Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/358

 350 not be denied. As treason is a crime levelled at the immediate existence of society, when the laws have once ascertained the guilt of the offender, there would seem to be a fitness in referring the expediency of an act of mercy towards him to the judgment of the legislature. But there are strong reasons also against it. Even in such cases a single magistrate, of prudence and sound sense, would be better fitted, than a numerous assembly, in such delicate conjunctures, to weigh the motives for and against the remission of the punishment, and to ascertain all the facts without undue influence. The responsibility would be more felt, and more direct. Treason, too, is a crime, that will often be connected with seditions, embracing a large portion of a particular community; and might under such circumstances, and especially where parties were nearly poised, find friends and favourites, as well as enemies and opponents, in the councils of the nation. So, that the chance of an impartial judgment might be less probable in such bodies, than in a single person at the head of the nation.

§ 1494. A still more satisfactory reason is, that the legislature is not always in session; and that their proceedings must be necessarily slow, and are generally not completed, until after long delays. The inexpediency of deferring the execution of any criminal sentence, until a long and indefinite time after a conviction, is felt in all communities. It destroys one of the best effects of punishment, that, which arises from a prompt and certain administration of justice following close upon the offence. If the legislature is invested with