course of time, as many different systems in these several cir cuits us there are circuits; and the result will be the some uncertainty, the same multiplication of systems that existed before the constitutiOn of the U.S. was established and courts were organized under that Constitution. The effect of an appeal to the SCOTUS in commercia cases where there is no authoritative efficacy in the decision upon the courts of the States, has yet been a very salutary one, because of the character of the tribunal. I do not speak of the tribunal as it exists with a view to disparage it, for certainly l have no such purpose, nor do I think it could be properly disparaged; but looking to the tribunal as it has heretofore existed from the beginning of the Government up to the present time, there has been a general confidence upon the part of the courts of the States and upon the part of the professional men of the several States in the judgments of that tribunal, and the operation of that confidence is that the State courts have conformed their decisions in a great measure to the decisions of the Supreme Court, especially upon all questions of commercial law; and in a country like the U.S., every Senator will at once see that it is exceedingly desirable that there should be that uniformity, Now, the confidence in the Supreme Court under its present organization felt by the State courts will) not be had, we cannot expect it to be entertained toward these circuit courts. There is not a State court, I am sure. in the U.S. that would not say, and perhaps they would be justified in saying. “ We are as capable of judging upon all these questions as the single judge of the circuit court of the U.S and his 3 or 4 district judges.” I do not know what is the case in the other circuits, but speaking general], with the salaries that you now give your district judges, although there are certainly some striking exceptions, it is impossible to get superior men. But. for the honornf the station it would be almost impossible to get superior men upon the bench of the SCOTUS But there is an honor in that station which, in the judgnient of many, and some of the best men that the profession has ever produced, causes them to forget for a time iow inadequately they are compensated, and they leave a practice worth 3 or 4 times as much as the salary that you give, and go upon the bench of the Supreme Court for the honor; and certainly no higher honor can be conferred upon an American citizen. But that is not the ease with the district judges. They are, and they must be as a general thing, in public opiu inn not equal to the State judges; certainly not equal to the judges of the State superior courts; and where that is the case there will not be felt in their decisions the same confidence that is felt in the decisions of the Supreme Court. As I have said, I shall vote for this bill, but with very great doubts whether it will operate beneficially throughout the country. My opinion coincides with that of the honorable Senfrom Massachusetts, and others who concur with him in thinking that the SCOTUS should be relieved alto gether from circuit court duty. I know that there are objections to a measure of that kind. Those objections were stated very forcibly upon several occasions when the proposition was made to relieve them from circuit court duty. It was supposed to be ver important that they should go into the severa circuits and see the people. The reason was as much political as anything else, but it was deemed to be political in an exalted and statesmaulikc sense. It was supposed that the public would be better satisfied with a court, the members of which they were in the habit of seeing from time to time, and that the judes of the court would individually be better a plG to decide the questions that came up from the circuits if they were themselves participators in the judgments in the courts below. 1he act of 1789was prepared, I think, by Mr. Ellsworth. The Senate will see that in the recent writings that we have published of Mr. Madison, he disclaimed being, as was ascribed to him, the author of the act of 1789, and he gave that credit very freely to Mr. Ellsworth. It was deemed by the wise men by whom that act was prepared, so important that these judges should go through the circuits in order that they might themselves know what the local law was from personal observation, and in a measure from personal practice, that the judge whose judgment was brought by a writ of error or appeal to the SCOTUS, was directed to sit in judgment when the case was being heard. The principle, perhaps, as a principle . in its genera up lication was erro neous. but the error of app ying the principle in that case was supposed to be outweighed by the benefit of having the testimony of the judge himself. But now the country has grown to such did mensions, and is growing even with greater rapidity than it has done in the past, that it would seem to be clear that the Supreme Court judges will be unable to perform their circuit duties and at the same time perform the duties which belong to them here. If that is the case, ifihe value of the Supreme Court is to be totally lost unless we give up the benefit to be derived from the judges going on circuit, we must rid them from the obligation to of the circuit and coufine the mtoa pellate jurisdictional together. But I am very clear in the opinion and with that remark I shall close that it would be very unjust to the suitor, and relieve the court more than the necessities of the court demand, if the amount which can be brought up by appeal or writ of error should be placed so high as $10,000. I shall, therefore, vote for the amendment proposed by the Senfrom “ise onsin.