an object. These intentions, he is confident, were legal and laudable; and if, in any part of his conduct, he swerved from this line, it was an error of his judgment and not of his heart.

And the said respondent for plea to the said fourth article of impeachment, saith, that he is not guilty of any high crime and misdemeanor, as in and by the said fourth article is alleged against him, and this he prays, may be inquired of by this honorable Court, in such manner as law and justice shall seem to require.

The fifth article of impeachment charges this respondent with having awarded "a capias against the body of the said James Thompson Callender, indicted for an offence not capital, whereupon the said Callender was arrested and committed to close custody, contrary to law in that case made and provided."

This charge is rested, 1st, on the act of Congress of September 24, 1789, entitled "An act to establish the judicial courts of the United States," by which it is enacted "that for any crime or offence against the United States, the offender may be arrested, imprisoned, or bailed, agreeably to the usual mode of process, in the State where such offender may be found." And, 2dly, on a law of the State of Virginia, which is said to provide that upon presentment by any grand jury, of an offence not capital, the court shall order the clerk to issue a summons against the person or persons so offending, to appear and answer such presentment at the next court." It is contended, in support of this charge, that the act of Congress above-mentioned made the State law the rule of proceeding, and that the State law was violated by issuing a capias against Callender, instead of a summons.

The first observation to be made on this part of the case is, that the date of the law of Virginia is not mentioned in the article. A very material omission! For it cannot be contended, that by the act of Congress in question, which was passed for establishing the laws of the United States, and regulating their proceedings, it was intended to render those proceedings dependent on all future acts of the State Legislatures. The intention certainly was to adopt, to a certain limited extent, the regulations existing in the States at the time of passing the act. Consequently, a law of Virginia, passed after this act, can have no operation on the proceedings under it. But by refer ring to the law of Virginia in question, it will be found to bear date on November 13. 1792, more than three years after this act of Congress, by which it is said to have been adopted. But the omission of the date of this law of Virginia is not the most material oversight which has been made in citing it. Its title is, "An act directing the method of proceeding against free persons charged with certain crimes," &c., and it enacts, section 28th, "that upon presentment made by the grand jury, of an offence not capital, the court shall order the clerk to issue a summons, or other proper process, against the person or persons so presented, to appear and answer at the next court." It will be observed that these words, "or other proper

process," which leave it perfectly in the discretion of the court what process shall issue, provided it be such as is proper for bringing the of fender to answer to the presentment, are omitted in this article of impeachment.

From these words it is perfectly manifest that the law of Virginia, admitting it to apply, did not order a summons to be issued, but left it perfectly in the discretion of the court to issue a summons, or such other process as they should judge proper. It is, therefore, a sufficient answer to this article to say, that this respondent considered a capias as the proper process, and therefore ordered it to issue; which he admits that he did immediately after the presentment was found against the said Callender by the grand jury.

This he is informed, and expects to prove, has been the construction of this law by the courts of Virginia, and their general practice. Indeed it would be most strange if any other construction or practice had been adopted. There are many offences not capital, which are of a very dangerous tendency, and on which very severe punishment is inflicted by the laws of Virginia; and to enact by law that in all such cases, however notorious or profligate the offenders might be, the courts should be obliged, after a presentment by a grand jury, to proceed against them by summons, would be to enact, that as soon as their guilt was rendered extremely probable, by the presentment of a grand jury, they should receive regular notice to escape from punishment by flight or concealment.

It will also appear, as this respondent believes, by a reference to the laws and practice of Virginia, into which he has made all the inquiries which circumstances and the shortness of time allowed him for preparing his answer would permit, that all the cases in which a summons is considered as the only proper process, are cases of petty offences, which, on the presentment of a grand jury, are to be tried by the court in a summary way, without the intervention of a petit jury. Therefore these provisions had no application to the case of Callender, which could be no otherwise proceeded on than by indictment, and trial on the indictment by a petit jury.

It must be recollected that the act of Congress of September 24, 1789, enacts, section 14, that the courts of the United States shall have power to issue writs of scire facias, habeas corpus, and all other writs not specially provided for by statute, which may be necessary for the exercise of their respective jurisdictions, and agreeable to the principles and usages of laws." Consequently, the circuit court, where the proceedings in question took place, had power to issue a capias against the traverser, on the presentment, unless the State law above-mentioned governed the case, and contained something to restrain the issuing of that writ in such a case. This respondent contends, for the reasons above stated, that this State law neither applied to the case, nor contained anything to prevent the issuing of a capias, if it had applied.

