Page:Review of the Proclamation of President Jackson.djvu/28

 Was this pledge violated by any overt act of force? The act was declared to be Treason, and the proper punishment of this crime was announced. If it be true then, as the President in his Proclamation says, that "Treason is an offence against sovereignty, and sovereignty must reside with the power to punish it," the Commonwealth of Virginia which defined this crime against itself, provided for its punishment, and once at least inflicted, it must have been a sovereign. The law of Virginia defining and punishing Treason, is the sanction of the oath of fidelity, and is not less curious and important than the form of that assurance. It is in these words: "If a man do levy war against the Commonwealth in the same, or be adherent to the enemies of the Commonwealth, within the same, giving to them aid and comfort in the Commonwealth, or elsewhere, and thereof be legally convicted of open deed, by the evidence of two sufficient and lawful witnesses, or his own voluntary confession, the cases above rehearsed shall be judged Treason which extendeth to the Commonwealth, and the persons so convicted, and, his or her aiders, abettors and counsellors, being thereof convicted, shall suffer death, by hanging by the neck without benefit of clergy. Also, every person or persons, who shall erect or establish, or cause or procure to be erected or established, any government separate from, or independent of the government of Virginia, within the limits thereof, unless by act of the Legislature of this Commonwealth for that purpose first obtained; or who shall, in any such usurped government, hold or execute any office, legislative, executive, judiciary, or ministerial, by whatever name such office may be distinguished or called; or who shall swear, or otherwise solemnly profess allegiance or fidelity to the same; or who shall, under pretext of authority derived from, or protection afforded by, such usurped government resist or oppose the due execution of the laws of this Commonwealth, shall be adjudged guilty of high Treason, and shall be proceeded against, and punished in the same manner as other Traitors may be proceeded against and punished."—[See Revised Code of 1819, Vol. I., p. 591.]

The scholar may read the rough English of some parts of this statute, as he does the bald and confessedly bad Latin of Magna Cliarta, with a contemptuous But if ever a sovereign, she