HKB
[27] See Pitkin's History, pp. 42, 47.
[28] The inhabitants of Massachusetts had deviated from the forms which are preserved in the criminal and civil procedure of England: in 1650 the decrees of justice were not yet headed by the royal style. See Hutchinson, vol. i., p. 452.
[29] Code of 1650, p. 28. Hartford, 1830.
[30] See also in Hutchinson's History, vol. i., pp. 435, 456, the analysis of the penal code adopted in 1648, by the colony of Massachusetts: this code is drawn up on the same principles as that of Connecticut.
[31] Adultery was also punished with death by the law of Massachusetts; and Hutchinson, vol. i., p. 441, says that several persons actually suffered for this crime. He quotes a curious anecdote on this subject, which occurred in the year 1663. A married woman had had criminal intercourse with a young man; her husband died, and she married the lover. Several years had elapsed, when the public began to suspect the previous intercourse of this couple; they were thrown into prison, put upon trial, and very narrowly escaped capital punishment.
[32] Code of 1650, p. 48. It seems sometimes to have happened that the judge superadded these punishments to each other, as is seen in a sentence pronounced in 1643 (New Haven Antiquities, p. 114), by which Margaret Bedford, convicted of loose conduct, was condemned to be whipped, and afterward to marry Nicolas Jemmings her accomplice.
[33] New Haven Antiquities, p. 104. See also Hutchinson's History for several causes equally extraordinary.
[34] Code of 1650, pp. 50, 57.
[35] Ibid, p. 64.
[36] Ibid, p. 44.
[37] This was not peculiar to Connecticut. See for instance the law which, on the 13th of September, 1644, banished the ana-baptists from the state of Massachusetts. (Historical Collection of State Papers, vol. i., p. 538.) See also the law against the quakers, passed on the 14th of October, 1656. "Whereas," says the preamble, "an accursed race of heretics called quakers has sprung up," &c. The clauses of the statute inflict a heavy fine on all captains of ships who should import quakers into the country. The quakers who may be found there shall be whipped and imprisoned with hard labor. Those members of the sect who should defend their opinions shall be first fined, then imprisoned, and finally driven out of the province. (Historical Collection of State Papers, vol. i., p. 630.)
[38] By the penal law of Massachusetts, any catholic priest who should set foot in the colony after having been once driven out of it, was liable to capital punishment.
[39] Code of 1650, p. 96.
[40] New England's Memorial, p. 316. See Appendix E.
[41] Constitution of 1638, p. 17.
[42] In 1641 the general assembly of Rhode Island unanimously declared that the government of the state was a democracy, and that the power was vested in the body of free citizens, who alone had the right to make the laws and to watch their execution. Code of 1650, p. 70.
[43] Pitkin's History, p. 47.
[44] Constitution of 1638, p. 12.
[45] Code of 1650, p 80.
[46] Code of 1650, p. 78.
[47] Code of 1750, p. 94.
[48] Ibid, p. 86.
[49] See Hutchinson's History, vol. i. p. 455.
[50] Ibid, p. 40.
[51] Code of 1650, p. 90.
[52] Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana, vol. ii., p. 13. This speech was made by Winthrop; he was accused of having committed arbitrary actions during his magistracy, but after having made the speech of which the above is a fragment, he was acquitted by acclamation, and from that time forward he was always re-elected governor of the state. See Marshall, vol. i., p. 166.
[53] See Appendix F.
[54] Crimes no doubt exist for which bail is inadmissible, but they are few in number.
[55] See Blackstone; and Delolme, book i., chap. x.