IN RE   }
MCARDLE.}      PROTEST OF MR. JUSTICE GEIER.

This case was fully argued in the beginning of this month.  It is a case that involves the liberty and rights not only of the appellant, but of millions of our fellow-citizens.  The country and the parties had a right to expect that it would receive the immediate and solemn attention of this Court.  By the postponement of the case we shall subject ourselves, whether justly or unjustly, to the imputation that we have evaded the performance of a duty imposed on us by the Constitution, and waited for legislation to interpose to supersede our action and relieve us from our responsibility.  I am not willing to be a partaker either of the eulogy or opprobrium that may follow;

    and can only say: 

    “Pudet haec opprobria nobis,
    Et dici potuisse; et non potuisse repelli."[4]

    R.C.  GRIER.

    I am of the same opinion with my brother Grier, and unite in
    his protest.

    FIELD, J.

After the passage of the repealing act, the case was continued; and at the ensuing term the appeal was dismissed for want of jurisdiction.—­(7 Wall., 506.)

The record had been filed early in the term, and, as the case involved the liberty of the citizen, it was advanced on the calendar on motion of the appellant.  From that time until its final disposition the Judges were subjected to close observation, and most of them to unfriendly comment.  Their every action and word were watched and canvassed as though national interests depended upon them.  I was myself the subject of a most extraordinary exhibition of feeling on the part of members of the lower house of Congress, the immediate cause of which was a circumstance calculated to provoke merriment.  Towards the close of January, 1868, I was invited to a dinner given by Mr. Samuel Ward to the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. McCullough.  It was understood that the dinner was to be one of unusual excellence, and that gentlemen of distinction in Congress would be present.  As some of the invited guests desired to go to New York on the same evening, the hour was fixed at five.  A distinguished party assembled at that time at the rooms of Welcker, a noted restaurateur in Washington.  Our host, Mr. Ward, was a character deserving of special notice.  He had been a member of the noted firm of bankers, Prime, Ward & King, of New York; and afterwards represented our government in Brazil.  He was an accomplished linguist, familiar with several languages, ancient and modern.  He was a profound mathematician, and had read, without the assistance of Bowditch’s translation, Laplace’s celebrated work, the “Mecanique Celeste.”  He passed most of his time during the sessions of Congress in Washington, looking after the interests of bankers and others in New York, as they might be affected by pending legislation.  Though called “King of the Lobby,” he had little of the character of the lobbyist.  He was