Justice Wilson, of Pennsylvania, thought the question involved even
a higher point--do the people of the United States form a nation? Many
commentators on the Constitution before its adoption, including even
Hamilton himself, in commenting on this clause had assured the people
that it was not rational to suppose a sovereign State could be dragged
before the national tribunal. Yet it had been done within three years
after being put in force.
It is indicative of the prevalence of State-sovereignty feeling at the
time to note the general alarm caused by this decision. An eleventh
amendment to the Constitution, forbidding a State to be sued before
the Federal courts by non-residents, immediately passed the Senate by
a vote of twenty-three to two and the House by eighty-one to nine. It
was ratified by every State except New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and
Tennessee. The speed with which this remedy was applied gave confidence
in amendments for the future. But the number of amendments must be
endless if each aggression of the judiciary was to be met in this
manner.
The last toast at the judiciary banquet of 1790 was a wish that the
convention of Rhode Island, called for the early spring, would "soon
introduce the stray sister to her station in the happy national family
of America.
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