power
and prerogatives of the crown has intrenched the subject behind a line
of outposts, in the shape of forms and preliminary proceedings; the
accused, for his greater security against a power which, if unwatched,
might become arbitrary and oppressive, has been invested with rights
which must be respected and complied with, and by the neglect of which
the whole proceedings are rendered null and void. At this moment, in
all treasons, except attempts upon the person of the sovereign, "the
prisoner," in the language of Lord Erskine, "is covered all over with
the armour of the law;" and there must be twice the amount of evidence
which would be legally competent to establish his guilt in a criminal
prosecution for any other offence, even by the meanest and most
helpless of mankind. Sedition is a head of crime of a somewhat vague
and indeterminate character, and, in many cases, it may he extremely
difficult, even for an acute and practised lawyer, to decide whether
the circumstances amount to sedition. Mr East, in his pleas of the
crown, says, that "sedition is understood in a more general sense than
treason, and extends to other offences, not capital, of a like
tendency, but without any actual design against the king in
contemplation, such as contempts of the king and his government,
riotous assemblings for political purposes, and the like; and in
general all contemptuous, indecent, or malicious observations upon his
person and government, whether by writing or speaking, or by tokens,
calculated to lessen him in the esteem of his subjects, or weaken his
government, or raise jealousies of him amongst the people, will fall
under the notion of seditious acts." An offence which admits of so
little precision in the terms in which it is defined, depending often
upon the meaning to be attached to words, the real import of which is
varied by the tone or gesture of the speaker, by the words which
precede, and by those which follow, depending also upon the different
ideas which men attach to the same words, evidently rests on very
different grounds from those cases, where actual crimes have been
perpetrated and deeds committed, which leave numerous traces behind,
and which may be proved by the permanent results of which they have
been the cause. Technical difficulties without number also exist: the
most literal accuracy, which is indispensable--the artful inuendoes,
the artistical averments, which are necessary, correctly to shape th