The state courts are competent to decide federal questions arising before them and it is their duty to do so and there is a pre sumption that they will do what the consti tution and laws require of them; if error intervenes the remedy is a writ of error to the state court, and the federal courts can not be called on to interpose in a controversy properly pending in the state courts on the ground that the state court might so decide as to render their final action unconstitu tional; Defiance Water Co. v. Defiance, 191 U. S. 184, 24 Sup. Ct. 63, 48 L. Ed. 140. The jurisdiction of the supreme court to review a judgment of a state court depends upon the assertion of a right, privilege, or immunity under the federal constitution or laws set up and denied in state courts, and the latter are not amenable to review for the administration of the common law according to their own understanding and interpreta tion thereof ; Pennsylvania R. Co. v. Hughes, 191 U. S. 477, 24 Sup. Ct. 132, 48 L. Ed. 268, affirming Hughes v. R. Co., 202 Pa. 222, 51 Atl. 990, 63 L. R. A. 513, 97 Am. St. Rep. 713. Although a federal right may not have been specially set up in the original petition or earlier proceedings, if it clearly and un mistakably appears from the opinion of the state court under review that a federal ques tion was assumed by the highest court of the state to be in issue and was actually decided against the federal claim and such decision was essential to the judgment rendered, the decision is reviewable by the United States supreme court; Montana v. Rice, 204 U. S. 291, 27 Sup. Ct. 281, 51 L. Ed. 490. It has been held that federal questions are involved in suits brought by corporations created by acts of congress; Union Pac. Ry. Co. v. My ers, 115 U. S. 2, 5 Sup. Ct. 1113, 29 L. Ed. 319; Northern Pac. R. Co. v. Amato, 144 U. S. 465, 12 Sup. Ct. 740, 36 L. Ed. 506; to determine the validity of a railroad consolidation authorized by act of congress; Ames v. Kansas, 111 U. S. 449, 4 Sup. Ct. 437, 28 L. Ed. 482; to enjoin the erection of a bridge across a navigable river authorized by act of congress; Miller v. New York, 13 Blatch. 479, Fed. Cas. No. 9,585; Whether full faith and credit were given to a judg ment in another state; Huntington v. Attrill, 146 U. S. 657, 13 Sup. Ct. 224, 36 L. Ed. 1123; where the supreme court of a state failed to give proper effect to a decree of the circuit court of the United States ; Dow ell v. Applegate, 152 U. S. 327, 14 Sup. Ct. 611, 38 L. Ed. 463 ; where a federal officer is sued in trespass to real estate which he claims to have possession for and under au thority of the United States; Stanley v. Schwalby, 147 U. S. 508, 13 Sup. Ct. 418, 37 L. Ed. 259. So, of course, are suits for in fringement of patents and copyrights. (For a discussion of the jurisdiction in patent cases, see Henry v. A. B. Dick Co., 224 U. S. 1, 32 Sup. Ct. 364, 56 L. Ed. 645.) So also of cases in which it is claimed that a state law is invalid because in conflict with the constitution or laws of the United States or as depriving one of some right, privilege, or immunity thereby guaranteed, and crimi nal prosecutions for violations of federal laws.
A federal question arises in a case in which the correct decision depends upon the construction of a section of the federal con stitution ; New Orleans, M. & T. R. Co. v. Mississippi, 102 U. S. 135, 26 L. Ed. 96; New Orleans Water-Works Co. v. Water-Works Co., 14 Fed. 194; or where it is to be de cided whether a judgment of the federal court was a lien on laud when the state law was changed after the enactment of the fed eral law making such judgments liens in all cases where they were such by the laws of the state; Cooke v. Avery, 147 U. S. 375, 13 Sup. Ct. 340, 37 L. Ed. 209; or where on the
whole record there is a controversy involving the construction of either the federal con stitution or laws ; Van Allen v. IL Co., 3 Fed. 545 ; Leonard v. City of Shreveport, 28 Fed. 257; or where the defence depends wholly on the federal constitution and laws ; Hodgson v. Millward, 3 Grant Cas. 418, Fed. Cas. No. 6,568; and cases arising out of legislation of congress whether constituting a right or priv ilege, or claim or protection, or defence, in whole or in part, of the party by whom it is asserted; Ellis v. Norton, 16 Fed. 4; when the controversy turns upon the existence, ef fect or operation of a law of the United States, as a suit by a riparian owner to en join the construction of a bridge, upon the ground that the defendant was not author ized to build it by an act of congress under which it claimed the right ; Hughes v. Ry. Co., 18 Fed. 106 ; whether by force of the Ordinance of 1787 and treaties with the Miami Indians certain lands were exempt from tttxation; Wau-pe-man-qua v. Aldrich, 28 Fed. 489; an action to enforce the trusts of a will bequeathing property situated on a United States reservation at Fortress Mon roe, where the, question was whether the fed eral constitution and law had segregated the territory from the state of Virginia and conferred jurisdiction over it on the federal courts ; Woodfin v. Phoebus, 30 Fed. 289 ; when the complainant invokes the protec tion of a federal law and the case depends on the construction of that law; Richards v. Town of Rock Rapids, 31 Fed. 505; where the case involves the validity of a state tax alleged to be in violation of the federal con stitution ; U. S. Exp. Co. v. Allen, 39 Fed. 712; whether the marshal's proceedings to enforce a lien under the state law, adopted by rule of the federal court under R. S. § 916, were in conformity with the rule; Sowl es v. Witters, 46 Fed. 497; a claim for dam ages for conspiracy to disbar an attorney from practicing in the state court because he had filed a bill in the federal courts charg ing defendants with misconduct and corrup tion in certain litigations pending in the state courts; Green v. Rogers, 56 Fed. 220 ; a municipal ordinance attacked as unconsti tutional because of unreasonable rates, even though their reasonableness cannot be decid ed from the inspection Of the ordinance but needs extrinsic testimony; Capital City Gas Co. v. City of Des Moines, 72 Fed. 818; where the title in litigation involved an examina tion of the government survey of a lake whose meander line was a part thereof ; French-Glenn Live Stock Co. v.. Springer, 185 U. S. 47, 22 Sup. Ct. 563, 46 L. Ed. 800; where the bill set up a contract with the state in a railway charter and averred that it had been impaired by subsequent legisla tion; Illinois Cent. R. Co. v. Adams, 180 U.
S. 28, 21 Sup. Ct. 251, 45 L. Ed. 410; where a state court denied the contention of the plaintiff in error that a state statute as ap plied to interstate commerce was in conflict with the commercial clause of the constitu tion ; Adams Exp. Co. v. Kentucky, 214 U.
S. 218, 29 Sup. Ct. 633, 53 L. Ed. 972; West ern Turf Ass'n v. Greenberg, 204 U. S. 359, 27 Sup. Ct. 384, 51 L. Ed. 520; where the plaintiff in error claimed and set up a right under the constitution of the United States and the decision of the supreme court of the state was tantamount to a denial of that right; Detroit, Ft. W. & B. I. R. Co. v. Os born, 189 U. S. 383, 23 Sup. Ct. 540, 47 L. Ed. 860; and where the answer in an action in the state court to enforce alien created by a reassessment of taxes sets up that notice of the reassessment was insufficient and there by property would have been taken without due process of law ; Bellingham Bay & B. C.