z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-08.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 636
636 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
establishment of a Federal Court in India, there are three questions with which we are mainly concerned. The first question is the jurisdiction of the Federal Court; the second, the enforcement of the judgments and decisions of the Federal Court; and the third, the organisation of the Federal Court. I propose to offer a few remarks on each of these heads, and the first head that I propose to take for consideration is the jurisdiction of the Federal Court.
It is an accepted proposition that one of the functions of the Federal Court is to interpret the Federal Constitution. The distinguishing feature of a Federal Government, as contrasted with a unitary system of government, is that there is, in a Federal Government, a division of functions which constitutes the essence of Federation. There are two spheres, one allotted legally to the Federal Government and another allotted to the State or the Provincial Government; and the important thing in a Federation is to see that the one does not interfere in the sphere of the other. In order to see that there is, of course, the evident necessity of a Federal Judicature which will keep the two governments restricted to the spheres allotted to them. That is one purpose for which a Federal Court is necessary. But it seems to me that there is also a second purpose which a Federal Court of Judicature must perform. The Federal Court of Judicature is also what may be called a Court of international justice. One of the objects which has led many national governments to form a Federation is to see that disputes between different governments and different units which before the formation of the Federation, used to be decided by diplomacy, or by war, failing diplomacy, should be decided by judicial decisions of a Federal Court, to which they are all subjects. That is the view taken by the Supreme Court of the United States of America itself; and, with your permission, I would just like to read a small paragraph from one of the judgments of the Supreme Court of the United States of America reported in Louisiana v. Texas, 176, U.S.
Chairman : What is the date of that ?
Dr. Ambedkar: 1900. This is what Mr. Justice Brown said regarding the function of the Supreme Court :
“In view of the solicitude which, from time immemorial States have manifested for the interests of their own citizens ; of the fact that wars are frequently waged by Stales in vindication of individual rights, of which the last War of Independence, the Opium War of 1840 between Great Britain and China, and the war which is now being carried on in South Africa between Great Britain and the Transval Republic, are notable examples ; of the further fact that treaties are entered into for the protection of individual rights, and that international tribunals are constantly being established for the settlement of rights of private parties—it would seem a strange anomaly if a State of this Union, which is prohibited by the Constitution from levying war upon another State, would not invoke the authority of this Court to raise an embargo which had been established by another State against its citizens and their