Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/200

 174 OCTOBER TERM, 1907. Shepard in the Circuit Court of the United States was, as to the defendant Young, one against him az, and ordy becaus/ waz, Attorney General of Minnesota. No relief was sought against him individually but only in his capacity az Attorney General. And the manifest, indeed the avowed and admitted, object of seeking such relief was to t/e t/ hands of the $tat so that it could not in any manner or by any mode of proceed- ing in /tz own courtz, test the validity of the statutes and orders in question. It would therefore seem clear that within ths true meaning of the Eleventh Amendment the suit brought in the Federal court was one, in legal effect, against the State-- as much so as if the State had been formally named oa the record as a party--sad therefore it was s suit to which, under the Amendment, so far as the State or its Attorney General was concerned, .the judicial power of the United States did not sad could not extend. If this preposition be sound it will follow--indeed, it is conceded that if, so far as relief is sought against the Attorney General of Minnesota, this be a suit against the State--then the order of the Federal court enjoin- ing that officer from taking any action, suit, step or proceed- ing to compel the railway company to obey the Minnesota statute was beyond the jurisdiction of that court and wholly void; in which case, that officer was at liberty to proceed in the discharge of his official duties as defined by the laws of the State, and' the order adjudging him to be in contempt for bringi.ug the mandamus proceeding in the state court was a nullity. The fact that the Federal Circuit Court had, prior to the institution of the mandamns suit in the state court prelimi- narily' (but not finally). held the statutes of Minnesota sad the orders of its Hailroad and Warehouse Commission in ques- tion to be in violation of the Constitution of the United States, was no reason why that court should have laid violent hands upon the Attorney General of. Minnesota sad by its orders have deprived the State of the services of its constitutional law officer in its own courts. Yet tkat is what was done by

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