Mr. Chief Justice Marshall delivered the opinion of the Court.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Georgia in general assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, that, after the 1st day of February 1831, it shall not be lawful for any person or persons, under colour or pretence of authority from said Cherokee tribe, or as headmen, chiefs or warriors of said tribe, to cause or procure by any means the assembling of any council or other pretended legislative body of the said Indians or others living among them, for the purpose of legislating (or for any other purpose whatever). And persons offending against the provisions of this section shall guilty of a high misdemeanour, and subject to indictment therefor, and, on conviction, shall be punished by confinement at hard labour in the penitentiary for the space of four years.

Section 2. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that, after the time aforesaid, it shall not be lawful for any person or persons, under pretext of authority from the Cherokee tribe, or as representatives, chiefs, headmen or warriors of said tribe, to meet or assemble as a council, assembly, [p*522] convention, or in any other capacity, for the purpose of making laws, orders or regulations for said tribe. And all persons offending against the provisions of this section shall be guilty of a high misdemeanour, and subject to an indictment, and, on conviction thereof, shall undergo an imprisonment in the penitentiary at hard labour for the space of four years.

Section 3. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that, after the time aforesaid, it shall not be lawful for any person or persons, under colour or by authority of the Cherokee tribe, or any of its laws or regulations, to hold any court or tribunal whatever for the purpose of hearing and determining causes, either civil or criminal, or to give any judgment in such causes, or to issue, or cause to issue, any process against the person or property of any of said tribe. And all persons offending against the provisions of this section shall be guilty of a high misdemeanour, and subject to indictment, and, on conviction thereof, shall be imprisoned in the penitentiary at hard labour for the space of four years.

Section 4. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that, after the time aforesaid, it shall not be lawful for any person or persons, as a ministerial officer, or in any other capacity, to execute any precept, command or process issued by any court or tribunal in the Cherokee tribe, on the persons or property of any of said tribe. And all persons offending against the provisions of this section shall be guilty of a trespass, and subject to indictment, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by fine and imprisonment in the jail or in the penitentiary, not longer than four years, at the discretion of the court.

Section 5. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that, after the time aforesaid, it shall not be lawful for any person or persons to confiscate, or attempt to confiscate, or otherwise to cause a forfeiture of the property or estate of any Indian of said tribe in consequence of his enrolling himself and family for emigration, or offering to enroll for emigration, or any other act of said Indian in furtherance of his intention to emigrate. And persons offending against the provisions of this section shall be guilty of high misdemeanour, and, on conviction, shall undergo an imprisonment in the penitentiary at hard labour for the space of four years.

Section 6. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that none of the provisions of this act shall be so construed as to prevent said tribe, its headmen, chiefs or other representatives, from meeting any agent or commissioner on the part of this State or the United States for any purpose whatever.

Section 7. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that all white persons residing within the limits of the Cherokee Nation, on the 1st day of March next, or at any time thereafter, without a license or permit from his Excellency the Governor, or from such agent as his Excellency the Governor shall authorise to grant such permit or license, and who shall not have taken the oath hereinafter required, shall be guilty of a high misdemeanour, and, upon conviction thereof, shall be punished by confinement to the penitentiary at hard labour for a term not less than four years: provided, that the provisions of this section shall not be so construed as to extend to any authorised agent or agents of the Government of the United States or of this State, or to any person or persons who may rent any of those improvements which have been abandoned by Indians who have emigrated west of the Mississippi; provided, nothing contained in this section shall be so construed as to extend to white females, and all male children under twenty-one years of age.

Section 8. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that all white persons, citizens of the State of Georgia, who have procured a license in writing from his Excellency the Governor, or from such agent as his Excellency the Governor shall authorise to grant such permit or license, to reside within the limits of the Cherokee Nation, and who have taken the following oath, viz., "I, A.B., do solemnly swear (or affirm, as the case may be) that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the State of Georgia, and uprightly demean myself as a citizen thereof, so help me God," shall be, and the same are hereby declared exempt and free from the operation of the seventh section of this act.

Section 9. And be it further enacted that his Excellency the Governor be, and he is hereby, authorized to grant licenses to reside within the limits of the Cherokee Nation, according to the provisions of the eighth section of this act.