Thus it appears that this respondent, in order

ing a capias to issue against Callender, decided correctly, as it certainly was his intention to do. But he claims no other merit than that of upright intention in this decision; for when he made the decision, he was utterly ignorant that such a law existed in Virginia; and declares he never heard of it till this article was reported by a committee of the House of Representatives during the present session of Congress. This law was not mentioned on the trial either by the counsel or the traverser, or by Judge Griffin, who certainly had much better opportunities of knowing it than this respondent, and who, no doubt, would have cited it had they known it and considered it as applicable to the case. This respondent well knows that, in a criminal view, ignorance of the law excuses no man in offending against it; but this maxim applies not to the decision of a judge; in whom ignorance of the law in general would certainly be a disqualification for this office, though not a crime; but ignorance of a particular act of assembly, of a State where he was an utter stranger, must be considered as a very pardonable error, especially as the counsel for the prisoner, to whose case that law is supposed to have applied, forebore or omitted to cite it; and as a judge of the State, always resident in it and long conversant with its local laws, either forgot this law, or considered it as inapplicable.

Such is the answer which this respondent makes to the fifth article of impeachment. If he erred in this case, it was through ignorance of the law, and surely ignorance under such circum stances cannot be a crime, much less a crime and misdemeanor, for which he ought to be removed from his office. If a judge were impeachable for acting against law from ignorance only, it would follow that he would be punished in the same manner for deciding against law wilfully, and for deciding against it through mistake. In other words, there would be no distinction between ignorance and design, between error and corruption. And the said respondent, for plea to the said fifth article of impeachment, saith, that he is not guilty of any high crime and misdemeanor, as in and by the said fifth article is alleged against him; and this he prays may be inquired of by this honorable Court, in such manner as law and justice shall seem to them to require.

The sixth article of impeachment alleges that this respondent, "with intent to oppress and procure the conviction of the said James Thompson Callender, did, at the court aforesaid, rule and adjudge the said Callender to trial, during the term at which he, the said Callender, was presented and indicted, contrary to the law in that case made and provided."

This charge also is founded, 1st, on the act of Congress of September 24, 1789, above-mentioned, which enacts, section 34, "that the laws of the severa! States, except where the Constitution, treaties, or statutes of the United States shall otherwise provide, shall be regarded as the rules of decision, in trials at common law, in the courts of the United States, in cases where they apply;" and, 2dly, on a law of the State of Virginia, which

is supposed to provide, "that in cases not capital, the offender shall not be held to answer any presentment of a grand jury, until the court next preceding that during which such presentment shall have been made." This law, it is contended, is made the rule of decision by the above-mentioned act of Congress, and was violated by the refusal to continue the case of Callender till the next term.

In answer to this charge this respondent declares, that he was at the time of making the above-mentioned decision wholly ignorant of any such law of Virginia as that in question; that no such law was adduced or mentioned by the counsel of Callender, in support of their motion for a continuance; neither when they first made it, before this respondent sitting alone, nor when they renewed it, after Judge Griffin had taken his seat in court; that no such law was mentioned by Judge Griffin, who concurred in overruling the motion for a continuance and ordering on the trial; which he could not have done had he known that such a law existed, or considered it as applicable to the case; and that this respondent never heard of any such law until the articles of impeachment now under consideration were reported, in the course of the present session of Congress, by a committee of the House of Representatives.

A judge is certainly bound to use all proper and reasonable means of obtaining a knowledge of the laws which he is appointed to administer; but, after the use of such means, to overlook, misunderstand, or remain ignorant of some particular law, is at all times a very pardonable error. It is much more so in the case of a Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, holding a circuit court in a particular State, with which he is a stranger, and with the local laws of which he can have enjoyed but very imperfect opportunities of becoming acquainted. It was foreseen by Congress, in establishing the circuit courts of the United States, that difficulties and inconveniences must frequently arise from this source, and to obviate such difficulties, it was provided that the district judge of each State, who having been a resident of the State, and a practitioner in its courts, had all the necessary means of becoming acquainted with its local laws, should form a part of the circuit court in his own State. The Judge of the Supreme Court is expected, with reason, to be well versed in the general laws; but the local laws of the State form the peculiar province of the district judge, who may be justly consid ered as particularly responsible for their due observance. If, in the case in question, this respondent overlooked or misconstrued any local law of the State of Virginia, which ought to have gov erned the case, it was equally overlooked and misunderstood, not only by the prisoner's counsel who made the motion, and whose peculiar duty it was to know the law and bring it into the view of the court, but also by the district judge, who had the best opportunities of knowing and understanding it, and in whom, nevertheless, this oversight or mistake is considered as a venal error.

