grounds as in the case of The Moses Taylor. Mr. Justice Miller, in delivering the opinion of the court, said,

"The record distinctly raises the question, how far the jurisdiction of the District Court in admiralty causes arising on the navigable inland waters of this country is exclusive, and to what extent the State courts can exercise a concurrent jurisdiction. Perhaps all the States, whose territories are penetrated or bounded by rivers capable of floating a steamboat, have statutes authorizing their courts, by proceedings in rem, to enforce contracts, or redress torts, which, if they had the same relation to the sea that they have to the waters of those rivers, would be conceded to be the subjects of admiralty jurisdiction."

The court then expresses entire concurrence in the series of decisions from the case of The Genesee Chief to that of The Moses Taylor, and proceeds,

"The remedy pursued in the Iowa courts is, in no sense, a common law remedy. It is a remedy partaking of all the essential features of an admiralty proceeding in rem. . . . It must be taken, therefore, as the settled law of this court, that wherever the district courts of the United States have original cognizance of admiralty causes by virtue of the Act of 1789, that cognizance is exclusive, and no other court, State or national, can exercise it; with the exception always of such concurrent remedy as is given by the common law."

The case is then remanded to the Supreme Court of Iowa, with directions that it be dismissed for want of jurisdiction. These cases, therefore, decide that State statutes which attempt to confer upon State courts remedies for marine torts and contracts "on the sea, and inland waters connecting with the sea, by proceedings in rem," are void, because they are in conflict with the Act of Congress of 1789.

The importance of these decisions can only be realized when we consider the extent to which the statutes have been administered over the immense commerce of our western rivers.

It is not necessary, and we have not the space, to examine in every class of maritime causes whether the common law remedy saved, can be taken advantage of. It will be readily seen that in nearly all cases of contract and tort connected with navigation, a personal suit at common law will afford a remedy more or less adequate. Thus, material-men and seamen may maintain an action of debt or assumpsit against the owner or master of a vessel;

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or, in case of collision, an action of trespass may be brought against the master. The remedies in admiralty are, however, so much more speedy and equitable, that but little effect is given to this concurrent remedy at common law.

The saving clause of the Act of 1789 includes also the process of foreign attachment, by which property in vessels is seized, and liable to sale without personal notice to the owner, because of non-residence.1

The question next follows, What is the effect of the decisions in the case of The Moses Taylor and of The Hine v. Trevor, on the jurisdiction of admiralty over the lakes and their connecting waters, as conferred by the Act of 1845? This statute, in addition to a saving clause like that of the Act of 1789, gives to suitors any concurrent remedy which may be given by the State courts. In what other respects it acts as a limitation of the powers conferred by the Act of 1789, we have already seen; viz., to vessels of twenty tons employed in commerce between different States.

It will be remembered that there is a clause in the Act of 1789,. in regard to the size of the vessel; but this is not a limitation of jurisdiction. The District Court is declared to have jurisdiction of certain seizures made on waters navigable by vessels of ten tons. "The jury clause in the Act of 1845 was probably added from abundant caution, lest the exclusive terms of the act might be deemed to have taken away the concurrent remedy."2 No reported case is found where the trial by jury has been taken advantage of. In the case of The Hine v. Trevor, Judge Miller says that the jurisdiction over the lakes is not exclusive, but is expressly made concurrent with such remedies as may be given by State laws. He also says, "It could not have been the intention of Congress, by the exception in the Act of 1789, to give the suitor all such remedies as might afterwards be enacted by State statutes, for this would have enabled the States to make the jurisdiction of their courts concurrent in all cases, by simply providing a statutory remedy for all cases.'

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In the Act of 1845, where Congress does mean this, the language expresses it clearly; for, after saving to the parties, in cases arising under that Act, a right of trial by jury, and the right of a

1 The Hine v. Trevor, 4 Wall. 555, 571; Ashbrook v. The Golden Gate, Newb. 296, 800.

2 N. J. S. Nav. Co. v. Merchants' Bank, 6 How. 344.

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concurrent remedy at common law, where it is competent to give it, there is added "any concurrent remedy which may be given by the State laws." In the case of Ashbrook v. The Golden Gate, arising under the Act of 1789, the court, in remarking on certain decisions of the Supreme Court of Ohio, in which the exclusive jurisdiction in rem of the United States courts is denied, says that these opinions do not apply to the case before it, because the cases in which they were given arose and were decided under the Act of 1845," which not only saves the common law remedy, but any concurrent remedy," &c.

We are obliged to conclude, from the wording of the Act of 1845, and from the opinions above, that the jurisdiction of admiralty over the lakes is concurrent with all such remedies as the States may constitute; and that, in cases arising on the lakes, similar to those of The Moses Taylor, and The Hine v. Trevor, the jurisdiction of the State courts would be sustained, and the statutes held constitutional.