Section 10. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that no person shall collect or claim any toll from any person for passing any turnpike gate or toll bridge by authority of any act or law of the Cherokee tribe, or any chief or headman or men of the same.

Section 11. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that his Excellency the Governor be, and he is hereby, empowered, should he deem it necessary, either for the protection of the mines or for the enforcement of the laws of force within the Cherokee Nation, to raise and organize a guard, to be employed on foot, or mounted, as occasion may require, which shall not consist of more than sixty persons, which guard shall be under the command of the commissioner or agent appointed by the Governor, to protect the mines, with power to dismiss from the service any member of said guard, on paying the wages due for services rendered, for disorderly conduct, and make appointments to fill the vacancies occasioned by such dismissal.

Section 12. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that each person who may belong to said guard, shall receiver for his compensation at the rate of fifteen dollars per month when on foot, and at the rate of twenty dollars per month when mounted, for every month that such person is engaged in actual service; and, in the event, that the commissioner or agent, herein referred to, should die, resign, or fail to perform the duties herein required of him, his Excellency the Governor is hereby authorised and required to appoint, in his stead, some other fit and proper person to the command of said guard; and the commissioner or agent, having the command of the guard aforesaid, for the better discipline thereof, shall appoint three sergeants, who shall receive at the rate of twenty dollars per month while serving on foot, and twenty-five dollars per month, when mounted, as compensation whilst in actual service.

Section 13. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that the said guard, or any member of them, shall be, and they are hereby, authorised and empowered to arrest any person legally charged with, or detected in, a violation of the laws of this State, and to convey, as soon as practicable, the person so arrested before a justice of the peace, judge of the superior or justice of inferior court of this State, to be dealt with according to law; and the pay and support of said guard be provided out of the fund already appropriated for the protection of the gold mines.

The legislature of Georgia, on the 19th December 1829, passed the following act:

An act to add the territory lying within the chartered limits of Georgia, and now in the occupancy of the Cherokee Indians, to the counties of Carroll, De Kalb, Gwinnett, Hall, and Habersham, and to extend the laws of this State over the same, and to annul all laws and ordinances made by the Cherokee Nation of Indians, and to provide for the compensation of officers serving legal process in said territory, and to regulate the testimony of Indians, and to repeal the ninth section of the act of 1828 upon this subject.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the senate and house of representatives of the State of Georgia in general assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, that, from and after the passing of this Act, all that part of the unlocated territory within the limits of this State, and which lies between the Alabama line and the old path leading from the Buzzard Roost on the Chattahoochee, to Sally Hughes', on the Hightower River; thence to Thomas Pelet's on the old federal road; thence with said road to the Alabama line be, and the same is hereby added to, and shall become a part of, the County of Carroll.

Section 2. And be it further enacted that all that part of said territory lying and being north of the last mentioned line and south of the road running from Charles Gait's ferry, on the Chattahoochee River, to Dick Roe's, to where it intersects with the path aforesaid, be, and the same is hereby added to, and shall become a part of, the County of De Kalb.

Section 3. And be it further enacted, that all that part of the said territory lying north of the last mentioned line and south of a line commencing at the mouth of Baldridge's Creek; thence up said creek to its source; from thence to where the federal road crosses the Hightower; thence with said road to the Tennessee line, be, and the same is hereby added to, and shall become part of, the County of Gwinnett.

Section 4. And be it further enacted that all that part of the said territory lying north of said last mentioned line and south [p*526] of a line to commence on the Chestatee River, at the mouth of Yoholo Creek; thence up said creek to the top of the Blue ridge; thence to the head waters of Notley River; thence down said river to the boundary line of Georgia, be, and the same is hereby added to, and shall become a part of, the County of Hall.

Section 5. And be it further enacted that all that part of said territory lying north of said last mentioned line, within the limits of this State, be, and the same is hereby added to, and shall become a part of, the County of Habersham.

