general superintendence and direction over the attorneys and marshals of all the districts in the United States and the Territories as to the manner of discharging their respective duties; and the several district attorneys and marshals are required to report to the Attorney-General an account of their official proceedings, and of the state and condition of their respective offices, in such time and manner as the Attorney-General may direct.”  Section 788, R.S., provides that “the marshals and their deputies shall have, in each State, the same powers in executing the laws of the United States as the sheriffs and their deputies in such State may have, by law, in executing the laws thereof.”  By section 817 of the penal code of California the sheriff is a “peace officer,” and by section 4176 of the political code he is “to preserve the peace” and “prevent and suppress breaches of the peace.”  The marshal is, therefore, under the provisions of the statute cited, “a peace officer,” so far as keeping the peace in any matter wherein the powers of the United States are concerned, and as to such matters he has all the powers of the sheriff, as peace officer under the laws of the State.  He is, in such matters, “to preserve the peace” and “prevent and suppress breaches of the peace.”  An assault upon or an assassination of a judge of a United States court while engaged in any matter pertaining to his official duties, on account or by reason of his judicial decisions, or action in performing his official duties, is a breach of the peace, affecting the authority and interests of the United States, and within the jurisdiction and power of the marshal or his deputies to prevent as a peace officer of the National Government.  Such an assault is not merely an assault upon the person of the judge as a man; it is an assault upon the national judiciary, which he represents, and through it an assault upon the authority of the nation itself.  It is, necessarily, a breach of the national peace.  As a national peace officer, under the conditions indicated, it is the duty of the marshal and his deputies to prevent a breach of the national peace by an assault upon the authority of the United States, in the person of a judge of its highest court, while in the discharge of his duty.  If this be not so, in the language of the Supreme Court, “Why do we have marshals at all?” What useful functions can they perform in the economy of the National Government?

Section 787 of the Revised Statutes also declares that “It shall be the duty of the marshal of each district to attend the District and Circuit Courts when sitting therein, and to execute throughout the district all lawful precepts directed to him and issued under the authority of the United States, and he shall have power to command all necessary assistance in the execution of his duty.”  There is no more authority specifically conferred upon the marshal by this section to protect the judge from assassination in open court, without a specific order or command,