Since 1792 the federal courts have emphasized finality of judgment as an
essential attribute of judicial _power_. In Hayburn's Case[15] a motion
for mandamus was filed in the Supreme Court to direct the Circuit Court
for the District of Pennsylvania to act upon a petition for a pension
under the pensions act which placed the administration of pensions in
the judges of the federal courts, but which made the action of the
courts on application subject to review by Congress and the Secretary of
War. The Court took the case under advisement, but Congress changed the
law by the act of February 28, 1793, before decision was rendered. In
view of the attitude of the circuit courts of the United States for the
districts of New York, North Carolina and Pennsylvania there can be no
doubt what the decision would have been. The judges of the circuit
courts in each of these districts refused to administer the pensions,
because the revisory powers of Congress and the Secretary of War were
regarded as making the administration of the law nonjudicial in nature.
At the time of this episode, Chief Justice Jay and Justice Cushing were
members of the Circuit Court in the New York district, Justices Wilson
and Blair in Pennsylvania and Justice Iredell in North Carolina.

The Taney Doctrine

On these foundations Chief Justice Taney posthumously erected finality
into a judicial absolute.[16] The original act creating the Court of
Claims provided for an analogous procedure with appeals to the Supreme
Court after which judgments in favor of claimants were to be referred to
the Secretary of the Treasury for payments out of the general
appropriation for the payment of private claims. However, section 14 of
the act provided that no money should be paid out of the Treasury for
any claims "till after an appropriation therefor shall be estimated by
the Secretary of the Treasury." In Gordon _v._ United States,[17] the
Court refused to hear an appeal, probably for the reasons given in Chief
Justice Taney's opinion which he did not deliver because of his death
before the Court reconvened but which was published many year later.[18]
In any event the reiteration of Taney's opinion in subsequent cases made
much of it good law. Because the judgment of the Court of Claims and the
Supreme Court depended for execution upon future action of the Secretary
of the Treasury and of Congress, the Chief Justice regarded it as
nothing more than a certificate of op