Dushane v. Benedict was a United States Supreme Court case that addressed the issue of whether a state court had the authority to issue a writ of habeas corpus to a prisoner who was being held in a federal prison. The case arose when a prisoner, Dushane, was held in a federal prison in California. Dushane sought a writ of habeas corpus from the state court, claiming that he was being held in violation of his constitutional rights. The state court granted the writ, and the federal government appealed the decision to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court held that the state court did not have the authority to issue a writ of habeas corpus to a prisoner held in a federal prison. The Court reasoned that the writ of habeas corpus was a federal remedy, and that the state court did not have the power to interfere with the federal government's authority to imprison individuals. The Court also noted that the writ of habeas corpus was a remedy that could only be used to challenge the legality of a prisoner's detention, and not to challenge the conditions of the prisoner's confinement. The Court's decision in Dushane v. Benedict established that state courts do not have the authority to issue writs of habeas corpus to prisoners held in federal prisons. The decision also clarified the scope of the writ of habeas corpus, and established that it could only be used to challenge the legality of a prisoner's detention, and not to challenge the conditions of the prisoner's confinement.

Justice Field delivered the dissenting opinion in Dushane v. Benedict, arguing that the Court should not have granted a writ of error to review the case. He argued that it was an action for damages brought by one party against another and did not involve any federal question or constitutional issue, so there was no basis for granting a writ of error from the Supreme Court. Furthermore, he noted that even if there had been some federal questions raised in this case, they were all decided correctly by both lower courts and thus would be unlikely to result in any different outcome at the Supreme Court level. As such, Justice Field concluded that it would be inappropriate for them to grant a writ of error since doing so could set dangerous precedent which might lead other litigants into believing their cases could also receive similar treatment when they lacked sufficient merit or legal standing before either state or federal court systems.