rom being wantonly or maliciously interfered with, hindered
or obstructed in the lawful exercises of their official
duties, not arbitrarily of course, but through its regularly
constituted agencies, and according to the established
principles of law; and where such obstruction consists in the
forcible restraint of the officer's liberty, I see no reason
why the federal judiciary should not inquire into it on
_habeas corpus_, when it is alleged to be not only illegal but
contrived for the very purpose of hindering the officer in the
discharge of his official duties, and impairing the efficiency
of the public service. It is true that in such an
investigation a real or apparent conflict between State and
federal authority may be presented, which a due regard to the
respective rights of the two governments would require to be
considered with the utmost caution, such caution, at least, as
it is fair to presume an intelligent court would always be
careful to exercise, in view of the absolute importance of
maintaining as far as possible the strictest harmony between
the two jurisdictions. Yet those rights are determined and by
fixed legal principles, which it would be impossible for a
court to apply in any case without a competent knowledge of
the _facts_ upon which their application in the particular
case might depend. For instance, if your court should issue a
writ of _habeas corpus_ for the relief of a federal officer
upon the averments in his petition that he was forcibly and
illegally restrained of his liberty for the purpose of
preventing him from performing his official duties, and it
should appear in the return to the writ that the person
detaining the prisoner was a ministerial officer of the State
government authorized by its laws to execute its process, and
that he held the petitioner in custody by virtue of a warrant
of arrest in due form, issued by a competent magistrate, to
answer for an offense against the State laws, I presume the
court, in the absence of any further showing, would instantly
remand the petitioner to the custody of the State authorities
without regard to his official position or the nature of his
public duties. But, on the other hand, suppose there should be
a traverse of the return, averring that the warrant of the
arrest, though apparently regu