We have stated the case only to the extent necessary to make clear the questions essential to be decided.
The assignments of error in general terms assail the overruling of the demurrer, the striking of matter from the answer, and the final decree. The propositions, however, which are urged at bar to sustain these general assignments, are numerous and we think in some aspects redundant. To consider them in the order in which they are urged would, besides giving rise to repetition, tend to produce confusion. We hence disregard the mere order in which they are stated in the argument, and come to consider the fundamental propositions necessary to be taken into view in order to determine whether the court below was right in holding that the law under which the secretary of state acted, as well as the action of that officer, was void because inconsistent with the judicial power of the United States, reserving until that is done such separate consideration of the propositions relied on as we may deem it necessary to make.
It may not be doubted that the judicial power of the United States as created by the Constitution and provided for by Congress pursuant to its constitutional authority is a power wholly independent of state action, and which therefore the several states may not by any exertion of authority in any form, directly or indirectly, destroy, abridge, limit, or render inefficacious. The doctrine is so elementary as to require no citation of authority to sustain it. Indeed, it stands out so plainly as one of the essential and fundamental conceptions upon which our constitutional system rests, and the lines which define it are so broad and so obvious, that, unlike some of the other powers delegated by the Constitution, where the lines of distinction are less clearly defined, the attempts to transgress or foreget them have been so infrequent transgress or forget them have been so infrequent their statement and application. However, though infrequent, occasions have not ben wanting, especially on the subject of the removal of causes with which we are now dealing, where the general principle has been expounded and applied so as to cause the subject, even from the mere point of view of authority, to be beyond the domain of all possible controversy.
See for general question, Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 52 L. ed. 714, 13 L.R.A.(N.S.) 932, 28 Sup. Ct. Rep. 441, 14 Ann. Cas. 764; Reagan v. Farmers' Loan & T. Co. 154 U.S. 362, 391, 38 L. ed. 1014, 1021, 4 Inters. Com. Rep. 560, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1047; Hess v. Reynolds, 113 U.S. 73, 77, 28 L. ed. 927, 928, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 377; Madisonville Traction Co. v. St. Bernard Min. Co. 196 U.S. 239, 252, 49 L. ed. 462, 467, 25 Sup. Ct. Rep. 251, and on subject of removal, Southern P. Co. v. Denton, 146 U.S. 202, 36 L. ed. 942, 13 Sup. Ct. Rep. 44; St. Louis & S. F. R. Co. v. James, 161 U.S. 545, 40 L. ed. 802, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 621; Southern R. Co. v. Allison, 190 U.S. 326, 47 L. ed. 1078, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 713; Herndon v. Chicago R. I. & P. R. Co. 218 U.S. 135, 54 L. ed. 970, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 633.