National University - Docket Yearbook (Washington, DC)

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administrations of Monroe and John Quincy Adams, but it blazed anew after Andrew Jackson obtained the reins of government. In 1832 , when he was seventy-seven years old, the great Chief Justice handed down his decision in the case of W orcester v. Georgia. Worcester was a missionary who had been imprisoned in Georgia for preaching the gospel among the Cherokee Indians in violation of a State law. Georgia formally denied the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States and refused to appear at the hearing. In his decision Marshall declared the statute under which the missionary had been arrested was unconstitutional and the de- cision of the State court, which had convicted Worcester, was “reversed and annulled.” President Jackson, a strong believer in states rights and in sym- pathy with Georgia, declared, according to tradition, that “John Marshall has made his decision — now let him enforce it.” Of course the Court was powerless without the aid and cooperation of the executive branch of the Federal Government and consequently the mandate was never obeyed by Georgia. Even before his death the Marshall legend was growing so rapidly that many people assumed that he was the first instead of the fourth Chief Justice. He died July 6, 1835, in Philadelphia, full of years and greatness. Two days later the famous Liberty Bell of Revolutionary times was cracked while it was being tolled as the remains of the great Chief Justice were removed from the City of Brotherly Love to Virginia for burial. President Jackson’s choice to succeed Marshall was Roger Brooke Taney, who as Attorney-General had rendered an opinion in favor of the right of the President to remove the deposits from the United States Bank and who as Secretary of the Treasury had actually made the removal. Taney belonged to an old Roman Catholic family in Maryland, and his mother was related to the Thomas Brooke from whom the village of T. B. in Prince Georges County received its name. Broadly speaking, Chief Jus-

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MELVILLE W. FULLER— 1888-1910