That this honorable Court may be able to form correctly its judgment, concerning the transaction mentioned in this article, this respondent submits the following statement of it, which he avers to be true, and expects to prove:

On the 27th day of June, 1800, this respondent, as one of the associate justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. presided in the circuit court of the United States, then held at Newcastle, in and for the district of Delaware, and was assisted by Gunning Bedford, Esq., then district judge of the United States for that district. At the opening of the court on that day, this respond ent, according to his duty and his uniform praetice, delivered a charge to the grand jury, in which he gave in charge to them several statutes of the United States, and, among others, an act of Congress, passed July 14th, 1798, entitled "An act in addition to the act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States," and commonly called the "sedition law." He directed them to inquire concerning any breaches of those statutes, and especially of that commonly called the sedition law, within the district of Delaware. On the same day, before the usual hour of adjournment, the grand jury came into court, and informed the court that they had found no indictment or presentment, and had no business before them, for which reason they wished to be discharged. This respondent replied, that it was earlier than the usual hour of discharging a grand jury; and that business might occur during the sitting of the court. He also asked them if they had no information of publications within the district, that came under the sedition law, and added, that he had been informed that there was a paper called the Mirror, published at Wilming ton, which contained libellous charges against the Government and President of the United States: that he had not seen that paper, but it was their duty to inquire into the subject; and if they had not turned their attention to it, the attorney for the district would be pleased to examine a file of that paper, and if he found anything that came within the sedition law, would lay it before them." This is the substance of what the respondent said to the grand jury on that occasion, and, he believes, nearly his words; on the morning of the next day they came into court and declared that they had no presentments or indictments to make. on which they were immediately discharged. The whole time, therefore, for which they were detained, was twenty-four hours, far less than is generally required of grand juries.

In these proceedings, this respondent acted according to his sense of what the duties of his office required. It certainly was his duty to give in charge to the grand jury, all such statutes of the United States as provided for the punishment of offences, and, among others, that called the sedition act; into all offences against which act, while it continued in force, the grand jury were bound together with the other acts of Congress for the punishment of offences, he followed, moreover, the example of the other judges of the Supreme Court, in holding their respective circuit courts. He also contends, and did then believe, that it was his duty, when informed of an offence, which the grand jury had overlooked, to direct their attention towards it, and to request for them, and even to require, if necessary, the aid of the District Attorney in making their inquiries. In thus discharging what he conceives to be his duty, even if he committed an error in so considering it, he denies that he committed or could commit any offence whatever.

With respect to the remarks which he is charged by this article with having made to the grand jury relative to "a highly seditious temper, which he had understood to have manifested itself in the State of Delaware, among a certain class of people, particularly in Newcastle county, and more especially in the town of Wilmington," and relative to "a most seditious printer, residing in Wilmington, unrestrained by any principle of virtue, and regardless of social order;" this respondent does not recollect or believe, that he made any such observations. But if he did make them, it could not be improper in him to tell the jury that he had received such information, if in fact he had received it; which was probably the case, though he cannot recollect it with certainty at this distance of time. That this information, if he did receive it, was correct so far as regarded the printer in question, will fully appear from a file of the paper called the "Mirror of the Times," &c., published at Wilmington, Delaware, from February 5th to March 19th, 1800, inclusive, which he has lately obtained, and is ready to produce to this honorable Court, when necessary, and some extracts from which are contained in the exhibits severally marked No. 7, which he prays leave to make part of this his answer.

And for plea to the said seventh article of impeachment, the said Samuel Chase saith, that he is not guilty of any high crime or misdemeanor, as in and by the said seventh article is alleged against him, and this he prays may be inquired of by this honorable Court, in such manner as law and justice shall seem to them to require.

The eighth article of impeachment charges that this respondent, "disregarding the duties and dignity of his official character did, at a circuit court for the district of Maryland, held at Baltimore, in the month of May, 1803, pervert his official right and duty to address the grand jury then and there assembled, on the matters coming within the province of the said jury for the purpose of delivering to the said grand jury an intemperate