The Western District of Arkansas, based at Fort Smith on the Arkansas-Indian Territory border, held jurisdiction over federal crimes in Indian Territory. Before 1875, that jurisdiction had been exercised inadequately, and the court itself had been plagued by corruption under its previous judge. Indian Territory’s reputation as a place where federal law could not easily reach was, for these reasons, not entirely unfounded. It attracted people who wanted to operate beyond the reach of state and federal authorities.
Into this situation, in May 1875, arrived Isaac C. Parker.
Parker had been appointed by President Ulysses Grant to preside over the Western District of Arkansas. He arrived at Fort Smith on May 4, 1875, and held his first session of court on May 10. He was thirty-six years old, a former congressman from Missouri, and he came with both a mandate to restore the court’s reputation and a clear understanding that Indian Territory required a different approach than a judge in a settled eastern jurisdiction would need.
Parker’s court covered, at its peak jurisdiction, roughly 75,000 square miles. He immediately ordered U.S. Marshal James Fagan to recruit a force of deputy marshals capable of actually policing that territory. Fagan was authorized to hire up to 200 deputies. Parker’s court began, in its first term, with eight murder convictions, leading to six executions on the Fort Smith gallows in September 1875. Parker would be known for the rest of his life as the Hanging Judge — a reputation he did not entirely welcome, given that he consistently argued for crime prevention over punishment.