Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/269/13/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 16:04:56+00:00

Document:
1. The power of a district court to inquire by habeas corpus into the cause of the detention of a person held in custody by the authority of a state court in alleged violation of the Constitution, laws or treaties of the United States is to be exerted in the exercise of a sound discretion, and the due and orderly administration of justice in a state court is not to be thus interfered with save in rare cases where exceptional circumstances of peculiar urgency are shown to exist. P. 269 U. S. 17.
2. Lack of ability to bear the expense of proceedings for relators' protection in the state courts or to furnish bonds required on appeal does not alter this rule. P. 269 U. S. 19.
3. Persons who were imprisoned by a New York court for contempt in disobeying its order prohibiting further proceedings in the Peacemakers' Court of the Cattaraugus Indian Reservation claimed that the land in question was outside the sovereignty of the state and the jurisdiction of its courts, and that their arrest and detention violated their rights as Seneca Indians, under treaties with the Seneca Nation, and their rights under the federal Constitution. Held, inasmuch as the state courts were proceeding under state laws passed in response to a request of the Seneca Nation and which apparently for the greater part of a century had not been challenged as impeding the authority of the federal government, that it was peculiarly appropriate that the questions raised should be dealt with by those courts in the first instance, subject to review by this Court, and that a writ of habeas corpus, issued by the district court, should have been discharged upon that ground, rather than upon the merits.
test the validity of their arrest and imprisonment for contempt of a prohibitory order of the Supreme Court of New York. The United States and Alice Estella Spring intervened in the district court and joined in the appeal. William F. Waldow, then Sheriff of Erie County, was named defendant; upon the expiration of his term, Frank M. Tyler, his successor, was substituted.
process of law guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. The writ was sued out by the relator Walter S. Kennedy, father of Warren.
The district court exercised its discretion in favor of issuing the writ principally upon the ground that Pierce and Warren Kennedy, being Seneca Indians, were wards of the nation, and entitled to the protection of the federal courts. But, in deciding the case upon the merits, that court pointed out that, as early as 1849, the State of New York, at the earnest request of the Indians themselves, had assumed jurisdiction over them and their lands and possessions within the state; that, to that end, state laws had been enacted for their civil government and the regulation of their internal affairs; that the peacemakers' courts on the several reservations were created by state law, and that the courts of the state had uniformly held that the power of the state in respect of these matters had never been doubted or questioned, and such sovereignty as the Indians may have formerly possessed had been merged and lost in the sovereignty of the state, under which they must look for protection of life and property. In the absence of congressional action, the district court concluded that these state laws and decisions, by long acquiescence on the part of the Indians, had become rules of property within the state, and were controlling. The writ was accordingly dismissed. United States v. Waldow, 294 F. 111.
peacemakers' courts, administered these laws through its courts, and that Congress has never undertaken to interfere with this situation or to assume control. Whether the state judicial power extends to controversies in respect of the succession of Indian lands within the boundaries of the state, whether the peacemakers' court, in the exercise of its jurisdiction, is subject to the authority of the state supreme court, whether the subject matter of these controversies and proceedings was one exclusively within the control of the national government and beyond the authority of the state, are all questions which, under the circumstances recited, it is peculiarly appropriate should in the first instance be left to be dealt with by the courts of the state. Insofar as they involve treaty or constitutional rights, those courts are as competent as the federal courts to decide them. In the regular and ordinary course of procedure, the power of the highest state court in respect of such questions should first be exhausted. When that has been done, the authority of this Court may be invoked to protect a party against any adverse decision involving a denial of a federal right properly asserted by him.
York v. Eno, 155 U. S. 89, 155 U. S. 98; Whitten v. Tomlinson, 160 U. S. 231, 160 U. S. 240-242; Baker v. Grice, 169 U. S. 284, 169 U. S. 290; Tinsley v. Anderson, 171 U. S. 101, 171 U. S. 104-105; Davis v. Burke, 179 U. S. 399, 179 U. S. 401-403; Riggins v. United States, 199 U. S. 547, 199 U. S. 549; Drury v. Lewis, 200 U. S. 1, 200 U. S. 6; Glasgow v. Moyer, 225 U. S. 420, 225 U. S. 428; Johnson v. Hoy, 227 U. S. 245, 227 U. S. 247.
"its obligation to render such decision as will give full effect to the supreme law of the land and protect any right secured by it to the accused is the same that rests upon the courts of the United States. When the claim of the accused of immunity from prosecution in a state court for the offenses charged against him has been passed upon by the highest court of New York in which it can be determined, he may then, if the final judgment of that court be adverse to him, invoke the jurisdiction of this Court for his protection in respect of any federal right distinctly asserted by him, but which may be denied by such judgment."
upon the ground that to permit him to be prosecuted in the state courts would greatly impede and embarrass the administration of justice in a national tribunal, and Wildenhus' Case, 120 U. S. 1, where a member of the crew of a foreign merchant vessel was discharged from the custody of the state because the arrest was contrary to the provisions of an international treaty. Thus, it will be seen, two of these cases involved interferences by the state authorities with the operations of departments of the general government, and the other concerned the delicate relations of that government with a foreign nation.
It is hardly necessary to say that this case presents no such exceptional and imperative circumstances. The state courts proceeded under laws passed in response to the request of the Indian Nation of which contemners are members -- laws which apparently for the greater part of a century had not been seriously challenged as impeding the authority of the federal government. Under these conditions, contemners, deliberately having taken the risk of setting at defiance the judgment of the state court, must look for redress, if they are entitled to any, to the appropriate and authorized appellate remedies. They are not entitled to relief in a federal court by the writ of habeas corpus.
Something is said in the opinion of the court below to the effect that the relators pleaded lack of ability to bear the expense of proceedings for their protection in the state courts or to furnish bonds required on appeal. We are unable to find anything in the record to support this claim, but, even if it were true, it would afford no basis for a different conclusion. Markuson v. Boucher, 175 U. S. 184, 175 U. S. 185-187.

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