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[705 nolu chan] But seriously, he makes no legal argument. He could have had his case heard in court. He did everything possible to prevent that from happening.

[709 Walt] Such as?

MY POST NUMBER 663

During the ACW, Congress curtailed the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court in order to prevent them from passing on the constitutionality of the legislation. 327 U.S. 304 324, quoted below.

http://laws.findlaw.com/us/327/304.html

U.S. Supreme Court
DUNCAN v. KAHANAMOKU
327 U.S. 304 (1946)

Argued Dec. 7, 1945.
Decided Feb. 25, 1946.

327 US 304 324

Congress prior to the time of the enactment of the Organic Act had only once authorized the supplanting of the courts by military tribunals. Legislation to that effect was enacted immediately after the South's unsuccessful attempt to secede from the Union. Insofar as that legislation applied to the Southern States after the war was at an end it was challenged by a series of Presidential vetoes as vigorous as any in the country's history. [21]

And in order to prevent this Court from passing on the constitutionality of this legislation Congress found it necessary to curtail our appellate jurisdiction. [22]

[Footnote 21] In one of these vetoes President Johnson said: 'The trials having their origin under this bill are to take place without the intervention of a jury and without any fixed rules of law or evidence. The rules on which offenses are to be 'heard and determined' by the numerous agents are such rules and regulations as the President, through the War Department, shall prescribe. No previous presentment is required nor any indictment charging the commission of a crime against the laws; but the trial must proceed on charges and specifications. The punishment will be, not what the law declares, but such as a court-martial may think proper; and from these arbitrary tribunals there lies no appeal, no writ of error to any of the courts in which the Constitution of the United States vests exclusively the judicial power of the country.' Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Richardson, Vol. VI, 399. In another he said: 'It is plain that the authority here given to the military officer amounts to absolute despotism. But to make it still more unendurable, the bill provides that it may be delegated to as many subordinates as he chooses to appoint, for it declares that he shall 'punish or cause to be punished.' Such a power has not been wielded by any monarch in England for more than five hundred years. ... This broad principle limits all our functions and applies to all subjects. It protects not only the citizens of States which are within the Union, but it shields every human being who comes or is brought under our jurisdiction. We have no right to do in one place more than in another that which the Constitution says we shall not do at all.' Id., pp. 502, 503.

[Footnote 22] In re McCardle, 6 Wall. 318. See also Warren, The Supreme Court in United States History, Vol. 2, 464, 484.