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judgment was granted, and on October 26, 1891, an entry was made in the cause in the words and figures following: "In this cause the court, being fully advised in the premises, file their written decision and find that plaintiff is entitled to an order for the operation of the road by defendant as prayed for, and that a writ issue accordingly. It is further considered by the court that the defendant pay the costs of this court, taxed at $22.75, and that execution issue therefor."

The cause was then brought to this court by writ of error.

Mr. Anthony C. Daly for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Milton Remley, Attorney General of the State of Iowa, for defendant in error.

MR. JUSTICE WHITE, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court.

The contention of the plaintiff in error is that the proceeding instituted against it in the Supreme Court of Iowa was an action for mandamus, and that no such action could lawfully be brought to compel it to operate the leased portion of its road until its legal duty to do so had been previously determined by the verdict of a jury. There was no assertion that the court below had no jurisdiction over the subject-matter. Nowhere in the answer or in the amendments to the answer filed on behalf of the company was it claimed that the proceeding was violative of the Constitution of the United States, or assailed any right, title, privilege, or immunity specially set up or claimed under that Constitution. Indeed, there was no mention of any right thereunder until the filing of a brief for defendant entitled "Defendant's Resistance and Objection to Plaintiff's Motion to Enter Order Prayed for in the Petition," in the ninth paragraph whereof it was claimed that it I would be a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States to grant the order prayed for upon the motion in question. It is apparent that this defence merely asserted that the rights of the corporation as a

Opinion of the Court.

citizen of the United States would be impaired by enforcing the claim urged against it on the motion, instead of by another and less summary form of action. But it is clear that the Fourteenth Amendment in no way undertakes to control the power of a State to determine by what process legal rights, may be asserted or legal obligations be enforced, provided the method of procedure adopted for these purposes gives reasonable notice and affords fair opportunity to be heard before the issues are decided. This being the case, it was obviously not a right, privilege, or immunity of a citizen of the United States to have a controversy in the state court prosecuted or determined by one form of action instead of by another. It is also equally evident, provided the form sanctioned by the state law gives notice and affords an opportunity to be heard, that the mere question of whether it was by a motion or ordinary action in no way rendered the proceeding not due process of law within the constitutional meaning of those words. Whether the court of last resort of the State of Iowa properlyconstrued its own constitution and laws in determining that the summary process under those laws was applicable to the matter which it adjudged, was purely the decision of a question of state law, binding upon this court. Mere irregularities in the procedure, if any, were matters solely for the consideration of the judicial tribunal within the State empowered by the laws of the State to review and correct errors committed by its courts. Such errors affect merely matters of state law and practice, in no way depending upon the Constitution of the United States or upon any act of Congress. Ludeling v. Chaffe, 143 U. S. 301, 305.

As said by this court, speaking through Mr. Chief Justice Fuller, in Leeper v. Texas, 139 U. S. 462, 468: "Law in its regular course of administration through courts of justice is due process, and when secured by the law of the State the constitutional requirement is satisfied." There was a “regular course of administration" in the case at bar, as that term was employed in the case cited.

It is manifest that it was never contemplated by the framers of the Constitution that this court should sit in review, as an

Opinion of the Court.

appellate court, of such a question as that presented by the record in the case at bar, viz., whether or not the highest court of a State erred in holding that it could rightfully determine from the statements in the pleadings filed by both parties to a controversy pending before it that the averments of an answer set forth no defence to the claim of the plaintiff. It was not a denial of a right protected by the Constitution of the United States to refuse a jury trial, even though it were clearly erroneous to construe the laws of the State as justifying the refusal. Brooks v. Missouri, 124 U. S. 394; Spies v. Illinois, 123 U. S. 131, 166.

Writ of error dismissed for want of jurisdiction.

SPALDING v. CHANDLER.

ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN.

The Indian reservation at Sault Ste. Marie, under the treaty of June 26, 1820, with the Chippewas, continued until extinguished by the treaty of August 2, 1855; and upon the extinguishment of the Indian title at that time the land included in the reservation was made, by § 10 of the act of September 4, 1841, not subject to preëmption.

