the injury
to the bunting, the linen, or silk on which the stars and
stripes are stamped which startles and arouses the country.
It is the indignity and insult to the emblem of the nation's
majesty which stirs every heart, and makes every patriot
eager to resent them. So, the forcible resistance to an
officer of the United States in the execution of the process,
orders, and judgments of their courts is in like manner an
indignity and insult to the power and authority of the
Government which can neither be overlooked nor extenuated."

After reviewing Terry's statement, Justice Field said:

"We have read this petition with great surprise at its
omissions and misstatements. As to what occurred under our
immediate observation, its statements do not accord with the
facts as we saw them; as to what occurred at the further end
of the room and in the corridor, its statements are directly
opposed to the concurring accounts of the officers of the
court and parties present, whose position was such as to
preclude error in their observations. According to the sworn
statement of the marshal, which accords with our own
observations, so far from having struck or assaulted Terry, he
had not even laid his hands upon him when the violent blow in
the face was received. And it is clearly beyond controversy
that Terry never voluntarily surrendered his bowie-knife, and
that it was wrenched from him only after a violent struggle.

"We can only account for his misstatement of facts as they
were seen by several witnesses, by supposing that he was in
such a rage at the time that he lost command of himself, and
does not well remember what he then did, or what he then said.
Some judgment as to the weight this statement should receive,
independently of the incontrovertible facts at variance with
it, may be formed from his speaking of the deadly bowie-knife
he drew as 'a small sheath-knife,' and of the shameless
language and conduct of his wife as 'her acts of
indiscretion.'

"No one can believe that he thrust his hand under his vest
where his bowie-knife was carried without intending to draw
it. To believe that he placed his right hand there for any
other purpose--such as to rest it after the violent fatigue of
the blow in the marshal's face or to smooth down his ruffled
linen--would be ch