the indictment against him. 12 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law, 598; Ex parte Scott, 9 B. & C. 446; State v. Kealy, 89 Iowa, 94; State v. Patterson, 110 Missouri, 505; State v. Smith, 1 Bailey L. (S. Car.) 283.

There is no difference between cases of kidnaping by unauthorized persons and cases wherein the extradition is conducted under the forms of law but through mistake or intentionally the Governor of either the demanding or surrendering State has failed in his duty. The Governor upon whom the demand is made must determine for himself, in the first instance, whether the demanded person is a fugitive from justice. Ex parte Reggel, 114 U. S. 642; Roberts v. Reilley, 116 U. S. 80; People v. Pratt, 78 California, 349; Hyatt v. Corkran, 188 U. S. 691, distinguished.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, after making the foregoing statement, delivered the opinion of the court.

As the application for the writ of habeas corpus was, by stipulation of the parties, taken as the answer of the accused to the return of the officer holding him in custody, and as that answer was stricken out by the court below as immaterial, we must, on this appeal, regard as true all the facts sufficiently alleged in the application which, in a legal sense, bear upon the question whether the detention of the accused by the state authorities was in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States.

That application is too lengthy to be incorporated at large in this opinion. It is sufficient to say that its allegations present the case of a conspiracy between the Governors of Idaho and Colorado, and the respective officers and agents of those States, to have the accused taken from Colorado to Idaho under such circumstances and in such way as would deprive him, while in Colorado, of the privilege of invoking the jurisdiction of the courts there for his protection against wrongful deportation from the State-it being alleged that the Governor

of Idaho, the Prosecuting Attorney of Canyon County, and the private counsel who advised them well knew all the time that "he was not in the State of Idaho on the thirtieth day of December, 1905, nor at any time near that date." The application also alleged that the accused "is not and was not a fugitive from justice; that he was not present in the State of Idaho when the alleged crime was alleged to have been committed, nor for months prior thereto, nor thereafter, until brought into the State as aforesaid."

In the forefront of this case is the fact that the appellant is held in actual custody for trial under an indictment in one of the courts of Idaho for the crime of murder charged to have been committed in that State against its laws, and it is the purpose of the State to try the question of his guilt or innocence of that charge.

Undoubtedly, the Circuit Court had jurisdiction to discharge the appellant from the custody of the state authorities if their exercise of jurisdiction over his person would be in violation of any rights secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States. But that court had a discretion as to the time and mode in which, by the exercise, of such power, it would by its process obstruct or delay a criminal prosecution in the state court. The duty of a Federal court to interfere, on habeas corpus, for the protection of one alleged to be restrained of his liberty in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States, must often be controlled by the special circumstances of the case, and unless in some emergency demanding prompt action the party held in custody by a State and seeking to be enlarged will be left to stand his trial in the state court, which, it will be assumed, will enforce-as it has the power to do equally with a court of the United States; Robb v. Connolly, 111 U. S. 624, 637-any right secured by the Supreme law of the land. "When the state court," this court has said, "shall have finally acted upon the case, the Circuit Court has still a discretion whether, under all the circumstances then existing, the accused, if convicted, shall be

put to his writ of error from the highest court of the State, or whether it will proceed, by writ of habeas corpus, summarily to determine whether the petitioner is restrained of his liberty in violation of the Constitution of the United States." Ex parte Royall, 117 U. S. 241, 251, 253. To the same effect are numerous cases in this court, among which may be named Ex parte Fonda, 117 U. S. 516; New York v. Eno, 155 U. S. 89, 93; Cook v. Hart, 146 U. S. 183, 192; Minnesota v. Brundage, 180 U. S. 499, 501; Reid v. Jones, 187 U. S. 153; Riggins v. United States, 199 U. S. 547, 549. This rule firmly established for the guidance of the courts of the United States is applicable here, although it appears that the Supreme Court of Idaho has already decided some of the questions now raised. But the question of Pettibone's guilt of the crime of having murdered Steunenberg has not, however, been finally determined and cannot be except by a trial under the laws and in the courts of Idaho. If he should be acquitted by the jury, then no question will remain as to a violation of the Constitution and laws of the United States by the methods adopted to secure his personal presence within the State of Idaho.

