## Facts

- A New Orleans municipal subdivision enacted an ordinance barring corpses from being brought into or exposed in Catholic churches within the municipality and directing funeral rites to occur at a designated obituary chapel.
- The ordinance was amended to remove penalties on lay persons and to impose a $50 fine on any priest officiating at funerals in any church other than the obituary chapel.
- Bernard Permoli, a Roman Catholic priest, officiated over a corpse in St. Augustin church using Catholic funeral prayers and ceremonies.
- The municipality sought to collect the $50 fine against Permoli in local court proceedings.
- Permoli argued the ordinance violated federally protected religious liberty, relying on federal territorial legislation extending protections associated with the 1787 ordinance to the Orleans Territory and on congressional acts related to Louisiana’s admission to the Union.
- The highest state appellate tribunal available affirmed enforcement of the fine, and Permoli sought review in the U.S. Supreme Court by writ of error under §25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789.

## Issues

1. Whether the Supreme Court had appellate jurisdiction under §25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 to review a state-court judgment enforcing a municipal ordinance alleged to impair religious liberty.
2. Whether federal law (the U.S. Constitution or federal territorial/enabling/admission acts) created an enforceable federal right limiting Louisiana’s authority to regulate religious funeral practices after statehood.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court dismissed the writ of error for lack of jurisdiction under §25.
- The Court held that the case did not present a reviewable federal question because the asserted sources of federal protection did not operate as continuing restraints on Louisiana’s internal regulation of religious practices after admission as a state.
- The Court stated that protection of religious liberty against state action was left to state constitutions and laws, not secured by the federal Constitution against the states at that time.

## Legal Principles

- Supreme Court review under §25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 is limited to state-court decisions that deny a federal right or sustain a state measure against a federal constitutional, statutory, or treaty challenge; absent such a federal right, the Court lacks jurisdiction.
- The federal Constitution’s guarantees of religious liberty were not, at that time, understood to constrain state governments; religious-liberty protections against state action depended on state constitutional and statutory law.
- Federal territorial governance measures extending rights during territorial status generally ceased to have independent force upon statehood unless incorporated into the state’s constitution or otherwise made continuing federal obligations.
- Conditions in enabling and admission legislation were treated as satisfied upon admission “on an equal footing” with existing states, except for expressly continuing federal interests (such as federal property rights and specified navigation rights).

## Conclusion

The Supreme Court dismissed for want of §25 appellate jurisdiction because no continuing federal right constrained Louisiana’s post-statehood regulation of religious funeral practices, leaving the municipal judgment and ordinance undisturbed and placing any remedy within state constitutional and legal processes.


Permoli v. Municipality No. 1 of the City of New Orleans, 44 U.S. 589 (1845)