equity was instituted by a land company against the
State of Virginia.[1] These suits aroused great alarm,
particularly among those who had opposed the adoption of the Constitution and who still feared lest the independence of the State Governments should be lost in the
increasing growth and consolidation of the powers of the Federal Government in all its branches. A Committee FA of the Legislature of Virginia, in June, 1792, protested
(Cont) against the illegality of the suit against that State,
saying that "the jurisdiction of the Court does not and
cannot extend to this case. . . and that the State cannot
be made a defendant in the said Court at the suit of any
individual or individuals", and it resolved "that the
Executive be requested to pursue such measures as may
seem most conducive to the interest, honor and dignity
of the Commonwealth."[2] How extravagant were the apprehensions of the result of the maintenance of such
suits, a letter from Philadelphia appearing in many newspapers of the day well illustrates: The writ
was served upon the Governor (of Maryland), the Supreme Executive of the State and upon the Attorney
General. Two months were given for the State to plead. Should this action be maintained, one great
National question will be settled that is, that the
- ↑ The case was Indiana Company v. Virginia, not reported in Dallas Reports but commented on in Patrick Henry (1909), by William Wirt Henry, II, 462, 538; George Mason, Life, Correspondence and Speeches (1912), by Kate Mason Rowland, II, 842-845. See also letter from William R. Davie of North Carolina to Judge Iredell, June 12, 1798: "In your letter of 14th of February, you mention a bill in equity being filed by the Indiana Company to recover damages, etc. This is surely of the first impression and has excited my curiosity very much. Pray what rules are you guided by in the Supreme Court; for this is not the first novelty your practice there has produced."
- ↑ See Observations upon the Government of the United States of America (1791), by James Sullivan, Attorney-General of the State of Massachusetts and a reply thereto, An Enquiry into the Constitutional Authority of the Supreme Federal Court over the Several States in Their Political Character (1792), by a Citizen of South Carolina (David Ramsay); Dunlap's American Daily Advertiser, Feb. 8, 1792; Gazette of the United States, Feb. 20, 1790, Feb. 4, 1792; Connecticut Courant, March 7, 1791; New York Journal, March 24, 1791; Federal Gazette, Feb. 25, 1790.
