or acquitted, upon impeachment, fhall nevertheless be hable to indictment, trial, judgment, and punishment, according to law," would be a direct recognition of a right, to punish a man twice, for the fame offence. But the negative words imply an affirmative, that although you cannot go beyond, you will not go to the extent, of your authority. It is true, that the expreffion connects, by the copulative" and," the removal from office, with the difqualification to hold any of fice; but the expreffion is governed and explained, by the motive in ufing it, which was merely to defignate the extreme of the fentence to be pronounced on a conviction; and the dif junctive "or," could not have been there fubftituted, upon any principle of grammar, or common fenfe. It is, with fome variance of phrafeology, nothing more, than the ordinary claufe in a penal ftatute; which empowers the court to im pofe a fine, not exceeding a specific fum, or to order an imprifonment, not exceeding a limited period, beyond which the court cannot punish, but certainly they are not bound to punifh fo far.

Every principle of juftice is in unifon with this conftruction. An impeachment lies for any, and for every, misdemeanor in office: but there is a vaft difference in their degrees of guilt; and it would confound all our ideas of diftributive juftice, to fay, that there fhould be no apportionment. of punishment, to the heinoufnefs of the crime; in a cafe, too, where the attribute of mercy cannot operate, as in the ordinary cafes of punishment. Befides, fome actions may prove a man to be unfit for a particular office, and yet by no means prove a general difqualification for the public fervice. For inftance, an ambitious and tyrannical difpofition, will make a bad judge; but might not be incompatible with the command of a garrifon; and it would be indifcreet to difquality fuch a judge, from hereafter accepting a commission in the

army.

It appears, then, fir, that the fenate poffefs a difcretion to apportion the punishment (as far as they can punish) to the degree of the offence; and may if they pleafe modify their fentence, either to a fimple removal, or to a removal and a difqualification from holding any judicial office, under this commonwealth. But even if no fuch exercife of difcretion were permitted, the feverity of the punishment cannot be a reafon, for affording impunity to the offence. The fenate, acting in their ftation of high refponfibility, muft decide upon the conflitution, the law, and the evidence, whether Mr. Addifon has been guilt

ty of a misdemeanor in office, without regard to the confe quences of the decifion. Fiat juftitia, ruat cælum!

That this honorable court will do justice between the state and the defendant, is the expectation and the wish of every candid and generous mind. For my own part, I hope that I have faid nothing, which does not naturally belong to the cause; and I pray that every thing that I have faid, may be applied as a commentary upon the charges and the proofs, and not as a personal attack upon the fame, or the fortunes, of Mr. Addifon. Nay, fir, I will conclude (gratefully impreffed with the patience and attention of the fenate,) under this folemn affurance, that an acquittal would be infinitely more pleafing to my feelings, than a conviction, if you, his honorable and upright judges, can contemplate, in that acquittal, a vindication of the violated honor of the commonwealth.

[Here Mr. Dallas concluded: Mr. Addison requested till the next day to prepare himself to proceed in his defence, which was granted, and he delivered himself as follows.]

NOTE.

The public are refpectfully informed, that in order to expedite this work, it became necessary to divide it: that that part of the work, beginning with Mr. Addison's defence, p. 101, was set up at the fame time as the teftimony, apprehending, from a view of the matter, that the paging would correspond; but as the preceding part of the work exceeded the calculation, it has occafioned feveral pages to be doubled, or twice numbered; which has rendered this explanation necessary; but does not render the work lefs perfect.

