sheriff's, constables, and all other officers and subjects;" so that, in short, it is directed to every subject in the king's dominions. Every one with this writ may be a tyrant; if this commission be legal, a tyrant in a legal manner, also, may control, imprison, or murder any one within the realm. In the next place, it is perpetual; there is no return. A man is accountable to no person for his doings. Every man may reign secure in his petty tyranny, and spread terror and desolation around him, until the trump of the archangel shall excite different emotions in his soul. In the third place, a person with this writ, in the daytime, may enter all houses, shops, etc., at will, and command all to assist him. Fourthly, by this writ, not only deputies, etc., but even their menial servants, are allowed to lord it over us. What is this but to have the curse of Canaan with a witness on us; to be the servant of servants, the most despicable of God's creation? Now, one of the most essential branches of English liberty is the freedom of one's house. A man's house is his castle; and whilst he is quiet, he is as well guarded as a prince in his castle. This writ, if it should be declared legal, would totally annihilate this privilege. Custom-house officers may enter our houses when they please; we are commanded to permit their entry. Their menial servants may enter, may break locks, bars, and everything in their way: and whether they break through malice or revenge, no man, no court can inquire. Bare suspicion without oath is sufficient.

To show another absurdity in this writ, if it should be established, I insist upon it every person, by the 14th Charles II., has this power as well as the custom-house officers. The words are, "it shall be lawful for any person or persons authorized,” etc. What a scene does this open! Every man prompted by revenge, ill-humor, or wantonness to inspect the inside of his neighbor's house, may get a writ of assistance. Others will ask it from self-defense; one arbitrary exertion will provoke another, until society be involved in tumult and in blood.

Again, these writs are not returned. Writs in their nature are temporary things; but these live forever; no one can be called to account. Thus reason and the constitution are both against this writ.

Let us see what authority there is for it. Not more than one instance can be found of it in all our law books; and that was in the zenith of arbitrary power, namely, in the reign of Charles II., when Star-Chamber powers were pushed to extremity by some ignorant clerk of the Exchequer. But had this writ been in any book whatever, it would have been illegal. All precedents are under the control of the principles of law. Lord Talbot says it is better to observe these than any precedents, though in the House of Lords, the last resort of the subject. No acts of Parliament can establish such a writ; though it should be made in the very words of the petition, it would be void. An act against the constitution is void. (See Viner.) [Charles Viner was the author of A General Abridgement of Law and Equity, in 23 vols., published in England, 1742-53.] But these prove no more than what I before observed, that special writs may be granted on oath and probable suspicion. The Act of 7 and 8 William III., that the officers of the Plantations shall have the same powers, etc., is confined to this sense, that an officer should show probable ground, should take his oath to it, should do this before a magistrate, and that such a magistrate, if he thinks proper, should issue a special warrant to a constable to search the places. That of 6 Anne can prove no more.

2. JOHN ADAMS, OF MASSACHUSETTS.- ON THE BOS

TON MASSACRE

(Delivered at Boston, November, 1770.)

THE "Boston Massacre" is a good illustration of the increased tension of feeling between the colonists and the representatives of the English government which was produced by ten years of friction and agitation. After many minor affrays, a picket guard from the two regiments which had been stationed at Boston since 1768, were provoked (on March 5, 1770) into firing upon a crowd, killing several persons and wounding others. The officer and soldiers concerned were indicted and tried for murder. John Adams and Josiah Quincy, braving public opinion, undertook the defense of the accused. Quincy opened for the defense in a speech of much power and eloquence; Adams, in closing, confined himself to "a clear recapitulation of the common law in cases of homicide." The accused were all acquitted except two, who were convicted of manslaughter and lightly punished.

The interest felt in the trial was so great that the then difficult task of a stenographic report of it was attempted. The notes, however, proved so imperfect that Adams struck out the greater part of the report of his speech, and the

JOHN ADAMS. Born in Massachusetts, 1735; graduated from Harvard College, 1755; began to practice law, 1758; argued against the Stamp Act before the Massachusetts Supreme Court, 1765; elected to the legislature, 1770; in Continental Congress, 1774, 1775, 1776; in American diplomatic service abroad, 1778-79, 1779-88; Vice President, 1789-97; President, 1797-1801; died, 1826.

published volume thus contains only the outline of what he said. The Marquis di Beccaria, mentioned in the beginning of the oration, was an Italian writer who published a celebrated treatise On Crimes and Punishments, of which an English translation appeared two years before this trial. Adams's telling use of the passage quoted in his simple exordium produced, we are told, “an electrical effect upon the immense and excited auditory." (Adams, Works, II, p. 238.) Wemms, Killroy, and Montgomery, mentioned in the extracts below, were among the soldiers indicted; Gray, Attucks, and Carr were numbered among their victims. The documents and speeches may be most conveniently found in Kidder's History of the Boston Massacre (Albany, 1870).

[JOHN ADAMS, in the old State House, at Boston, in November, 1770.]

M1

AY IT PLEASE YOUR HONORS, and you, GentLEMEN OF THE JURY: I am for the prisoners at the bar, and shall apologize for it only in the words of the Marquis Beccaria: "If I can but be the instrument of preserving one life, his blessings and tears of transport shall be a sufficient consolation to me for the contempt of all mankind." As the prisoners stand before you for their lives, it may be proper to recollect with what temper the law requires we should proceed to this trial. The form of proceeding at their arraignment has discovered that the spirit of the law upon such occasions is conformable to humanity, to common sense and feeling; that it is all benignity and candor. And the trial commences with the prayer of the court, expressed by the clerk, to the Supreme Judge of judges, empires, and worlds, "God send you a good deliverance."

We find, in the rules laid down by the greatest English judges, who have been the brightest of mankind, [that] we are to look upon it as more beneficial that many guilty per

sons should escape unpunished than one innocent person should suffer. The reason is, because it is of more importance to the community that innocence should be protected than it is that guilt should be punished; for guilt and crimes are so frequent in the world that all of them cannot be punished; and many times they happen in such a manner that it is not of much consequence to the public whether they are punished or not. But when innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, especially to die, the subject will exclaim, It is immaterial to me whether I behave well or ill, for virtue itself is no security. And if such a sentiment as this should take place in the mind of the subject, there would be an end to all security whatI shall take it for granted, as a first principle, that the eight prisoners at the bar had better be all acquitted, though we should admit them all to be guilty, than that any one of them should, by your verdict, be found guilty, being innocent.

soever.

I shall now consider the several divisions of law, under which the evidence will arrange itself.

The action now before you is homicide; that is, the killing of one man by another. The law calls it homicide; but it is not criminal in all cases for one man to slay another. Had the prisoners been on the Plains of Abraham [at Quebec] and slain an hundred Frenchmen apiece, the English law would have considered it as a commendable action, virtuous and praiseworthy; so that every instance of killing a man is not a crime in the eye of the law. There are many other instances which I cannot enumerateofficer that executes a person under sentence of death, etc. So that, gentlemen, every instance of one man's killing another is not a crime, much less a crime to be punished with death. But to descend to some more particulars.

-an

The law divides homicide into three branches: the first is justifiable, the second excusable, and the third felonious. Felonious homicide is subdivided into two branches: the first is murder, which is killing with malice aforethought;