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.
294 F. 111 affirmed.
Appeal from a judgment of the district court discharging upon
the merits a writ of habeas corpus issuance of which was procured
by Walter S. Kennedy on behalf of his son, Warren Kennedy and
Sylvester J. Pierce, to
Page 269 U. S. 14
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.
MR. JUSTICE SUTHERLAND delivered the opinion of the Court.
Nathaniel C. Patterson, a duly enrolled Seneca Indian residing
on the Cattaraugus Indian Reservation in the State of New York,
died testate leaving a widow (a white woman), a daughter, and three
sons. The widow was named in the will as sole executrix. The will
was regularly admitted to probate by the surrogate of Erie County,
New York, and letters of administration granted. The widow
thereupon presented her letters of administration together with the
will to the peacemakers' court of the Cattaraugus Reservation,
where the deceased had left real property, asking that the probate
of the will be recognized or the
Page 269 U. S. 15
will itself be admitted there to probate. The peacemakers'
court, holding that the widow and her children were not members of
the Seneca Nation, and therefore, under tribal custom, not entitled
to inherit lands in the reservation, declined to grant either
prayer, but appointed Pierce administrator. Pierce brought an
action in the peacemakers' court to eject the widow from the
property and to set aside the probate of the will by the surrogate
of Erie County. The widow appeared specially and objected to the
jurisdiction of the peacemakers' court. That court overruled the
objection and entered judgment against her for possession of the
property. Upon the application of the widow, the supreme court of
the state issued its final order prohibiting Pierce, administrator,
and the members of the peacemakers' court from taking any further
steps in the matter. In violation of that order, Pierce caused a
mandate of the peacemakers' court to be issued and delivered to
Warren Kennedy, marshal of the reservation, under which the latter
took possession of the property. Thereupon contempt proceedings
were had before the state supreme court, as a result of which
Pierce and Kennedy were adjudged guilty of a contempt of that court
in having willfully disobeyed its prohibition order and sentenced
to pay a fine in the sum of $184.50, with imprisonment as the
alternative. Upon their failure to pay the fine, Pierce and Kennedy
were ordered committed to the Erie County jail, and to that end
were taken into custody by the sheriff of Erie County. A writ of
habeas corpus was immediately sought in the Federal District Court
for the Western District of New York upon the grounds that Pierce
and Kennedy were Seneca Indians and their detention was in
violation of their rights under treaties with the Seneca Nation;
that both the Indians and the lands in question were outside the
sovereignty of the state, and consequently of the jurisdiction of
its courts, and that, by their arrest and detention they were
denied the due
Page 269 U. S. 16
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.
We are asked to enter upon a review of these matters and of the
historical relations of the Indians to the nation and to the State
of New York from a time long anterior to the adoption of the
federal Constitution. The conclusion we have reached makes this
unnecessary. It is enough for present purposes to say that the
State of New York, as early as 1849 at the request of the Indians,
assumed governmental control of them and their property, passed
laws creating and defining the jurisdiction of the
Page 269 U. S. 17
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.
The rule has been firmly established by repeated decisions of
this Court that the power conferred on a federal court to issue a
writ of habeas corpus to inquire into the cause of the detention of
any person asserting that he is being held in custody by the
authority of a state court in violation of the Constitution, laws,
or treaties of the United States is not unqualified, but is to be
exerted in the exercise of a sound discretion. 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.
Ex parte Royall,
117 U. S. 241,
117 U. S.
250-253;
In re Wood, 140 U.
S. 278,
140 U. S. 289;
In re Frederich, 149 U. S. 70,
149 U. S. 77-78;
New
Page 269 U. S. 18
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.
In
New York v. Eno, supra, a federal circuit court had
discharged a prisoner held by virtue of the judgment of a state
court on the ground that the offenses for which he was indicted
were exclusively cognizable under the authority of the United
States. This Court reversed the judgment, holding that the state
court of original jurisdiction was competent to decide the
questions in the first instance and that
"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."
This general rule is emphasized by a consideration of the few
cases where this Court has upheld the allowance of the writ. They
were all cases of exceptional urgency. Such, for example, were
In re Neagle, 135 U. S. 1, where a
deputy marshal of the United States was discharged on habeas corpus
from state custody on a charge of homicide committed in the
performance of his duty to guard and protect a justice of this
Court;
In re Loney, 134 U. S. 372,
where petitioner, charged with perjury in testimony given in a
contested congressional election case, was discharged
Page 269 U. S. 19
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.
The court below should have discharged the writ upon the
foregoing grounds, rather than upon the merits; but, the result
being the same, the judgment is
Affirmed.