There does not seem, however, to be any reason from public policy why the jurisdiction of admiralty on the lakes and their connecting waters should be any less exclusive than on inland waters connected with the sea. The arguments advanced by the court in the case of The Genesee Chief, for the extension of admiralty jurisdiction to the lakes, independent of the Act of 1845, contain equally good reasons why the jurisdiction should be exclusive. The commerce on the great lakes is directly connected with other nations, and these statutes apply to all vessels, whether foreign or domestic; thus the exclusive right of the United States to regulate commerce with other States and nations will be destroyed. If State courts may proceed in rem at common law, they may do so in chancery; and by combining the process in rem with equity, the admiralty jurisdiction of the district courts would be in effect also destroyed. In the case of The Globe, arising under the Act of 1845, Judge Conkling "doubts whether it is competent for a State legislature to interpose by creating new remedies unknown to common law, and calculated to supersede and defeat those provided by the laws of the United States."

By the Act of 1845, admiralty has no jurisdiction over voyages between ports of the same State. This limitation applies as well

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to navigation on tide water; and therefore we have not considered the question directly in connection with the Act of 1845.

Under this statute it has been decided that there is no jurisdiction over contracts of affreightment, in voyages between places in the same State.1

In the case of Maguire v. Card,2 it is held that these decisions are declaratory of the general law, and that by art. 1st, sec. 8th of the Constitution, the internal commerce of a State, whether on the lakes or Atlantic coast, is left entirely to State courts. The same is held in the case of Gibbons v. Ogden.3 This limitation seems to have been confined to maritime contracts. In the case of Allen v. Newberry, the court say, that perhaps it does not extend to cases of general average arising from internal commerce. In the case of The Commerce,5 the court held, that in a case of collision, it was not necessary to show that the vessels were engaged in voyages between different States; and in the case of The New World v. King, a passenger was allowed to maintain a suit for injuries received during a voyage between ports of the same State.

In the case of The Emma Johnson, before Mr. Justice Clifford, of the First Circuit, a suit was maintained on a contract of affreightment in a voyage between places entirely within one State on the Atlantic coast. In the case of The Sarah Jane, before the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, cognizance was taken of a libel for mariners' wages in a similar voyage.

The exclusive control of State courts over internal commerce, is here considered a doubtful question. Judge Lowell, in giving his opinion, says,

"The case of The Genesee Chief, and others, which uphold the admiralty jurisdiction over maritime torts occurring within State boundaries, decide, by a necessary consequence, that a contract of affreightment between the same termini is a maritime contract. And the district courts have uniformly acted on this theory, and have taken jurisdiction of causes of salvage, towage, pilotage, and collision, within the harbors of the several States, as well as upon the high seas. There are strong reasons why the

1 N. J. S. Nav. Co. v. Merchants' Bank, 6 How. 344.

2 21 How. 248.

4 21 How. 244.

71 Cliff. 633.

39 Wheat. 1.

5 1 Black, 574.

8 Am. Law Rev. 455.

6 16 How. 469.

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courts of admiralty should have cognizance of all maritime contracts, and by the Constitution and laws they are granted it, and a contract is not the less maritime in its character because it relates to a navigation wholly within State boundaries."

The same conclusion is reached by the court of one of the Western Districts.1

In the above cases the distinction is taken that the voyage was performed out upon the high seas; and a doubt is raised, if the decision in the case of Maguire v. Card is intended to apply to inland waters generally. The court also say, that if this case turned alone upon the fact that the voyage was between ports of the same State, it must be held to overrule the case of The New World v. King.

A careful and candid examination of the cases referred to, and of that of The Hine, affords no ground, we think, for these opinions, nor for the decisions in which they are expressed. The case of The Emma Johnson is directly in conflict with that of The New Jersey S. N. Co.; the case of Maguire v. Card reaffirms the case of Allen v. Newberry; and in both, the doctrine is explicitly stated, that admiralty has no jurisdiction over matters concerning the purely internal trade of a State; that this restriction was probably suggested by the limitation in the Constitution of the power in Congress to regulate commerce; that there can be no good reason given for extending jurisdiction over this commerce, and that such has been the doctrine from the case of Gibbons v. Ogden downwards.

If this restriction is confined to matters of contract, there can be no conflict in the decisions of the Supreme Court, as claimed in the case of The Sarah Jane.

The case of The New World v. King was a libel for an alleged marine tort, in a voyage from Sacramento to San Francisco, resulting from the bursting of a boiler flue and the escape of steam.

In the case of The Commerce, it is laid down in the strongest terms that the only requisite for admiralty jurisdiction to attach to cases of tort, is, that the locus should be on navigable water, even if within the body of a county.

Is that clause of the Constitution, which leaves internal commerce to State regulation, sufficient to exclude the jurisdiction of

1 Boston Herald, June 1, 1868.