THE plaintiff in error claimed the land in dispute in this controversy under an alleged preëmption entry. The claim of the defendant in error rested upon a patent from the United States. The case is stated in the opinion of the court.

Mr. John C. Donnelly and Mr. A. C. Raymond for plaintiff in error.

Mr. John H. Goff for defendant in error.

MR. JUSTICE WHITE delivered the opinion of the court.

Plaintiff in error by a bill in equity filed in the Circuit Court of the county of Chippewa, State of Michigan, sought

Opinion of the Court.

to have a trust declared in his favor in certain lands at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, at one time a part of what was known as the "Indian Reserve," which land had been patented by the United States to the defendant, and to have the defendant ordered to execute a conveyance of the legal title.

The facts in the case, as developed upon the trial, were as follows: On June 26, 1820, 7 Stat. 206, the Chippeway tribe of Indians ceded to the United States sixteen square miles of land. The tract ceded commenced at the Sault and extended two miles up and the same distance down the river with a depth of four miles, including a portage, the site of the village of Sault Ste. Marie, and the old French fort.. Schoolcraft's American Lakes, p. 140. One of the objects of the expedition which effected the signing of the treaty was to prepare the way for an American garrison at the Sault. Ib. p. 135. At the time of the signing of the treaty there were about forty lodges of Chippewa Indians, containing a population of about two hundred souls, resident at the Sault, who subsisted wholly upon the whitefish which were very abundant at the foot of the Falls near by the village. Ib. p. 133. The village settlement of the whites consisted of about fifteen or twenty buildings. Ib. p. 132. By the third article of the treaty it was provided that "the United States will secure to the Indians a perpetual right of fishing at the Falls of St. Mary's, and also a place of encampment upon the tract hereby ceded, convenient to the fishing ground, which place shall not interfere with the defences of any military work which may be erected, nor with any private rights.' The military post of Fort Brady was established on a part of the tract within a few years following the execution of the treaty.

On March 24, 1836, 7 Stat. 491, the Ottawa and Chippewa Nations ceded to the United States a large tract of territory, including in its general limits the sixteen square miles above mentioned. By article third of this treaty the right of fishing and encampment was preserved to the Indians in the following words: "It is understood that the reservation for

Opinion of the Court.

a place of fishing and encampment, made under the treaty of St. Mary's, of the 16th of June, 1820, remains unaffected by this treaty." In 1845, under the directions of the surveyor general for the Northwest Territory a survey was made at Sault Ste. Marie, and upon the map of said survey was noted the territory occupied by the military, as shown by the stockade or high posts around such occupation, and also the ground then in the occupation of the Indians under the treaty of 1820, and each of said reservations was respectively noted upon the map as the "Military Reserve" and the "Indian Reserve." At the time of the making of the survey of 1845 there was no occupation of the Indian reserve other than by Indians, and a raceway bounded the reserve on the south.

By an act approved March 1, 1847, c. 32, 9 Stat. 146, Congress established the Lake Superior land district in Michigan, embracing therein, among other land, the territory ceded by the Chippewas under the treaty of 1820, and provision was made for a geological survey and examination of the lands therein. It was provided in the closing sentence of section 2 that all non-mineral lands within said district should "be sold in the same manner as other lands under the laws now in force for the sale of the public lands, excepting and reserving from such sales section sixteen in each township for the use of schools, and such reservations as the President shall deem necessary for public uses."

On April 3, 1847, pursuant to the recommendation of the Secretary of the Treasury, based upon a communication from the Commissioner of the General Land Office, acting on the suggestion of the Fifth Auditor of the Treasury, the President ordered that certain described lands in the northern peninsula of Michigan, or so much thereof as might be found necessary, should be reserved for public uses, and in said described land was included the north fractional half of fractional township 47 north, of range 1 east, which embraced the Indian reserve in question as also the site of Fort Brady.

On August 25, 1847, as the result of a report of Brigadier General Brady, commanding the Fourth Military Department, the acting Secretary of War made application to the Commis