Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/82

without being brought to answer by due course and process of law; that in criminal and civil cases there should be a trial by jury at all events upon a final trial on appeal; with the right to challenge for just cause; and in capital cases a peremptory right to challenge twenty jurors as in England; that no party should be cast or condemned, unless upon the testimony of two sufficient witnesses, or other sufficient evidence or circumstances, unless otherwise specially provided by law; that all persons of the age of twenty-one years, and of sound memory, should have power to make wills and other lawful alienations of their estate, whether they were condemned, or excommunicated or other; except that in treason their personal estate should be forfeited; but their real estate was still to be at their disposal. All processes were directed to be in the king's name.^[1] All trials in respect to land were to be in the county, where it lay; and all personal actions, where one of the parties lived; and lands and goods were liable to attachment to answer the judgment rendered in any action. All lands were to descend according to the free tenure of lands of East Greenwich, in the county of Kent; and all entailed lands according to the law of England. All the sons were to inherit equally, except the eldest, who was to have a double share. If there were no sons, all the daughters were to inherit alike. Brothers of the whole blood were to inherit; and if none, then sisters of the whole blood. All conveyances of land were to be by deed only, acknowledged before some magistrate, and recorded in the public records. Among capital offences were enumerated, without any discrimination, idolatry, blasphemy, treason, murder,

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1. 1 Haz. Coll. 473; Plymouth Col. Laws, (1688,) p. 16.