HKB
Although a suit to restrain the attorney general of a State from proceeding in the courts of the State to enforce a State law not declared unconstitutional would seem effectively to stay proceedings in a State court, Justice Peckham drew a distinction between the power to enjoin the attorney general and other law officers as individuals and a suit against a State court on the ground that the former does not include the "power to prevent any investigation or action by a grand jury. The latter body is part of the machinery of a criminal court, and an injunction against a State court would be a violation of the whole scheme of our Government."[673] Justice Harlan, not convinced by this distinction, characterized the suit as an attempt "to tie the hands of the State so that it could not in any manner or by any mode of proceeding in its own courts, test the validity of the statutes and orders in question."[674]
Although the rigor of the rule of Ex parte Young has been mitigated by subsequent decisions[675] and the mode of its exercise somewhat narrowed by statute, it has not been overruled and remains a source of friction in federal-state relations. Simultaneously, however, Sec. 266 (see note 2 above[Transcriber's Note: Reference is to footnote 674 of Article III.]) has been construed strictly as designed "to secure the public interest in 'a limited class of cases of special importance,'"[676] and not "a measure of broad social policy to be construed with great liberality, but as an enactment technical in the strict sense of the term and to be applied as such."[677]
STATE INTERFERENCE BY HABEAS CORPUS PROCEEDINGS WITH FEDERAL JURISDICTION
The most spectacular type of State court interference with federal courts has been their use of the writ of habeas corpus to release persons in federal custody. Between 1815 and 1861, judges in nine State courts asserted the right to release persons in federal custody,[678] and the issue was not finally settled until 1859, when Ableman v. Booth[679] was decided. Here a Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court first released a prisoner held by a United States commissioner on charges of violating the fugitive slave law. After the trial, conviction, and sentence of the defendant, the State supreme court issued a second writ of habeas corpus and after hearing ordered the release of the prisoner. The national Supreme Court then issued a writ of error to the State court which refused to make a return. In an opinion based in part on national supremacy and in part on dual sovereignty, Chief Justice Taney, speaking for the Court, laid down the absolute rule that no State court has the power to release prisoners held in custody under the authority of the United States.[680]
Notwithstanding the strong language of the Court in Ableman v. Booth, the Wisconsin courts thirteen years later again asserted the power to release persons in federal custody by directing the release of an enlisted soldier in the custody of a recruiting officer of the United States Army. Once again the Court held that a State court has no authority to issue a writ of habeas corpus for the release of persons held under the authority or claim and color of authority of the United States. Justice Field for the Court went on to lay down the generalization that neither government "can intrude with its judicial process into the domain of the other, except so far as such intrusion may be necessary on the part of the National Government to preserve its rightful supremacy in cases of conflict of authority."[681]
FEDERAL INTERFERENCE BY REMOVAL AND HABEAS CORPUS