reviewed judicially in proceedings in habeas corpus, or whether it is not conclusive, are questions not settled by harmonious judicial decisions, nor by any authoritative judgment of this court. It is conceded that the determination of the fact by the executive of the State in issuing his warrant of arrest, apon a demand made on that ground, whether the writ contains a recital of an express finding to that effect or not, must be regarded as sufficient to justify the removal until the presumption in its favor is overthrown by contrary proof. Ex parte Reggel, 114 U. S. 642."

Replying to the suggestion, in that case, that the fugitive was not within the demanding State subsequent to the finding of the indictment, the court further said: "The appellant in his affidavit does not deny that he was in the State of New York about the date of the day laid in the indictment when the offense is alleged to have been committed, and states, by way of inference only, that he was not in that State on that very day; and the fact that he has not been within the State since the finding of the indictment is irrelevant and immaterial. To be a fugitive from justice, in the sense of the act of Congress regulating the subject under consideration, it is not necessary that the party charged should have left the State in which the crime is alleged to have been committed, after an indictment found, or for the purpose of avoiding a prosecution anticipated or begun, but simply that having within a State committed that which by its laws constitutes a crime, when he is sought to be subjected to its criminal process to answer for his offense, he has left its jurisdiction and is found within the territory of another." To the same effect are Ex parte Brown, 28 Fed. Rep. 653, 655; In re White, 55 Fed. Rep. 54, 57; In re Bloch, 87 Fed. Rep. 981, 983. It is suggested that Roberts v. Reilly was substantially modified in Streep v. United States, 160 U. S. 128, 134, in which the court had occasion to construe sec. 1045 of the Revised Statutes. But this is an error. Interpreting the words "fleeing from justice" as found in that section, the court expressly held that these words must receive

the same construction as was given in Roberts v. Reilly to like words in sec. 5278 of the Revised Statutes, the inquiry in that case being whether the accused was a fugitive from justice.

In support of his contention, the appellant refers to Hyatt v. Corkran, 188 U. S. 691. That was the case of an arrest in New York, under the warrant of the Governor of that State, of an alleged fugitive from the justice of Tennessee, in which State he stood charged by indictment with crime committed in that State. This court said (p. 719) that as the alleged fugitive "showed without contradiction and upon conceded facts that he was not within the State of Tennessee at the times stated in the indictment found in the Tennessee court, nor at any time when the acts were, if ever committed, he was not a fugitive from justice within the meaning of the Federal statute upon that subject, and upon these facts the warrant of the Governor of the State of New York was improperly issued, and the judgment of the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, discharging the relator from imprisonment by reason of such warrant must be affirmed." The present case is a wholly different one; for here the presumption arising from the recitals in the warrant of arrest in favor of its validity was not overthrown by the proof; on the contrary, it appeared, by a preponderance of evidence, that the accused was in the State of New York when the alleged crime was committed.

Similar views to those expressed in Roberts v. Reilly have been expressed by state courts. In Kingsbury's case, 106 Massachusetts, 223, 227, 228, the contention of the fugitive from justice was that, as she went into the demanding State and returned to her home in the other State before the alleged crime was known, she could not be deemed to have fled from justice. But the court said: "The material facts are, that the prisoner is charged with a crime in the manner prescribed, and has gone beyond the jurisdiction of the State, so that there has been no reasonable opportunity to prosecute her after the facts were known. The fact in this case, that she returned to her permanent home, cannot be material. It is sufficient

