n Georgia _v._
Tennessee Copper Co.,[503] not to be confined to those which are
proprietary but to "embrace the so-called 'quasi-sovereign' interests
which * * * are 'independent of and behind the titles of its citizens,
in all the earth and air within its domain.'"[504]

GEORGIA _v._ PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD

In the course of his opinion Justice Douglas, speaking for a narrowly
divided Court, treated the alleged injury to Georgia as a proprietor as
a "makeweight," and remarked that the "original jurisdiction of this
Court is one of the mighty instruments which the framers of the
Constitution provided so that adequate machinery might be available for
the peaceful settlement of disputes between States and between a State
and citizens of another State * * * Trade barriers, recriminations,
intense commercial rivalries had plagued the colonies. The traditional
methods available to a sovereign for the settlement of such disputes
were diplomacy and war. Suit in this Court was provided as an
alternative."[505] Discriminatory freight rates, said he, may cause a
blight no less serious than noxious gases in that they may arrest the
development of a State and put it at a competitive disadvantage.
"Georgia as a representative of the public is complaining of a wrong
which, if proven, limits the opportunities of her people, shackles her
industries, retards her development, and relegates her to an inferior
economic position among her sister States. These are matters of grave
public concern in which Georgia has an interest apart from that of
particular individuals who may be affected. Georgia's interest is not
remote; it is immediate. If we denied Georgia as _parens patriae_ the
right to invoke the original jurisdiction of the Court in a matter of
that gravity, we would whittle the concept of justiciability down to the
stature of minor or conventional controversies. There is no warrant for
such a restriction."[506]

Controversies Between Citizens of Different States

THE MEANING OF "STATE"; HEPBURN _v._ ELLZEY

Despite stringent definitions of the words "citizen" and "State" and
strict statutory safeguards against abuse of the jurisdiction arising
out of it, the diversity of citizenship clause is one of the more
prolific sources of federal jurisdiction. In Hepburn _v._ Ellzey,[507]
Chief Justice Marshall, speaking for the Court, confined the meaning of
the word "State," as used in the Constitution, to "the members of the
Ameri