Federal Review, Finalty of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution to a Continuing Problem

BYU Law Review, Dec 1981

By James Duke Cameron, Published on 09/01/81

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Federal Review, Finalty of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution to a Continuing Problem

James Duke Cameron, Federal Review, Finalty of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution to a Continuing Problem Federal Review, Finalty of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution to a Continuing Problem James Duke Cameron 0 0 Thi s Symposium Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Brigham Young University Law Review at BYU Law Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in BYU Law Review by an authorized editor of BYU Law Digital Commons. For more information , please contact - Federal Review, Finality of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution t o a Continuing Problem James Duke Cameron* Under the federal supremacy clause,' not only must state courts apply federal law where appropriate, but they are subject to review by the federal courts when federal law is applied improperly. Although state judges may disagree with particular decisions of the federal courts, state judges should have no quarrel with federal review of state court decisions involving federal questions. If there is to be any semblance of uniformity in the application of federal constitutional provisions by the state courts, it is inevitable, if not desirable, that federal courts, and particularly the United States Supreme Court, have the last word. Unfortunately, because of the manner in which federal review of state court decisions is exercised, state cases involving federal constitutional questions are no longer final, and excessive delay is commonplace, particularly in criminal cases. The resulting confusion and delay in the application of federal law by the state courts have detracted from the prestige of the state courts and eroded the force and effect of state court decisions. Assurning that the achievement of consistency, predictability, and reasonably prompt finality in state court decisions can be compati* Justice, Arizona Supreme Court. A.B., 1950, University of California, Berkeley; J.D., 1954, University of Arizona College of Law. I am indebted to Mack Jones, A.B., 1977, Northwestern University; J.D., 1980, University of Arizona College of Law, for his help and assistance. I wish also to thank Judge Clement Haynsworth of the Third Circuit, Dean Erwin Griswold, and John Frank Esquire for reading the initial draft of this Article and for their kind suggestions. The subject matter of this paper has been discussed previously in the American Bar Association Journal. Cameron, National Court of State Appeals: A View from the States, 65 A.B.A.J. 709 (1979). Special acknowledgment is made to Daniel J. Meador, James Monroe Professor of Law, University of Virginia, for his critical evaluation and helpful suggestions. . 1. U.S. CONST.art. VI, c1. 2. ble with federal review, this Article will discuss a proposed solution which, although designed to benefit the state judicial systems, would also assist the federal judicial system. When we became a nation, routine review by the federal courts of state court decisions was not contemplated, and there is some question whether the framers of the Constitution envisioned the establishment of federal trial courts at all, leaving to the state trial courts the responsibility of deciding federal questions in a trial setting. The Judiciary Act of 1789,' however, created thirteen federal district courts, divided into three c i r c ~ i t s . ~ The resulting system was simple enough: state cases were tried in state courts, and federal cases, what few there were, were tried in federal courts. Our population was agrarian and small, commerce among the new states was limited, and the right to travel was a little-used privilege under our federal Constitution. That the law in one state was different from the law of a sister state was of little concern to the citizens or the courts. Professor Daniel Meador has commented: In the first decade of its existence, the Supreme Court reviewed only seven state court decisions, and for the next several decades it reviewed about an average of one state judgment a year. The state judges, by virtue of the Federal Supremacy Clause, were compelled to apply federal law whenever it came into play, but federal law was so skimpy in the early decades that this posed little or no added burden on the state judges.' This pattern began to change during the Reconstruction period that followed the War Between the States. In 1867 Congress gave federal courts jurisdiction over petitions for writs of habeas corpus filed by state prisoners,' and in 1868 ratification of the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution imposed due process and equal protection upon the states as a matter of federal law. In 1908 the Supreme Court, in Ex parte Y o ~ n gh,e~ld that federal courts could enjoin state officials from conduct that violated the United States Constitution. This gave the federal courts substantial p (...truncated)


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James Duke Cameron. Federal Review, Finalty of State Court Decisions, and a Proposal for a National Court of Appeals-A State Judge's Solution to a Continuing Problem, BYU Law Review, 1981, pp. 545-578, Volume 1981, Issue 3,