Treason

This word imports a betraying, treachery, or breach of allegiance. 4 Bla. Com. 75. In England, treason was divided into high and petit treason. The latter, originally, was of several forms, which, by 25 Edw. III. st. 5, c. 2, were reduced to three: the killing by a wife, of her husband; by a servant, of his master; of a prelate by an ecclesiastic owing obedience to him. These kinds of treason were abolished in 41 Treason it has been said is not felony but a grade of crime by itself.” Johnson v. State, 29 N. J. L. 453, 464. The constitution of the United States, art. 3, s. 3, defines treason against the United States to consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. By the same article of the constitution, no person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court. It is “the only crime defined by the constitution.... The clause was borrowed from an ancient English statute, enacted in the year 1352. Previous to the passage of that statute there was great uncertainty as to what constituted treason. Numerous offences were raised to its grade by arbitrary construction of the law. The statute was passed to remove this uncertainty and to restrain the power of the crown to oppress the subject by constructions of this character. It comprehends all treason under seven distinct branches. The framers of our constitution selected one of these branches, and declared that treason against the United States should be restricted to the acts which it designates.” No other acts can be declared to constitute the offence. Congress can neither extend, nor restrict, nor define the crime. Its power over the subject is limited to prescribing the punishment. Field, J., in U. S. v. Greathouse, 4 Sawy. 465, Fed. Cas. No. 15,251. See James C. Carter, The Law, etc., 107. By the same article of the constitution, no “attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood except during the life of, the person attainted.” Every person owing allegiance to the United States who levies war against them, or adheres to their enemies giving them aid and comfort within the, United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason; R. S. § 5331. The penalty is death, or at the discretion of the court, imprisonment at hard labor for not less than five years and a fine of not less than ten thousand dollars; and every person convicted of treason is rendered incapable of holding any office under the United States; It. S. § 5332. The term enemies, as used in the constitution, applies only to subjects of a foreign power in a state of open hostility with us. To constitute a “levying of war” there must be an assemblage of persons with force and arrds to overthrow the government or resist the laws. All who aid in the furtherance of the common object of levying war against the United States, in however minute a degree, or however remote from the scene of action, are guilty of treason; U. S. v. Greathouse, 4 Sawy. 457, Fed. Cas. No. 15,254. Treason may be committed against a state; Charge to Grand Jury

— Treason, 1 Sto. 614, The words “treason, felony and breach of the peace” in section 6, art. 1, of the United States constitution should be construed in the same sense as they were commonly used and understood in England as applied to the parliamentary privilege, and as excluding from the privilege all arrests and prosecutions for criminal offences, and confining the privilege alone to arrests in civil cases; Williamson v. U. S., 207 U. S. 425, 28 Sup. Ct. 163, 52 U. Ed. 278. Treason felony in England is a statutory offense punishable with penal servitude for life under an act of 1848, and relates to the offense of deposing the king from the style, honor or royal name of the imperial crown, or declaring war against him to compel him to change his measures or councils, or to put any force upon parliament, etc. By the Act of 1814, treason was punished by mutilation after death; by the act of 1870, by hanging, unless the king substitutes decapitation. 4 Steph. Com. 144. Treason, or its French equivalent, “Traliison'* (German, Kricgsverrath ), as employed to indicate any acts on the part of the inhabitants of an invaded territory which are calculated to deceive the invader or to inform their own side of his forces or movements. Holland, War on Land 49. See Sedition.