Section 6. And be it further enacted, that all the laws, both civil and criminal, of this State, be, and the same are hereby, extended over said portions of territory, respectively; and all persons whatever, residing within the same, shall, after the 1st day of June next, be subject and liable to the operation of said laws in the same manner as other citizens of this State, or the citizens of said counties, respectively, and all writs and processes whatever, issued by the courts or officers of said courts, shall extend over, and operate on, the portions of territory hereby added to the same, respectively.

Section 7. And be it further enacted that, after the 1st day of June next, all laws, ordinances, orders and regulations, of any kind whatever, made, passed or enacted, by the Cherokee Indians, either in general council or in any other way whatever, or by any authority whatever of said tribe, be, and the same are hereby declared to be, null and void, and of no effect, as if the same had never existed, and, in all cases of indictment or civil suits, it shall not be lawful for the defendant to justify under any of said laws, ordinances, orders or regulations; nor shall the courts of this State permit the same to be given in evidence on the trial of any suit whatever.

Section 8. And be it further enacted that it shall not be lawful for any person or body of persons, by arbitrary power or by virtue of any pretended rule, ordinance, law or custom of said Cherokee Nation, to prevent by threats, menaces or other means, or endeavour to prevent, any Indian of said Nation residing within the chartered limits of this State, from enrolling as an emigrant, or actually emigrating or removing from said nation; nor shall it be lawful for any person or body of persons, by arbitrary power or by virtue of any pretended rule, ordinance, law or custom of said nation, to punish, in any manner, or to molest either the person or property, or to abridge the rights or privileges of any Indian, for enrolling his or her name as an emigrant, or for emigrating or intending to emigrate, from said nation.

Section 9. And be it further enacted that any person or body of persons offending against the provisions of the foregoing section shall be guilty of a high misdemeanour, subject to indictment, and on conviction shall be punished by confinement in the common jail of any county of this State, or by confinement at hard labour in the penitentiary, for a term not exceeding four years, at the discretion of the court.

Section 10. And be it further enacted that it shall not be lawful for any person or body of persons, by arbitrary power, or under colour of any pretended rule, ordinance, law or custom of said nation, to prevent or offer to prevent, or deter any Indian headman, chief or warrior of said nation, residing within the chartered limits of this State, from selling or ceding to the United States, for the use of Georgia, the whole or any part of said territory, or to prevent or offer to prevent, any Indian, headman, chief or warrior of said nation, residing as aforesaid, from meeting in council or treaty any commissioner or commissioners on the part of the United States, for any purpose whatever.

Section 11. And be it further enacted, that any person or body of persons offending against the provisions of the foregoing sections, shall be guilty of a high misdemeanour, subject to indictment, and on conviction shall be confined at hard labour in the penitentiary for not less than four nor longer than six years, at the discretion of the court.

Section 12. And be it further enacted, that it shall not be lawful for any person or body of persons, by arbitrary force, or under colour of any pretended rules, ordinances, law or custom of said nation, to take the life of any Indian residing as aforesaid, for enlisting as an emigrant, attempting to emigrate, ceding, or attempting to cede, as aforesaid, the whole or any part of the said territory, or meeting or attempting to meet, in treaty or in council, as aforesaid, any commissioner or commissioners aforesaid; and any person or body of persons offending against the provisions of this section shall be guilty of [p*528] murder, subject to indictment, and, on conviction, shall suffer death by hanging.

Section 13. And be it further enacted that, should any of the foregoing offences be committed under colour of any pretended rules, ordinances, custom or law of said nation, all persons acting therein, either as individuals or as pretended executive, ministerial or judicial officers, shall be deemed and considered as principals, and subject to the pains and penalties herein before described.

Section 14. And be it further enacted that for all demands which may come within the jurisdiction of a magistrate's court, suit may be brought for the same in the nearest district of the county to which the territory is hereby annexed, and all officers serving any legal process on any person living on any portion of the territory herein named shall be entitled to recover the sum of five cents for every mile he may ride to serve the same, after crossing the present limits of the said counties, in addition to the fees already allowed by law; and in case any of the said officers should be resisted in the execution of any legal process issued by any court or magistrate, justice of the inferior court, or judge of the superior court of any of said counties, he is hereby authorised to call out a sufficient number of the militia of said counties to aid and protect him in the execution of this duty.

