hybrid appellate courts In Pennsylvania, where William Hayburn tried to have his claim adjudicated, the federal circuit court composed of Justices James Wilson and John Blair, and United States District Judge Richard Peters would not hear his petition.23 The reasons for refusing to proceed were announced from the bench, but it is not known whether one, two, or three opinions were given, for the only extant evidence of that court session is Representative Elias Boudinot’s report to the House of Representatives in which he referred only to “the Court.” Boudinot stated that the judges believed the act unconstitutional because (1) it imposed a duty on the court, examining invalids, that was not typically judicial, and (2) it subjected the court’s decisions to revision by the executive and the legislature, an authority not given to those branches under the Constitution.24 In the course of the discussion that occurred after Boudinot spoke, another congressman noted that the judges of the circuit court for the New York district had agreed to perform the task imposed on them but on different grounds. These judges, Chief Justice John Jay, Justice William Cushing, and U. S. District Judge James Duane, reasoned that, in order to find the act constitutional (the plain meaning of the words of the act clearly being unconstitutional), it should be read as giving the pension duties to commissioners, who had been designated by their “official, instead of personal descriptions.” The judges, therefore, were the commissioners identified by the act, and, as such, they consented to discharge their duties under it.25 As the judges explained, “That as the objects of this act are exceedingly benevolent, and do real Honor to the humanity and justice of Congress, and as the Judges desire tomanifest on 23 Ruling of the United States Circuit Court for the District of Pennsylvania, April 11, 1792, in Marcus, Maeva 1998 p. 46. 24 Proceedings of the United States House of Representatives, April 13, 1792, in ibid., pp. 48-49. The Pennsylvania judges later explained their position at length in a letter to President Washington. James Wilson, John Blair, and Richard Peters to George Washington, April 18, 1792, in ibid., pp. 53-55. The letter is also printed as an unnumbered footnote toHayburn’s Case, U. S. Reports (2 Dallas), vol. 2, p. 411. 25 Proceedings of the United States House of Representatives, April 13, 1792, in Marcus, Maeva 1998 p. 49. The judges in New York recorded their views in the minutes of the court; see Extract from theMinutes of the United States Circuit Court for the District of New York, April 5, 1792, in ibid., pp. 370-72. This extract is also printed as an unnumbered footnote toHayburn’s Case, U.S. Reports (2 Dallas), vol. 2, p. 410. 202
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