« Back to Explore

Cases

Habeas petitions described a broad range of carceral, institutional, and interpersonal confinement over the long nineteenth century, including those used to demand due process, resist enslavement, challenge child removal and reservation confinement, avoid deportation, present child custody claims and protest child marriage, and to challenge institutionalization and detention in private and state institutions. As a legal mechanism borrowed from British common law and guaranteed as a civil right in US federal and state constitutions, habeas provides a lens on a diverse community of legal actors.

Our encoding practice allows us to identify petitions in these three categories and to indicate where those categories overlap. In addition to these three general categories, our team has identified the specific carceral charge being challenged as well as the particular forms of institutional and interpersonal confinements being questioned.

You may also browse or search petitions by location and/or jurisdiction to learn more about the myriad complaints petitioners brought before judges in Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oregon, and Washington between 1812 and 1924. Each case entry includes a full citation, a summary, links to people with a role in the case, a list of other people named, and any sites of significance. Visitors wanting access to full case files can contact the cited repository for information about obtaining copies. Those without institutional affiliations may request image scans from Dr. Jagodinsky directly. The Glossary defines the attributes used to structure data from the habeas petitions. The Code Book explains the relational structure of the data and functionality of the database website.

Newspaper report on the May 28, 1924 ruling with the headline 'Woman Denied Divorce.' Full text in Katie's story.

Featured story: The Habeas Corpus and Divorce Proceedings of Katie Mayes

Filter by:

Clear Filters

11 results

Download JSON Download CSV

In the Matter of the Application of John Matthews for a Writ of Habeas Corpus

Earliest record date: August 31, 1919
Petition type(s): Carceral: immigration | Carceral: public charge | Carceral: moral turpitude

In the Matter of the Application of Yaichiro Goto, otherwise known as Yaichiro Matsuo, for a Writ of Habeas Corpus

Earliest record date: March 21, 1921
Petition type(s): Carceral: immigration | Carceral: public charge | Carceral: moral turpitude
Petition outcome: Petition denied
Fate of bound party: Deported | remained in custody