Section 15. And be it further enacted that no Indian or descendant of any Indian residing within the Creek or Cherokee Nations of Indians shall be deemed a competent witness in any court of this State to which a white person may be a party, except such white person resides within the said nation.

In September 1831, the grand jurors for the county of Gwinnett in the State of Georgia, presented to the superior court of the county the following indictment:

Georgia, Gwinnett county: The grand jurors, sworn, chosen and selected for the county of Gwinnett, in the name and behalf of the citizens of Georgia, charge and accuse Elizur Butler, Samuel A. Worcester, James Trott, Samuel Mays, Surry Eaton, Austin Copeland, and Edward D. Losure, white persons of said county, with the offence of "residing within the limits of the Cherokee Nation without a license:" For that the said Elizur Butler, Samuel A. Worcester, James Trott, Samuel Mays, Surry Eaton, Austin Copeland and Edward D. Losure, white persons, as aforesaid, on the 15th day of July 1831, did reside in that part of the Cherokee Nation attached by the laws of said State to the said county, and in the county aforesaid, without a license or permit from his Excellency the Governor of said State, or from any agent authorised by his Excellency the Governor aforesaid to grant such permit or license, and without having taken the oath to support and defend the Constitution and laws of the State of Georgia, and uprightly to demean themselves as citizens thereof, contrary to the laws of said State, the good order, peace and dignity thereof.

To this indictment, the plaintiff in error pleaded specially, as follows:

And the said Samuel A. Worcester, in his own proper person, comes and says that this Court ought not to take further cognizance of the action and prosecution aforesaid, because, he says, that on the 15th day of July in the year 1831, he was, and still is, a resident in the Cherokee Nation, and that the said supposed crime, or crimes, and each of them, were committed, if committee at all, at the town of New Echota, in the said Cherokee Nation, out of the jurisdiction of this Court, and not in the county Gwinnett, or elsewhere within the jurisdiction of this Court. And this defendant saith, that he is a citizen of the State of Vermont, one of the United States of America, and that he entered the aforesaid Cherokee Nation in the capacity of a duly authorised missionary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, under the authority of the President of the United States, and has not since been required by him to leave it; that he was, at the time of his arrest, engaged in preaching the gospel to the Cherokee Indians, and in translating the sacred Scriptures into their language, with the permission and approval of the said Cherokee Nation, and in accordance with the humane policy of the Government of the United States, for the civilization and improvement of the Indians, and that his residence there, for this purpose, is the residence charged in the aforesaid indictment, and this defendant further saith that this prosecution the State of Georgia ought not to have or maintain, because he saith that several treaties have, from time to time, been entered into between the United States and the Cherokee Nation of Indians, to-wit, at Hopewell on the 28th day of November, 1785; at Holston on the 2d day of July, 1791; at Philadelphia on the 26th day of June, 1794; at Tellico on the 2d day of October, 1798; at Tellico on the 24th day of October, 1804; at Tellico on the 25th day of October, 1805; at Tellico on the 27th day of October, 1805; at Washington City on the 7th day of January, 1805; at Washington City on the 22d day of March, 1816; at the Chickasaw Council House on the 14th day of September, 1816; at the Cherokee Agency on the 8th day of July, 1817, and at Washington City on the 27th day of February, 1819, all which treaties have been duly ratified by the Senate of the United States of America, and by which treaties the United States of America acknowledge the said Cherokee Nation to be a sovereign nation, authorised to govern themselves, and all persons who have settled within their territory, free from any right of legislative interference by the several states composing the United States of America in reference to acts done within their own territory, and by which treaties the whole of the territory now occupied by the Cherokee Nation on the east of the Mississippi has been solemnly guarantied to them, all of which treaties are existing treaties at this day, and in full force. By these treaties, and particularly by the treaties of Hopewell and Holston, the aforesaid territory is acknowledged to lie without the jurisdiction of the several states composing the Union of the United States; and, it is thereby specially stipulated that the citizens of the United States shall not enter the aforesaid territory, even on a visit, without a passport from the Governor of a State, or from some one duly authorised thereto by the President of the United States, all of which will more fully and at large appear by reference to the aforesaid treaties. And this defendant saith that the several acts charged in the bill of indictment were done or omitted to be done, if at all, within the said territory so recognized as belonging to the said Nation, and so, as aforesaid, held by them, under the guarantee of the United States; that for those acts the defendant is not amenable to the laws of Georgia, nor to the jurisdiction of the courts of the said State; and that the laws of the State of Georgia, which profess to add the said territory to the several adjacent counties of the said State, and to extend the laws of Georgia over the said territory [p*531] and persons inhabiting the same, and, in particular, the act on which this indictment against this defendant is grounded, to-wit:

