the original or appellate character of the jurisdiction is designated in the Constitution, are matters of legislative direction. Some cases there are, it is true, in which, from their nature, the judicial power of the United States, when invoked, is exclusive of all State authority. Such are cases in which the United States are parties, cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, and cases for the enforcement of rights of inventors and authors under the laws of Congress. The Moses Taylor, 4 Wall. 429; Railway Co. v. Whitton, 13 id. 288. But, in cases where the judicial power of the United States can be applied only because they involve controversies between citizens of different States, it rests entirely with Congress to determine at what time the power may be invoked, and upon what conditions, whether originally in the Federal court, or after suit brought in the State court; and, in the latter case, at what stage of the proceedings, whether before issue or trial by removal to a Federal court, or after judgment upon appeal or writ of error. The Judiciary Act of 1789, in the distribution of jurisdiction to the Federal courts, proceeded upon this theory. It declared that the circuit courts should have original cognizance, concurrent with the courts of the several States, of all suits of a civil nature, at common law or in equity, involving a specified sum or value, where the suits were between citizens of the State in which they were brought and citizens of other States; and it provided that suits of that character by citizens of the State in which they were brought might be transferred, upon application of the defendants, made at the time of entering their appearance, if accompanied with sufficient security for subsequent proceedings in the Federal court. The validity of this legislation is not open to serious question, and the provisions adopted have been recognized and followed with scarcely an exception by the Federal and State courts since the establishment of the government. But the limitation of the original jurisdiction of the Federal court, and of the right of removal from a State court, to a class of cases between citizens of different States involving a designated amount, and brought by or against resident citizens of the State, was only a matter of legislative discretion. The Constitution imposes no limitation upon the class of cases involving controversies between citizens of different States, to which the judicial power of the United States may be extended; and Congress may, therefore, lawfully provide for bringing, at the option of either of the parties, all such controversies within the jurisdiction of the Federal judiciary. As we have had occasion to observe in previous cases, the provision of the Constitution, extending the judicial power of the United States to controversies between citizens of different States, had its existence in the impression that State attachments and State prejudices might affect injuriously the regular administration of justice in the State courts. It was originally supposed that adequate protection against such influences was secured by allowing to the plaintiff an election. of courts before suit; and, when the suit was brought in a State court, a like election to the defendant afterwards. Railway Co. v. Whitton, 13 Wall. 289. But the experience of parties immediately after the late war, which powerfully excited the people of different States, and in many instances engendered bitter enmities, satisfied Congress that further legislation was required fully to protect litigants against influences of that character. It therefore provided, by the act of March 2, 1867 (14 Stat. 558), greater facilities for the removal of cases involving controversies between citizens of different States from a State court to a Federal court, when it appeared that such influences existed. That act declared, that where a suit was then pending, or should afterwards be brought in any State court, in which there was a controversy between a citizen of the State in which the suit was brought and a citizen of another State, and the matter in dispute exceeded the sum of $500, exclusive of costs, such citizen of another State, whether plaintiff or defendant, upon making and filing in the State court an affidavit that he had reason to believe, and did believe, that from prejudice or local influence he would not be able to obtain justice in the State court, might, at any time before final hearing or trial of the suit, obtain a removal of the case into the Circuit Court of the United States, upon petition for that purpose, and the production of sufficient security for subsequent proceedings in the Federal court. This act covered every possible case involving controversies between citizens of the State where the suit was brought and citizens of other States, if the matter in dispute, exclusive of costs, exceeded the sum of $500. It mattered not whether the suit was brought in a State court of limited or general jurisdiction. The only test was, did it involve a controversy between citizens of the State and citizens of other States? and did the matter in dispute exceed a specified amount? And a controversy was involved in the sense of the statute whenever any property or claim of the parties, capable of pecuniary estimation, was the subject of the litigation, and was presented by the pleadings for judicial determination. With these provisions in force, we are clearly of opinion that the State court of Louisiana erred in refusing to transfer the case to the Circuit Court of the United States upon the application of the plaintiff in error. If the Federal court had, by no previous act, jurisdiction to pass upon and determine the controversy existing between the parties in the parish court of Orleans, it was invested with the necessary jurisdiction by this act itself so soon as the case was transferred. In authorizing and requiring the transfer of cases involving particular controversies from a State court to a Federal court, the statute thereby clothed the latter court with all the authority essential for the complete adjudication of the controversies, even though it should be admitted that that court could not have taken original cognizance of the cases. The language used in Smith v. Rines, cited from the 2d of Sumner's Reports, in support of the position that such cases are only liable to removal from the State to the Circuit Court as might have been brought before the Circuit Court by original process, applied only to the law as it then stood. No case could then be transferred from a State court to a Federal court, on account of the citizenship of the parties, which could not originally have been brought in the Circuit Court. But the admission supposed is not required in this case. The suit in the parish court is not a proceeding to establish a will, but to annul it as a muniment of title, and to limit the operation of the decree admitting it to probate. It is, in all essential particulars, a suit for equitable relief, to cancel an instrument alleged to be void, and and to restrain the enforcement of a decree alleged to have been obtained upon false and insufficient testimony. There are no separate equity courts in Louisiana, and suits for special relief of the nature here sought are not there designated suits in equity. But they are none the less essentially such suits; and if by the law obtaining in the State, customary or statutory, they