Piracy

The offence of depredation, robbery, or unlawful violence upon the high seas. Pirate: one engaged in or guilty of piracy. Piratical: involving the crime or guilt of piracy; like a pirate. Piratically: after the manner of pirates. This is substantially the definition ordinarily given. It should, perhaps, be limited in one aspect. As usually understood, the vessels of the pirate and his victims are independent. We doubt whether larceny, by force or fear, committed by one member of a ship's company upon another member of the same crew, or depredations upon a ship's stores by persons sailing on board, are piracy, though they are cases of robbery or depredation at sea.

Compare United States v. Palmer, 3 Wheat. 610; United States ». Klintock, 5 Id. 144, 151.

The above is, moreover, the commonlaw definition; acts have been made piracy by statute which do not fall within it. Piracy is sometimes used, in a quasi figurative sense, of violation of copy- The definition of piracy varies according to circumstances: 1. At common-law, the crime of piracy consisted in committing those acts of robbery and depredation upon the high seas which, a committed upon land, would have amounted to felony there. If committed by an alien, it was held to be felony; if by a subject, it was a species of treason, until the statute of treasons, 25 Edw. III. ch.

2. 2.

By statute law, the following offences are to be deemed piratical: Hostilities by a natural-born subject against any of her majesty's subjects, under color of a commission from a foreign power; the betrayal of his trust by a commander or other seafaring person; endeavoring to make a revolt on board ship; trading with known pirates, or fitting out a vessel for a piratical purpose, &c. (4 Bl. Com. 71-73; 4 Steph. Com. 219- 222.) 3. Piracy, by the law of nations, includes such piratical acts as are committed on board vessels whose de facto possessors are not recognized by any sovereign power as the lawful owners thereof; also, all unauthorized acts of private hostility committed at sea.

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An act of congress, providing for the suppression of " piratical aggressions," without defining what shall be deemed piratical, but leaving the courts to consult the law of nations for a definition of the crime of piracy, is a constitutional exercise of the power of congress to define and punish piracy. Congress may define by using a term of a determinate meaning, as well as by an express enumeration of the particulars included in that term. That is certain which, by necessary inference, is made certain; and the law of nations has described the crime of piracy with reasonable certainty.

United States V. Smith, 5 Whe.at. 153. And see United States V. Chapels, 2 Wheel. Cr. Cas. 218; United States v. Kessler, Baldw. 15, 31.

Robbery, or forcible depredation upon the sea, anlmo furandi, is piracy by the law of nations and by act of congress.

United States V. Smith, 5 Wheat. 153; United States V. Pirates, Id. 184.

There is a distinction between the offence of piracy, as known to the law of nations, which is justiciable everywhere, and offences created by statutes of particular nations, cognizable only before the municipal tribunals of such nations. Dole i>. New England, &c.

Ins. Co., 2 Clif. 394, 418.

The general rule of the law, that robbery on the liigh seas is piracy, has no exception or qualification in favor of commissioned privateers in any act of congress, in the common law, or in the law of nations. United Sta,tes o.

Jones, 3 Wash. C. Ct. 209.

To make a robbery on the high seas piracy, it is not necessary that it should be punishable by death when committed upon the land. United States v. Hutchings, 2 Wheel. Cr. Cas. 543. edge no sovereign and no law, and support themselves by pillage and depredations at sea; but there are instances wherein the word pirata has been formerly taken for a sea-captain.

Spelman.

Pirates hold no commission or delegated authority from any sovereign or state, empowering them to attack others. They can, therefore, be only regarded in the light of robbers or assassins. They are the common enemies of all; and the law of nations gives to every one the right to pursue and exterminate them, without any previous declaration of war. But it is not allowed to kill them without trial, except in battle; those who surrender or are taken prisoners must be brought before the proper magistrates, and dealt with according to law.

Wharton.

A pirate is one who acts solely on his own authority, without any commission or authority from a sovereign state, seizing by force, and appropriating to himself without discrimination, every vessel he meets with. Robbery on the high seas is piracy; but to constitute the offence the taking must be felonious. Consequently the quo animo may be inquired into.

Davison v. Sealskins, 2 Paine, 324.

A pirate is one who roves the sea in an armed vessel, without any commission from any sovereign state, on his own authority, and for the purpose of seizing by force and appropriating to himself, without discrimination, every vessel he may meet. Trial of the O^fficers and Crew of the Savannah, p, 370. To constitute the offence of piracy, within the act of April 30, 1790, by " piratically and feloniously " running away with a vessel, personal force and violence is not necessary. The piratical and felonious act, within the meaning of the statute, is the runningaway with a vessel, with an intent to convert the same to the taker's own use, against the will of the owner. The intent must be aninw furandi. United States v. Tu Uy, 1 Gall. 247, If an innocent merchant-vessel is sunk or destroyed without any other object than to gratify the lawless appetite for mischief in the person who does the act, it is just as much a piratical aggression in the sense of the law of nations, and of the act of congress, ag if the act were done for plunder, lucri causa.

United States v. The Malek Adhel, 2 Bow. 210.