that the crime of larceny has been properly charged, and that the prisoner is a fugitive, and a requisition has been properly made." In State v. Richter, 37 Minnesota, 436, 438, the contention was that to constitute a fugitive from justice a person must have left the State where the crime was committed for the purpose of escaping the legal consequences of his crime. Referring to Roberts v. Reilly, above cited, as authoritative and binding, and as in accordance with its own views, the Supreme Court of Minnesota well said: "The sole purpose of this statute, and of the constitutional provision which it was designed to carry into effect, was to secure the return of persons who had committed crime within one State, and had left it before answering the demands of justice. The important thing is not their purpose in leaving, but the fact that they had left, and hence were beyond the reach of the process of the State where the crime was committed. Whether the motive for leaving was to escape prosecution or something else, their return to answer the charges against them is equally within the spirit and purpose of the statute; and the simple fact that they are not within the State to answer its criminal process, when required, renders them, in legal intendment, fugitives from justice, regardless of their purpose in leaving." In Voorhees case, 32 N. J. L. 141, 150, the court said: "A person who commits a crime within a State, and withdraws himself from such jurisdiction without waiting to abide the consequences of such act, must be regarded as a fugitive from the justice of the State whose laws he has infringed. Any other construction would not only be inconsistent with good sense, and with the obvious import of the word to be interpreted in the context in which it stands, but would likewise destroy, for most practical purposes, the efficacy of the entire constitutional provision." In Ex parte Swearingen, 13 S. Car. 74, 80, the court held that the terms fugitive from justice "were intended to embrace not only a case where a party after committing a crime actually flees, in the literal sense of that term, from the State where such crime was committed, but also a case where

a citizen of one State, who, within the territorial limits of another State, commits a crime, and then simply returns to his own home. The object of the Constitution was to enable a State whose laws had been violated, to secure the arrest of the person charged with such violation, even though such person might be beyond the reach of the ordinary process of such State." In Mohr's case, 73 Alabama, 503, 512, the court, referring to the words in the Constitution, "who shall flee from justice and be found in another State," said: "There is a difference of opinion as to what must be the exact nature of this flight on the part of the criminal, but the better view, perhaps, is that any person is a fugitive within the purview of the Constitution, 'who goes into a State, commits a crime, and then returns home.' In Hibler v. State, 43 Texas, 197, 201, the court said: "The words 'fugitive from justice,' as used in this connection, must not be understood in a literal sense, but in reference to the subject-matter, considering the general object of the Constitution and laws of the United States in relation thereto. A person who commits a crime in one State for which he is indicted, and departs therefrom and is found in another State, may well be regarded as a fugitive from justice in the sense in which it is here used."

Referring to the opinion in Pettibone v. Nichols, just decided, for a further discussion of the general subject, and perceiving no error in the action of the Circuit Court, its final order is

Affirmed.

203 U.S.

Argument for Plaintiff in Error.

FRANCIS v. FRANCIS.

ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN.

No. 8. Submitted October 10, 1906.-Decided December 3, 1906.

A title in fee may pass to an individual by a treaty without the aid of an act of Congress; and this rule having become a rule of property in the State of Michigan in regard to lands reserved for Indians specified in the Chippewa treaty of 1819, will not be disturbed, it not appearing that the treaty has been misinterpreted.

A patent to an Indian of land reserved to him by a treaty simply locates the land, the title to which passed under the treaty, and in the absence of any provision of the treaty, or any act of Congress, a restriction in the patent against alienation without the consent of the President is ineffectual, the President having no authority by virtue of his office to impose such a restriction.

Title to lands conveyed to an Indian in fee and which the Indian has power to alienate may be acquired by prescription.

136 Michigan, 288, affirmed.

THE facts are stated in the opinion.

Mr. Nathaniel T. Crutchfield, Mr. Thomas E. Webster, Mr. James Vankleeck and Mr. Henry M. Duffield, for plaintiff in

error:

Indians being regarded as the wards of the Government should be dealt with in the utmost good faith as respects their rights under treaties, which should be construed, not according to the technical meaning of the words, but in the sense in which they would naturally be understood by the Indians. Worcester v. Georgia, 6 Pet. 515; The Kansas Indians, 5 Wall. 737, 760; Choctaw Nation v. United States, 119 U. S. 1, 27, 28; Jones v. Meehan, 175 U. S. 10.

The policy of the Government has been to permit only a possessory or beneficial right in the lands occupied by Indians, both nations and individuals, and the power of alienation except with the consent of the Government has been prohibited