191-'.] OF THE UNITED STATES. 387 



life. The attorney -general had directed the United States marshal 

 in California to use all possible means to prevent such a catas- 

 trophe. N eagle was appointed deputy marshal and instructed to 

 attend upon Mr. Justice Field and endeavor to protect him from 

 any assault by Terry. While the justice was traveling to attend 

 court, such assault occurred, and Neagle shot and killed Terry. An 

 arrest by the California authorities for murder followed. Neagle 

 applied to the circuit court of the United States for a writ of habeas 

 corpus, under which he was discharged. On appeal to the Supreme 

 Court, that judgment was affirmed. The statute authorizing the 

 granting of such a writ of habeas corpus provided that it should 

 issue when the petitioner was " in custody for an act done or 

 omitted in pursuance of a law of the United States." No statute 

 existed which authorized the duties assumed by Neagle toward Mr. 

 Justice Field. But said the Court : 



" In the view we take of the Constitution of the United States, any obliga- 

 tion fairly and properly inferrible from that instrument, or any duty of the 

 marshal to be derived from the general scope of his duties under the laws 

 of the United States, is ' a law ' within the meaning of this phrase. It would 

 be a great reproach to the system of government of the United States, 

 declared to be within its sphere sovereign and supreme, if there is to be 

 found within the domain of its powers no means of protecting the judges, 

 in the conscientious and faithful discharge of their duties, from the malice 

 and hatred of those upon whom their judgments may operate unfavor- 

 ably. . . . We do not believe that the government of the United States is 

 thus ineiificient, or that its Constitution and laws have left the high officers of 

 the government so defenseless and unprotected.""' 



The Court then point out that by Article II., Section 3, of the Con- 

 stitution, it is provided that the President " shall take care that the 

 laws be faithfully executed " ; and they ask : 



"If an officer of the United States has been arrested on indictment found 

 by a State Court, for riot, assault and battery, and assault with attempt to kill, 

 the indictment now showing that the alleged offenses were committed while 

 the officer was professing to act under a law of the United States, or under 

 some order, process, or decree of some judge or Court thereof, this Court, 

 on a habeas corpus, where the petition of the officer denies the offense, and 

 avers that what is alleged as offense was done in proper execution of an 

 order, process, or decree of a Federal Court, will go outside the indictment, 

 and hear evidence to show the truth of the facts set forth by the officer."*'" 



''' Ibid., p. 59- ''■" Ibid., p. 64. 



