George Sutherland

“ The refusal of the trial court to issue a warrant of arrest under such circumstances is, in reality and effect, a refusal to permit the case to come to a hearing upon either questions of law or of fact, and falls little short of a refusal to permit the enforcement of the law. The authority conferred upon the trial judge to issue a warrant of arrest upon an indictment does not, under the circumstances here disclosed, carry with it the power to decline to do so under the guise of judicial discretion; or, as this court suggested in Ex parte United States, 242 U.S. 27, 42, 37 S.Ct. ”

“ The rule deducible from the later decisions, and which we now affirm, is that this court has full power in its discretion to issue the writ of mandamus to a federal District Court, although the case be one in respect of which direct appellate jurisdiction is vested in the Circuit Court of Appeals-this court having ultimate discretionary jurisdiction by certiorari-but that such power will be exercised only where a question of public importance is involved, or where the question is of such a nature that it is peculiarly appropriate that such action by this court should be taken. ”