An act entitled an act to prevent the exercise of assumed and arbitrary power by all persons, under pretext of authority from the Cherokee Indians, and their laws, and to prevent white persons from residing within that part of the chartered limits of Georgia occupied by the Cherokee Indians, and to provide a guard for the protection of the gold mines, and to enforce the laws of the State within the aforesaid territory,

are repugnant to the aforesaid treaties, which, according to the Constitution of the United States, compose a part of the supreme law of the land, and that these laws of Georgia are therefore unconstitutional, void, and of no effect; that the said laws of Georgia are also unconstitutional and void because they impair the obligation of the various contracts formed by and between the aforesaid Cherokee Nation and the said United States of America, as above recited; also that the said laws of Georgia are unconstitutional and void because they interfere with, and attempt to regulate and control, the intercourse with the said Cherokee Nation, which, by the said Constitution, belongs exclusively to the Congress of the United States; and because the said laws are repugnant to the statute of the United States, passed on ___ day of March 1802, entitled "an act to regulate trade and intercourse with the Indian tribes, and to preserve peace on the frontiers;" and that, therefore, this Court has no jurisdiction to cause this defendant to make further or other answer to the said bill of indictment, or further to try and punish this defendant for the said supposed offence or offences alleged in the bill of indictment, or any of them; and therefore this defendant prays judgment whether he shall be held bound to answer further to said indictment.

This plea was overruled by the court; and the jurisdiction of the Superior Court of the County of Gwinnett was sustained by the judgment of the court.

The defendant was then arraigned, and pleaded "not guilty," and the case came on for trial on the 15th of September 1831, when the jury found the defendants in the indictment guilty. On the same day the court pronounced sentence on the parties so convicted, as follows:

The State v. B. F. Thompson and others. Indictment for residing in the Cherokee Nation without license. Verdict, Guilty.

The State v. Elizur Butler, Samuel A. Worcester and others. Indictment for residing in the Cherokee Nation without license. Verdict, Guilty.

The defendants in both of the above cases shall be kept in close custody by the sheriff of this county until they can be transported to the penitentiary of this State, and the keeper thereof is hereby directed to receive them, and each of them, into his custody, and keep them, and each of them, at hard labour in said penitentiary, for and during the term of four years.

A writ of error was issued on the application of the plaintiff in error, on the 27th of October 1831, which, with the following proceedings thereon, was returned to this court.

United States of America, The President of the United States to the honourable the judges of the Superior Court for the County of Gwinnett, in the State of Georgia, greeting:

Because in the record and proceedings, as also in the rendition of the judgment of a plea which is in the said superior court, for the county of Gwinnett, before you, or some of you, between the State of Georgia, plaintiff, and Samuel A. Worcester, defendant, on an indictment, being the highest court of law in said State in which a decision could be had in said suit, a manifest error hath happened, to the great damage of the said Samuel A. Worcester, as by his complaint appears. We being willing that error, if any hath been, should be duly corrected, and full and speedy justice done to the parties aforesaid in this behalf, do command you, if judgment be therein given that then under your seal distinctly and openly, you send the record and proceedings aforesaid, with all things concerning the same, to the Supreme Court of the United States, together with this writ, so that you have the same at Washington on the second Monday of January next, in the said Supreme Court, to be then and there held; that the record and proceedings aforesaid being inspected, the said Supreme Court may cause further to be done therein, to correct that error, what of right, and according to the laws and custom of the United States, should be done.

Witness, the honourable John Marshall, chief justice of the said Supreme Court, the first Monday of August in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-one.

Source: Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. 515 (1831).