Melville Fuller

“ If such were the facts, and they made out a want of jurisdiction under the applicable statutes, which, on the merits, we do not hold, the circuit court, nevertheless, was authorized to hear and pass upon those questions in the first instance, and its decision was open to review in the appellate court by writ of error. But it could not be attacked collaterally as absolutely void, and habeas corpus cannot be availed of as a writ of error.
'It is rarely that things are wholly void and without force and effect as to all persons and for all purposes, and incapable of being made otherwise. ”

“ Toy Toy and Columbia George, both Indians of the Umatilla tribe, were jointly indicted in a state court in Oregon for the crime of murder in the first degree, committed on an Indian woman on the United States Indian reservation in Umatilla county, Oregon ”

“ The indictment in this case charged Columbia George and Toy Toy, Indians, with the murder of Annie Edna, an Indian woman, upon the Umatilla reservation, within the state and district of Oregon.
On the face of the record the United States circuit court for the district of Oregon, in which these Indians were last tried and convicted, had jurisdiction of the offense and of the defendants. They were tried, found guilty, and sentenced to the penitentiary for life. ”