George Digby

“ They proceed on the principle that while judicial courts are to be governed by the strict letter of the law, as previously known and established, Parliament, in exercising the high sovereignty of the state, may, "on great and crying occasions," arrest some enormous offender in the midst of his crimes, and inflict upon him the punishment he so richly deserves, even in cases where, owing to a defect in the law, or to the arts of successful evasion, it is impossible to reach him by means of impeachment, or through the ordinary tribunals of justice. Such a power is obviously liable to great abuses ”

“ Macaulay maintains that the Earl's death, under existing circumstances, was absolutely necessary; "that, during the civil wars, the Parliament had reason to rejoice that an irreversible law and an impassable barrier protected them from the valor and rapacity of Strafford." Those who think differently on this point must at least agree with Hallam, that "he died justly before God and man; though we may deem the precedent dangerous, and the better course of a magnanimous lenity rejected; and in condemning the bill of attainder, we can not look upon it as a crime." ”

“ Judges we are now, and must, therefore, put on another personage. It is honest and noble to be earnest in order to the discovery of truth; but when that hath been brought so far as it can be to light, our judgment thereupon ought to be calm and cautious. In prosecution upon probable grounds, we are accountable only for our industry or remissness; but in judgment, we are deeply responsible to Almighty God for its rectitude or obliquity. ”

“ We are now upon the point of giving, as much as in us lies, the final sentence unto death or life, on a great minister of the state and peer of this kingdom, Thomas, Earl of Strafford, a name of hatred in the present age for his practices, and fit to be made a terror to future ages by his punishment. ”

“ I know this great and wise body politic can have none; but I speak to individuals from the weakness which I find in myself. Away with personal animosities! Away with all flatteries to the people, in being the sharper against him because he is odious to them! ”

“ Speaker, these are the circumstances which I confess with my conscience, thrust quite out of doors that grand article of our charge concerning his desperate advice to the King of employing the Irish army here.
Let not this, I beseech you, be driven to an aspersion upon Mr. Secretary, as if he should have sworn otherwise than he knew or believed. He is too worthy to do that. ”

“ It is now generally admitted that, in a moral point of view, Strafford richly merited the punishment he received. On the question of legal right, it may be proper to say, that while the doctrine of constructive treason under an impeachment can not be too strongly condemned, the proceedings under a bill of attainder were of a different nature. "Acts of Parliament," says Blackstone, "to attaint particular persons of treason, are to all intents and purposes new laws made pro re nata, and by no means an execution of such as are already in being." ”

“ If this may not be hearkened unto, let me conclude in saying that to you all, which I have thoroughly inculcated upon mine own conscience, on this occasion. Let every man lay his hand upon his own heart, and seriously consider what we are going to do with a breath: either justice or murder—justice on the one side, or murder, heightened and aggravated to its supremest extent, on the other! For, as the casuists say, He who lies with his sister commits incest; but he that marries his sister, sins higher, by applying God's ordinance to his crime ”