any State to the contrary
notwithstanding." The court quoted the language of the Supreme Court
in Tennessee v. Davis (100 U.S. 257, 263), that "It [the General
Government] can act only through its officers and agents, and they
must act within the States. If, when thus acting and within the scope
of their authority, those officers can be arrested and brought to
trial in a State court, for an alleged offense against the law of the
State, yet warranted by the Federal authority they possess, and if
the General Government is powerless to interfere at once for their
protection--if their protection must be left to the action of the
State court--the operations of the General Government may, at any
time, be arrested at the will of one of its members. The legislation
of a State may be unfriendly. It may affix penalties to acts done
under the immediate direction of the National Government and in
obedience to its laws. It may deny the authority conferred by those
laws. The State court may administer not only the laws of the State,
but equally Federal law, in such a manner as to paralyze the
operations of the Government. And even if, after trial and final
judgment in the State court, a case can be brought into the
United States court for review, the officer is withdrawn from the
discharge of his duty during the pendency of the prosecution, and
the exercise of acknowledged Federal power arrested. We do not think
such an element of weakness is to be found in the Constitution. The
United States is a government with authority extending over the whole
territory of the Union, acting upon the States and upon the people of
the States. While it is limited in the number of its powers, so far
as its sovereignty extends, it is supreme. No State government can
exclude it from the exercise of any authority conferred upon it by the
Constitution, obstruct its authorized officers against its will, or
withhold from it, for a moment, the cognizance of any subject which
that instrument has committed to it." To this strong language the
Circuit Court added:

"The very idea of a government composed of executive,
legislative, and judicial departments necessarily comprehends
the power to do all things, through its appropriate officers
and agents, within the scope of its general governmental
purposes and powers, requisite to preserve its existence,
protect it and its ministers, and give it complete efficiency
in all its parts.