The appellant, however, contends that the principle settled in Ex parte Royall and other like cases can have application only where the State has legally acquired jurisdiction over the person of the accused, and cannot apply when, as is alleged to be the case here, his presence in Idaho was obtained by fraud and by a violation of rights guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Under such circumstances, it is contended, no jurisdiction could legally attach for the purpose of trying the accused under the indictment for murder.

In support of this view we have been referred to that clause. of the Constitution of the United States providing that if "a person charged in any State with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee from justice and be found in another State, shall, on demand of the executive authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up to be removed to the State having jurisdiction of the crime." Art. 4, §2;

also, to sec. 5278 of the Revised Statutes, in which it is provided that "whenever the executive authority of any State or Territory demands any person as a fugitive from justice, of the executive authority of any State or Territory to which such person has fled, and produces a copy of an indictment found or an affidavit made before a magistrate of any State or Territory, charging the person demanded with having committed treason, felony, or other crime, certified as authentic by the Governor or Chief Magistrate of the State or Territory from whence the person so charged has fled, it shall be the duty of the executive authority of the State or Territory to which such person has fled to cause him to be arrested and secured, and to cause notice of the arrest to be given to the executive authority making such demand, or to the agent of such authority appointed to receive the fugitive, and to cause the fugitive to be delivered to such agent when he shall appear. If no such agent appears within six months from the time of the arrest, the prisoner may be discharged. All costs or expenses incurred in the apprehending, securing, and transmitting such fugitive to the State or Territory making such demand shall be paid by such State or Territory."

Looking, first, at what was alleged to have occurred in the State of Colorado touching the arrest of the petitioner and his deportation from that State, we do not perceive that anything done there, however hastily or inconsiderately done, can be adjudged to be in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States. We pass by, both as immaterial and inappropriate, any consideration of the motives that induced. the action of the Governor of Colorado. This court will not inquire as to the motives which guided the Chief Magistrate of a State when executing the functions of his office. Manifestly, whatever authority may have been conferred upon the Governor of Colorado by the constitution or laws of his State, he was not required, indeed, was not authorized by the Constitution or laws of the United States to have the petitioner arrested, unless within the meaning of such Consti

tution and laws he was a fugitive from the justice of Idaho. Therefore he would not have violated his duty if it had been made a condition of surrendering the petitioner that evidence be furnished that he was a fugitive from justice within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States. Upon the Governor of Colorado rested the responsibility of determining, in some proper mode, what the fact was. But he was not obliged to demand proof of such fact by evidence apart from the requisition papers. As those papers showed that the accused was regularly charged by indictment with the crime of murder committed in Idaho and was a fugitive from its justice, the Governor of Colorado was entitled to accept such papers, coming as they did from the Governor of another State, as prima facie sufficient for a warrant of arrest. His failure to require independent proof of the fact that petitioner was a fugitive from justice cannot be regarded as an infringement of any right of the petitioner under the Constitution or laws. of the United States. Ex parte Reggel, 114 U. S. 642, 652, 653. In Munsey v. Clough, 196 U. S. 364, 372, this court said that the issuing of a warrant of arrest by the Governor of the surrendering State, "with or without a recital therein that the person demanded is a fugitive from justice, must be regarded as sufficient to justify the removal, until the presumption in favor of the legality and regularity of the warrant is overthrown by contrary proof in a legal proceeding to review the action of the Governor. Roberts v. Reilly, supra; Hyatt v. Cockran, 188 U. S. 691." See also In re Keller, 28 Fed. Rep.

681, 686.

But the petitioner contends that his arrest and deportation from Colorado was, by fraud and connivance, so arranged and carried out as to deprive him of an opportunity to prove, before the Governor of that State, that he was not a fugitive from justice, as well as opportunity to appeal to some court in Colorado to prevent his illegal deportation from its territory. If we should assume, upon the present record, that the facts are as alleged, it is not perceived that they make a case of the