can be maintained in a State court, whatever designation that court may bear, we think they may be maintained by original process in a Federal court, where the parties are, on the one side, citizens of Louisiana, and, on the other, citizens of other States. There are, it is true, in several decisions of this court, expressions of opinion that the Federal courts have no probate jurisdiction, referring particularly to the establishment of wills; and such is undoubtedly the case under the existing legislation of Congress. The reason lies in the nature of the proceeding to probate a will as one in rem, which does not necessarily involve any controversy between parties indeed, in the majority of instances, no such controversy exists. In its initiation all persons are cited to appear, whether of the State where the will is offered, or of other States. From its nature, and from the want of parties, or the fact that all the world are parties, the proceeding is not within the designation of cases at law or in equity between parties of different States, of which the Federal courts have concurrent jurisdiction with the State courts under the Judiciary Act; but whenever a controversy in a suit between such parties arises respecting the validity or construction of a will, or the enforcement of å decree admitting it to probate, there is no more reason why the Federal courts should not take jurisdiction of the case than there is that they should not take jurisdiction of any other controversy between the parties. But, as already observed, it is sufficient for the disposition of this case that the statute of 1867, in authorizing a transfer of the cause to the Federal court, does, in our judgment, by that fact, invest that court with all needed jurisdiction to adjudicate finally and settle the controversy involved. It follows from the views thus expressed that the judgment of the Supreme Court of Louisiana must be reversed, with directions to reverse the judgment of the parish court of Orleans, and to direct a transfer of the cause from that court to the Circuit Court of the United States, pursuant to the application of the appellant; and it is so ordered.1 TENNESSEE v. DAVIS. 100 United States, 257. 1879. BARRON v. BURNSIDE. 121 United States, 186. 1887. [PLAINTIFF in error was arrested in Iowa in a proceeding before a justice of the peace for knowingly transacting a portion of the business of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway Company within the State of Iowa when the company had no valid permit to do business in the State of Iowa, as required by chapter 76 of the laws of the 21st General Assembly, approved April 6, 1866. This statute required each foreign corporation desiring to transact business within the State to file with the Secretary of State a copy of its articles of incorporation and receive a permit from such officer for the general transaction of the business of the corporation, provided a penalty for any officer or agent of any foreign corporation when it had no such 1 MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY delivered a dissenting opinion, in which MR. JUSTICE SWAYNE Concurred. In UPSHUR COUNTY v. RICH, 135 U. S. 467 (1890), the question was whether an appeal from an assessment of taxes to a county court which was, by the State law, charged with administrative and not judicial functions in such matters, was a suit which could be removed to the Federal courts. MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY, delivering the opinion of the court, after citing the above case and others, used this language:· "The principle to be deduced from these cases is, that a proceeding, not in a court of justice, but carried on by executive officers in the exercise of their proper fuirctions, as in the valuation of property for the just distribution of taxes or assessments, is purely administrative in its character, and cannot, in any just sense, be called a 'suit';[ and that an appeal in such a case, to a board of assessors or commissioners having no judicial powers, and only authorized to determine questions of quantity, proportion, and value, is not a suit; but that such an appeal may become a suit, if made to a court or tribunal having power to determine questions of law and fact, either with or without a jury, and there are parties litigant to contest the case on the one side and on the other." permit, and further provided that any foreign corporation which should remove any cause brought against it in any court of the State to any Federal court on the ground that such company was a non-resident of the State, or a resident of any other State than that of the adverse party, should thereupon forfeit, and render null and void, any permit issued to such corporation to do business in the State. It was charged that the railway company had no permit, and that it had neglected and refused to file a copy of its articles and to apply for a permit; and that Barron, well knowing that the company had no permit, did act as locomotive engineer for the transaction of the business of the company within the State. After his arrest Barron applied to the Supreme Court of the State for a writ of habeas corpus to release him from confinement by Burnside as sheriff in pursuance of said arrest, and asked that the statute above referred to be held void as an attempt to interfere with the jurisdiction of the Federal courts. The State Supreme Court sustained the validity of the statute. Barron then sued out a writ of error from this court.] MR. JUSTICE BLATCHFORD delivered the opinion of the court. It is apparent that the entire purpose of this statute is to deprive the foreign corporation . . . of the right conferred upon it by the Constitution and laws of the United States, to remove a suit from the State court into the Federal court, either on the ground of diversity of citizenship or of local prejudice. The statute is not separable into parts. An affirmative provision requiring the filing by a foreign corporation, with the Secretary of State, of a copy of its articles of incorporation, and of an authority for the service of process upon a designated officer or agent in the State, might not be an unreasonable or objectionable requirement, if standing alone; but the manner in which, in this statute, the provisions on those subjects are coupled with the application for the permit, and with the stipulation referred to, shows that the real and only object of the statute, and its substantial provision, is the requirement of the stipulation not to remove the suit into the Federal court. In view of these considerations, the case falls directly within the decision of this court in Home Insurance Co. v. Morse, 20 Wall. 445. In that case, which was twice argued here, a statute of Wisconsin provided that it should not be lawful for any foreign fire insurance company to transact any business in Wisconsin unless it should first appoint an attorney in that State, on whom process could be served, by filing a written instrument to that effect, containing an agreement that the company would not remove a suit for trial into the Federal court. The Home Insurance Company, a New York corporation, filed the appointment of an agent containing the following clause: "And said company agrees that suits commenced in the State courts of Wisconsin shall not be removed by the acts of said company into the United States Circuit or Federal courts." A loss having occurred |