Federalist Policy and the Judiciary Act of 1801

Bibliographic Data

ID4222917
AuthorsKathryn Turner (0000-0002-8828-5260, corresponding author)
Year1965
Volume22
Issue1
Pages3
Publication date1965-01-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe William and Mary Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0043-5597 • E-ISSN: 1933-7698
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/1920766
OpenAlexW2313283232
LanguageEN
Citations received7

IN analyses of the Federalist decade, the organization of the government under the Constitution, fiscal and revenue programs, neutrality and foreign affairs, the Alien and Sedition Acts, all receive proper emphasis as identification marks of the Federalist party in power. Only passing reference, if that, is made to the Judiciary Act of i8oi, enacted in the lame duck session of the last Federalist Congress. Indeed, awareness of the Act seems to have been kept alive chiefly because it must be summoned to serve as the cause of its own repeal in March i 802. The creation of sixteen new circuit court judgeships followed by the appointment of Federalist partisans to judicial offices has often been advanced to justify its repeal by outraged Republicans; by inference, the Act itself has come to be regarded as evidence of the political perversity of the Federalists in defeat. However, the timing of the passage of this Judiciary Act easily obscures the timing of its birth, and emphasis on organizational changes and partisan appointments easily obscures the significance of the jurisdictional revisions provided by the legislation.' Only when attention is given to the latter can the Judiciary Act of i8oi be seen as an integral part of Federalist policy; the Act was clearly not occasioned by the Republican victory in i8oo. The question of what authority should be conferred upon the federal courts always represented one important element in the struggle between advocates of centralization and the advocates of state power. The estab

Federalist · Political science · Politics · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Law · Legal and Constitutional Studies · Legal Systems and Judicial Processes

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