Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 06.djvu/577

* DUELING. 501 DUE PROCESS OF LAW. cities there is no pretense to enforce the laws. In every tiennan royinicnt there is a court of honor, io Jcterniine all involveJ points of per- sonal or rojiiniental honor, and to decide upon the procedure demanded hy the circumstances. Where the result is a duel, and the civil authori- ties do not take any cognizance of the ali'air, the military authorities themselves rarely act. It is a point of honor, however, with the individ- ual officer to satisfy the regimental code, regard- less of any punishment, civil or military, that may afterwards he meted out to him. The prac- tice of dueling is common throughout all the armies of Continental Europe, although in most countries it is prohibited hy law. From the lime of Queen Elizabeth various legislative attempts have been made in Great Britain to ])ut an end to dueling, but without avail. Under the common law. the act of killing in a duel is regarded as murder, however fair the duel may have been: hut so long as public opinion approved the duel it was generally found impossible to induce a jury to convict. In 1844 rigid army rules were established to prevent dueling, and within the last half-century but few duels have occurred in England. How eonuuon dtieling formerly was. both in Great Britain and America, may be inferred from the number of prominent political leaders who participated in duels. The dukes of York, Norfolk, Kichmond. and Wellington, lords Shel- burne, Talbot. Lauderdale, Townshend, Paget, Londonderry. Castlereagh, and Fox, Pitt. Sheri- dan. Canning, Hastings, Grattan. Curran, and O'Connell all fought duels. In the United States, Charles Lee and .John Laurens, Cadwallader and Conway, General Mcintosh and Gwinnett, of the Revolutionary period, and Burr and Hamilton, Jack.son and Dickinson. Benton and Lucas. Clay and Randolph, De Witt Clinton and Swartout, and Cilley and Graves, fought duels. In no part of the world was dueling so earnestly engaged in as in America. Combats under all sorts of con- ditions, and with every conceivable variety of weapon, and in the great majority of instances fights fatal to one or both combatants were of frequent occurrence, and largely because of this was precipitated the legislation which finally succeeded in stamping out the custom. Laws now exist in all States of the Union against dueling. In some cases the punishment is death, in others imprisonment, and in others disqualification to hold office. A bill prohibiting dueling in the District of Columbia was passed in 1839. At the beginning of the twentieth century the custom was almost universally prohibited by law. although countenanced, if not actually de- manded, by officers, both naval and military, professional incn and I he upper circles generally, of Continental European society. Organized ef- forts are now being made, however, to attack the custom in its own stronghold and among the peo- ple who still practice and cherish its traditions. The [ntnrii'itioiifil Leiirfue, inaugurated in IflOO by Prince .Alfonso of Bourbon and .Austria- Este, has been organized with the declared in- tention of "setting right in the acceptation of society the sense of the words coiior>licc and rnurnfie, when used in connection with dueling." The French branch of the league is imder the ■direction of M. Joseph du Bourg, and although its inlluence is as yet very limited, it has had the support of Jl. Paul de Cassagnac, formerly a well - known duelist, and was considerably aided by the refusal, in 1001, of Licait.-Col. the -Manpiis d'Elln'c to accept Ihc challenge of the .lari|uis dc Chauvclin. Early in 1902 the league succeeded in forming a tribunal of honor in Paris, which consists of fourteen members, six of whom are military or naval officers, and wliose duties are to decide all disputed points without recourse to the duel. In the French provinces similar tril)unals have also been organized, and have already justified their existence. The anti- duelist movement in Germany is under the active direction of the Prince of Lijwenstcin. and is very strong mnncrically and influcntially. Its mem- bership includes nol)lemcn. soldiers, civilians, and university professors and students. The league jiublishes a representative periodical, and is championed by nearly every prominent news- paper in the Empire. In Italy, the Jtarquis Crispolti has been intrusted with the leadership of the movement, which, however, was not com- menced until late in 1002. On February 14, 1002. the Spanish Republican Fusion Party, at Valencia, passed a resolution condenming the duel as contrary to civilization, and forbidding members of the party from taking any part in a duel, either as principal or second. DUE PROCESS OF LAW. A phrase used in the Federal Constitution and in the constitutions of many of the United States as the legal equiva- lent of "law of the land.' in JIagna Charta (q.v. ). Some of our State constitutions contain both phrases, while others employ the words 'due course of law,' or 'due course of the law of the land.' All of these forms of expression are an- cient, and have long been tinderstood to have the same meaning. They were used interchangeably in a scries of statutes enacted under Edward III. {5 Edw. III., ch. 9; 2.5 id., ch. 4; 28 id., eh. .3), and were pronotinced by Lord Coke to be legal equivalents. The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constittition declares that "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or prop- erty without due process of law," and the Four- leenth Anundment contains this clause: "Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or ])roperty, without due process of law." By tills plirasc is meant law- in its regular course of administration throtigh the courts of justice; tliat is. law administered according to those rules and principles which have been established by our jurisprudence for the protection and enforce- ment of private rights: law which hears before it condemns, which proceeds upon due and orderly inquiry, and renders judgment only after trial. This iirinciple of constitutional law applies as well to the legislative and executive branches of government as to the judiciary. Neither Congress nor a State Legislature can lawfully deprive a per- son of life, liberty, or projierty by arbitrary en- actment. A statute attempting to do that would not be a law of the land: it would be unconstitu- tional and void. The same would be true of a like provision in a State Constitution. To quote from a decision of the .Supreme Court of Mis- souri : "It is as much out of the power of a State to deprive an owner of his property without due process of law through the medium of a consti- tutional convention as it would be thus to de- prive him by an ordinary act of legislation."