Ex parte Johnson
| Decision Date | 10 May 1897 |
| Docket Number | No. 13,13 |
| Citation | 17 S.Ct. 735,42 L.Ed. 103,167 U.S. 120 |
| Parties | Ex parte JOHNSON |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
This was a petition for a writ of habeas corpus to obtain the release of the petitioner from the custody of the marshal of the Southern district of the Indian Territory who now holds him under sentence of death for the crime of rape.
From the petition, and the return to the rule to show cause, it appears that on July 24, 1896, a warrant was issued by a commissioner for the Southern district of the Indian Territory to arrest Johnson upon the charge of rape, alleged to have been committed upon one Pearl McCormick on the same day; that subsequently, and on the 9th of October, at a regular term of the United States court for that district, he was indicted, and on the 17th of October was arraigned, tried, and convicted by a jury, and is now under sentence of death.
It further appears that on July 25th, the day following the commission of the offense, a warrant issued by a commissioner for the Eastern district of Texas, charging him with the same crime, was placed in the hands of the marshal for that district, who demanded of the marshal of the Southern district of the Indian Territory the surrender of the petitioner, in obedience to said writ, but the same was refused. It does not appear when this demand was made, or whether it was before or after the 1st day of September. It further appeared that, at the time of the commission of the offense, the United States court for the Eastern district of Texas was not in session, and that no term of said court was held until the third Monday of November, after petitioner had been tried, convicted and sentenced to death.
Upon this state of facts, the petitioner claimed that the United States court for the Southern district of the Indian Territory had no jurisdiction of the case; but that under the provisions of an act of congress, cited in the opinion, the court for the Eastern district of Texas retained jurisdiction of all offenses committed within the Southern district of the Indian Territory, where the punishment was death or imprisonment at hard labor, until September 1, 1896, and that the United States court for the Eastern district of Texas had sole and exclusive jurisdiction over his offense.
John J. Weed, for petitioner.
Sol. Gen. Conrad, for respondent.
Mr. Justice BROWN, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.
This case raises the question whether the United States court for the Southern district of the Indian Territory had jurisdiction to try and condemn the petitioner under the circumstances above set forth.
The following statutes are pertinent in this connection: By the fifth section of the act 'to establish a United States court in the Indian Territory,' etc., approved March 1, 1889 (25 Stat. 783), it is enacted 'that the court hereby established shall have exclusive original jurisdiction over all offenses against the laws of the United States, committed within the Indian Territory as in this act defined, not punishable by death or imprisonment at hard labor'; by the seventeenth section, 'that the Chickasaw Nation, and the portion of the Choctaw Nation,' within certain described boundaries (including the locus of this crime), 'and all that portion of the Indian Territory not annexed to the district of Kansas by the act approved January 6, 1883, and not set apart and occupied by the five civilized tribes, shall, from and after the passage of this act, be annexed to and constitute a part of the Eastern judicial district of the state of Texas for judicial purposes.'
The eighteenth section provides that sessions of said court shall be held twice in each year at Paris; 'and the United States courts, herein provided to be held at Paris, shall have exclusive original jurisdiction of all offenses committed against the laws of the United States within the limits of that portion of the Indian Territory attached to the Eastern judicial district of the state of Texas by the provisions of this act, of which jurisdiction is not given by this act to the court herein established in the Indian Territory.'
Taking these sections together, it is clear that jurisdiction was vested in the new court, created by the act, over all minor offenses against the laws of the United States committed within the Indian Territory; but that jurisdiction of all offenses punishable by death or by imprisonment at hard labor was conferred upon the United States court for the Eastern district of Texas over that portion of the Indian Territory described in section 17.
This jurisdiction was expressly continued by section 33 of the act of May 2, 1890 (26 Stat. 81), 'to provide a temporary government for the territory of Oklahoma.'
On March 1, 1895, an act was passed 'to provide for the appointment of additional judges of the United States court in the Indian Territory,' etc. 28 Stat. 693. The ninth section of that act reads as follows:
* * *
'All laws heretofore enacted conferring jurisdiction upon United States courts held in Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas, outside of the limits of the Indian Territory, as defined by law, as to offenses committed in said Indian Territory, as herein provided, are hereby repealed, to take effect on September 1, 1896; and the jurisdiction now conferred by law upon said courts is hereby given from and after the date aforesaid to the United States court in the Indian Territory: provided, that in all criminal cases where said courts outside of the Indian Territory shall have on September 1, 1896, acquired jurisdiction, they shall retain jurisdiction to try and finally dispose of such cases.'
The case evidently turns upon the construction of this last section. This section had three purposes: First, to enable the United States court in the Indian Territory to retain the jurisdiction it then had under the fifth section of the act of March 1, 1889, of all offenses against the laws of the United States, not punishable by death or by imprisonment at hard labor; second, to give it jurisdiction after September 1, 1896, of all offenses whatever, except of such cases as the courts in Texas, Arkansas, and Kansas had acquired jurisdiction before that time; third, to repeal all laws conferring jurisdiction upon these courts after that date, and to vest jurisdiction of the same upon United States courts in the Indian Territory, with a proviso repeating the exception above indicated.
Now, if the United States court for the Eastern district of Texas had 'acquired jurisdiction' of this case, manifestly it was entitled to try the petitioner, but otherwise not. The fact that the crime was committed on the 24th of July had no bearing upon the question, since jurisdiction was vested in the United States court in the Indian Territory, not of crimes or offenses committed after September 1st, but of all offenses in that territory of which the Texas court had not acquired...
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