Ex parte McCardle
United States of America Supreme Court
April 12, 1869
Source: Findlaw.com
U.S. Supreme Court
EX PARTE MCCARDLE, 74 U.S. 506 (1868)
74 U.S. 506 (Wall.)
EX PARTE MCCARDLE.
December Term, 1868
[74 U.S. 506, 507] APPEAL from the Circuit Court for the Southern District of
Mississippi.
The case was this:
The Constitution of the United States ordains as follows:
‘ 1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such
inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish.’
‘ 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law or equity arising under this
Constitution, the laws of the United States,’ &c.
And in these last cases the Constitution ordains that,
‘The Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such
exceptions, and under such regulations, as the Congress shall make.’
With these constitutional provisions in existence, Congress, on the 5th February,
1867, by ‘An act to amend an act to establish the judicial courts of the United States,
approved September 24, 1789,’ provided that the several courts of the United States, and
the several justices and judges of such courts, within their respective jurisdiction, in
addition to the authority already conferred by law, should have power to grant writs of
habeas corpus in all cases where any person may be restrained of his or her liberty in
violation of the Constitution, or of any treaty or law of the United States. And that, from
the final decision of any judge, justice, or court inferior to the Circuit Court, appeal might
be taken to the Circuit Court of the United States for the district in which the cause was
heard, and from the judgment of the said Circuit Court to the Supreme Court of the
United States.
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Ex parte McCardle
April 15, 1969
This statute being in force, one McCardle, alleging unlawful restraint by military
force, preferred a petition in the court below, for the writ