Mr. Speaker, and

Gentlemen of the Senate,

IT is now towards twelve years, fince I was appointed President of the courts of Common Pleas of the Fifth Circuit of the state of Pennsylvania. This appointment, though, when firft fuggefted, altogether unlooked for by me, I accepted with chearfulness because I thought it accorded with the wishes of the gentlemen of the bar, and of the people in general; and because I thought I was not altogether defiitute of capacity, and knew I poffeffed a very zealous difpofition, to be useful in it. In none of these motives have I any difappointment to regret. The favourable opinion, indulgently entertained of me, experience has ripened into a confidence. In a mixed fociety, of characters of all defcriptions, purfuit of univerfal approbation is fruitlefs and ineffectual as the chace of the rainbow. I have limited my ambition to the approbation of the wife and the good; and, in this, I humbly hope, I have not been uufuccefsful. I have endeavoured to be, what every magiftrate ought to be, "for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well"; and viewing popularity as but a fecondary object, and, when acquired, as it too often is, by unworthy means, a contemptible object; I have laboured to be useful. For five years and till a new county, no part of which was within its original jurifdiction, was annexed to the Fifth Circuit, I never was abfent from any court, a fingle day, nor a fingle hour in any day. I omitted no pains to qualify myself for a useful difcharge of the duties of my office; and I have difcharged them without any regard to favour or refentment. Every one who knows any thing of the confufion, in which the business of the County Courts was, while thofe Courts were held by Juftices of the peace, (and I blame not them; for how could it be otherwife?) of the great delay and growing accumulation of fuits; must know, that, to reduce this confufion to order, and to bring in a fyftem, at the fame time, correct and expeditious, was no eafy task. In the counties of the Fifth Circuit, at the western extremity of the ftate, lefs improved by the example of the Judges of the fupreme Court, the evil must have been greater, and the correction more difficult. But there I take upon me to fay this evil has been as completely corrected as in any other part of the ftate. That I may have often erred, is not only poffible, but natural; for it is the lot of man. But I humbly prefume it is believed, that, in no Court of Pennfylvania, has bufinefs been conducted with more regularity and difpatch, or decifions been G

1

more fatisfactory, than in the Courts of the Fifth Circuit A gentleman, of whofe pralfe even a proud man may be vain, handed me the following note "During the twelve years of your prefidency there has been no Bill of Excep tions, no Writ of Error on a Demurrer or cafe put upon the record; no fecond Ejectment except in two inftances, (one of which has been affirmed and the other not yet tried ;) though on an average more than forty Ejectments are tried every year. Perhaps this evidence of confidence in the opinions of the Court cannot be found in any other part of Pennsylvania, of the United States, or of any other country. It peaks. louder than any other encomium; because it will not be denied that at the Bar we have men capable, independent and willing to appeal and try another tribunal, if they believed that fuccefs would follow the appeal."

Without afferting that this ftatement is altogether correct, I may fairly rely on it as the opinion of a man, than whom no man is better acquainted with the bufinefs of the law in the Fifth Circuit or generally. If, in fpeaking thus of my felf, I fhall be thought to "have become a fool in boafting," I can fay with St. Paul, I have been. compelled to it,

Honeftly entertaining thefe fentiments, which I am now obliged frankly to avow, of my official conduct; and, after a careful review, folemnly declaring, that I can fee nothing in it worthy of blame; nothing, which, on deliberation,' I would not again do; I cannot but look with aftonifhment at my prefent fituation, ftanding as an offender at the bar of this Senate, and having my name publifhed to the world. as that of one guilty of a mifdemeanor in an important public office. In a fituation fo unpleasant, as to a man of any fenfibility this must be, I find confolation in looking over this paper, containing the Articles of Impeachment to which I am to anfwer. For, in it, I can fee no fhadow of corruption or dishonefty, no fpark of ufurpation or abuse of authority, no fign even of ignorance or mistake; nothing in which I do not deferve praife, inftead of blame. It is indeed a proud thing for me, that after a fcrutiny of my of ficial conduct for twelve years, in order to find a fault, my enemies, who have inftigated the House of Reprefentatives to this profecution, are compelled to aferibe falfe motives to proper actions, and can difcover an offence, not in my conduct, but in their own malicious imagination. For it is not my guilt, but their malignity, which is apparent on this record.