666 



TREASON. 



suffered death, under a conviction for high treason. 

 Jn the same rei^n, u gentleman, whose favourite 

 buck had been killed by the kinir. in hunting, said, 

 in his vexation, lie \vi>hed its horns in the belly of 

 the person who had counselled the king to kill it ; 

 and, as the king had killed it of his own accord, 

 and was so his own counsellor, this expression was 

 con -trued to be high treason, for which the party 

 suffered death ; though one of the justices of the 

 court in which the judgment was given, justice 

 Markham, chose rather to leave his place on the 

 bench, than to assent to such a judgment. Those 

 convictions were had under the species of treason, 

 which consists in compassing or imagining the 

 king's death. It was under the same description 

 of this crime, and in pursuance of a still broader 

 interpretation of it, that Dionysius, the tyrant of 

 Syracuse, ordered a man to be executed, for dream- 

 ing of the tyrant's death, on the pretence, that he 

 would dream of only that which had occupied his 

 waking thoughts. This was construing to be trea- 

 son what was not even the act or thought of the 

 party executed. But, when some act of the party 

 accused has been considered requisite to constitute 

 this crime, instances have occurred, of constructive 

 treasons, which were little more than dreams. Al- 

 gernon Sidney was condemned in the court of king's 

 bench for treason, while the infamous Jeffreys was 

 chief justice, and executed in pursuance of the 

 sentence, in the time of Charles II., on the proof 

 of some abstract speculations on the subject of 

 government, found in his hand-writing, in his pri- 

 vate cabinet, and not proved to have been shown 

 to any other person, or intended for publication. 

 These were construed to be an act of treason, be- 

 cause scribere est agere (to write is to act) ; and, 

 upon this construction, he was executed for what 

 was little more, in a juridical view, than a waking 

 dream reduced to writing. The legislation of par- 

 liament, during the reign of Henry VIII., seconded 

 the capricious and arbitrary disposition of that 

 monarch, by creating a multitude of descriptions of 

 high treason, such as stealing cattle by Welshmen; 

 counterfeiting foreign coin ; wilful poisoning; exe- 

 crations against the king, and calling opprobrious 

 names by public writing ; licentious solicitation of 

 the queen or a princess ; a woman's becoming mar- 

 ried to the king without first disclosing any devia- 

 tions from chastity, which she might have com- 

 mitted; judging or believing the king to have been 

 lawfully married to Anne of Cleves; derogating 

 from the king's royal style or title; assembling 

 riotously, to the number of twelve, and not dis- 

 persing on proclamation. It would be tedious to 

 enumerate all the acts, which by legislative enact- 

 ments or judicial construction, have been brought 

 under the denomination of treason, and, on the 

 imputation of which, men have been barbarously 

 put to death. 



The present law of treason in England rests sub- 

 stantially upon the statute of the twenty-fifth year 

 of Edward III., which comprehends seven des- 

 criptions, viz. 1. compassing or imagining the king's 

 death ; 2. violation of the king's companion (mean- 

 ing the queen), his eldest daughter, unmarried, or 

 the wife of his eldest son and heir; 3. levying war 

 against the king, in his realm ; 4. adhering to his 

 enemies in his realm, and giving them aid and com- 

 fort in the realm or elsewhere ; 5. counterfeiting 

 the great or privy seal; 6. counterfeiting the 

 money of the realm, or bringing into the 'realm any 

 counterfeit of the national coin ; and, 7. skying 



the chancellor, treasurer, either of the justices of 

 the court of king's bench or common pleas, or of 

 the justices in eyre or of assize, when in the dis- 

 charge of their judicial functions, in open court. 

 To the provisions of this statute others have been 

 added, by other statutes, relating, 1. to Papists; 

 2. to falsifying the coin ; 3. to the Protestant suc- 

 cession in the house of Hanover. Some of these 

 laws have become obsolete by the extinction of 

 the Pretender's branch of the reigning family, ;m<l 

 the laws in relation to Popery have been materially 

 modified and mitigated. 



It is evident, from the preceding enumeration of 

 acts, now or heretofore considered in Britain as 

 constituting treason, that this is a subject of legis- 

 lation and juridical administration, in which the 

 liberty of the subject or citizen is very deeply con- 

 cerned. " The natural inclination," says Mr 

 Rawle, " of those who possess power, is to in- 

 crease it. History shows that to enlarge the 

 description of treason has often been resorted 

 to, as one of the means of increasing power." 

 The governors, whether for life or fixed periods, or 

 by hereditary right, or election, or merely the right 

 of the strongest, in estimating what acts of disre- 

 spect, indignity, or hostilities to themselves, or to 

 the government of which they, for the time being, 

 form a part, shall be considered as treachery to 

 the state, and a dissolution of the ties of allegiance 

 are, very naturally, liable to err on the side of ex- 

 aggerating the treasonable character and tendency 

 of conduct. As far, therefore, as the influence of 

 self-esteem, and a love of the exercise of power, are 

 to be guarded against, it is important to limit the 

 discretion of the governors, in putting a construc- 

 tion upon the conduct of the governed, in this 

 respect. 



The punishment of treason is nothing less than 

 death, and, by the laws of some states, a peculiarly 

 cruel death ; as in the cases of Ravaillac and Da- 

 meins in France. The English law condemns the 

 convict to be drawn to the place of execution, there 

 hanged, and cut down alive, and embowelled, and 

 his entrails burned while he is yet alive; then he is 

 to be beheaded and quartered. But the more bar- 

 barous and revolting parts of this punishment are 

 usually remitted, the convict being drawn to the 

 place of execution, it is true, but on a hurdle, and 

 not on the ground, and, when he arrives there, is 

 simply beheaded. By the English law, a conviction 

 of treason works forfeiture of lands and goods to 

 the crown, and attainder of blood ; so that no per- 

 son can inherit an estate to which he must derive a 

 title through the person convicted of this crime. 

 This attainder may be reversed, that is, the punish- 

 ment of the traitor's heirs for his offence may be re- 

 mitted by act of parliament, as was done in respect 

 to the heirs of Algernon Sydney. In the French 

 code penal, the term high treason no longer occurs. 

 Crimes against the peace and safety of France, and 

 against the person of the king, or of the royal family, 

 are punished with death and the confiscation of pro- 

 perty (Code Penal, A. 75102). The Prussian 

 code defines high treason as that crime which lias 

 for its object a subversion, by violence, of the 

 government of the state, or which is directed against 

 the life or liberty of its sovereign, and is distin- 

 guished, both from the Landesverr'dtherei, 100 (by 

 which the state is exposed to danger from foreign 

 powers), and from crimes against the internal tran- 

 quillity and security of the state, and from the cri- 

 men lasa majestatis, or of personal injury to the 



