the same in any the cases aforesaid, before any one or more Justice or Justices of the Peace, Major or other Head-Officers of any City or Town Corporate,. by the Oath of two or more Witnesses (which Oath the said Justice or Justices and Head Officer have hereby power to administer in all the cases aforesaid) or Confession of the said persons, the party so convicted or confessing, shall be by the said Justice or Justices, or other Head-Officer committed to Prison or to the House of Correction, for the space of six moneths, without Bail or Mainprize, and until he or she shall have put in sufficient Sureties to be of good behavior for the space of one whole year. And if any person or persons so convicted as aforesaid, shall at any time afterwards avowedly profess, maintain or publish as aforesaid, any of the aforesaid Atheistical, Blasphemous or Execrable Opinions, upon complaint and proof made of the same before any one or more Justice or Justices of the Peace, Major or other Head-Officer of any City or Town Corporate, by the Oath of two or more Witnesses (which Oath the said Justice or Justices, or Head Officer have hereby power to administer) or confession of the said person, the party so confessing, or against whom proof shall be made as aforesaid, shall be by such Justice or Head-Officer sent to the Common Goal of such County, there to remain without Bail or Mainprize, until the next Assizes or Gaol-Delivery to be held for the said County; And if any such person shall be there convicted, by confession or otherwise, for such aforesaid avowedly professing, maintaining or publishing as aforesaid, any of the Atheistical, Blasphemous or Execrable Opinions aforesaid, That then the Judge or Judges before whom such Conviction shall be had as aforesaid, shall have power, and is hereby required to pronounce Sentence of Banishment upon such person so convicted as aforesaid out of the Commonwealth of England, and all the Dominions thereof: And thereupon every such person or persons so convicted and adjudged as aforesaid, shall depart out of this Commonwealth at such Haven or Port, and within such time as shall be in that behalf assigned and appointed by the said Judge or Justices, unless the same offender be letted or stayed by such reasonable means or causes as by the Common Laws of this Nation are allowed and permitted in cases of Abjuration for Felony; and in case of such let or stay, then to depart within such reasonable and convenient time after as the Common Law requireth, as in case of Abjuration for Felony as aforesaid: And if any such offender so convicted and adjudged as aforesaid, shall not go to such Haven, and within such time as is before appointed, and from thence depart out of this Commonwealth, according to this present Act; or

after such his departure shall return or come again into this Commonwealth or any the Dominions thereof, without special License of the Parliament in that behalf first had and obtained, That then in every such case the person so offending, shall be adjudged a Felon, and shall suffer as in case of Felony, without benefit of Clergy.

And to the end this Law may be the more effectually put into execution, and the growth of the aforesaid, and the like abominable and corrupt Opinions and Practises, tending to the Dishonor of God, the Scandal of Christian Religion, and the Proffessors thereof, and destructive to Humane Society, may be prevented and suppressed, Be it Enacted by the authority aforesaid, That all and every Justice and Justices of Assize, Justices of Oyer and Terminer, Justices of the Peace and Gaol-Delivery, be required and enjoyned at their Assizes and Sessions of the Peace in every County, City and Town Corporate respectively, which shall be held next after the publishing of this Act, to cause the same to be openly read and published, and do from time to time give in charge to the Grand Jury, to enquire of and present the Offences and Neglects aforesaid; which the said Justices of Assize, Justices of Oyer and Terminer, Justices of the Peace and Gaol-Delivery, have likewise by virtue of this Act, power and authority to Hear and Determine.

And be it lastly Enacted by authority aforesaid, that the Sheriffs of every County, the Majors, Bayliffs or other Head-Officers of all and every City, Borough or Town Corporate, be enjoined and required within one week after this Act shall be sent unto them or any of them, to Read, or cause the same to be Read and Proclaimed in every City, Borough or Town Corporate, upon the Market-day, and to cause the same to be affixed and set up in the publique places of such City, Borough or Town as is usual and accustumed.

Provided always, That no person or persons shall be punished, impeached, molested or troubled for any offence mentioned in this Act, unless he or she be for the same offence accused, presented, indicted or convicted within six months after such offence committed.

Passed 9 August, 1650.

See Scobell's Collection, p. 124 of the second part.

APPENDIX K, (p. 156.)

ERRORS OF LODGE AND DOYLE.

Lodge and Doyle, the latest writers on the early history of Maryland, each make erroneous statements. Lodge, p. 95, says:

"The government set up (by the Charter) was a copy of the English form, or rather of the form of English government, as it ought to have been, in the opinion of George Calvert. An Assembly of Burgesses filled the place of the Parliament, and the Lord Proprietary that of the King. The constitution was exactly such a one as a high prerogative courtier in the reign of James would be likely to draw if left to himself. The Lord Proprietary was to have the right to make laws, not repugnant to those of England, when the freeholders and Burgesses could not be brought together, and he was further to have the power of granting titles and erecting Manors and Courts Baron."

Section 7 of the Charter grants to the Proprietary

"full, free and absolute power by the tenor of these presents to Ordain, Make, and Enact Laws of what kind soever . of and with the Advice, Assent and Approbation of the FREEMEN of the same Province, or of the greater part of them, or of their Delegates or Deputies whom WE will shall be called together, when and as often as need shall require, by the aforesaid now Baron of Baltimore and his heirs."

Section 8, grants the power to

Make and Constitute fit and wholesome ORDINANCES from time to time to be kept and observed within the Province aforesaid, as well for the Conservation of the Peace, as for the better government of the People inhabiting therein so that said ORDINANCES be consonant to reason and be not repugnant nor contrary but (so far as conveniently may be done) agreeable to the Statutes or Rights of our Kingdom of England, and so that the same ORDINANCES do not in any sort extend to oblige, bind, charge or take away the Right or Interest of any Person or Persons of or in Members, Life, Freehold, Goods or Chattels,"

See the Charter in Bacon's Laws, 2 Bozman, p. 12.

Section 7 of the Charter provides for the first representative. Assembly ever created under any charter, or grant of colonization.

The laws are to be made by the "advice, assent and approbation" of the freemen, not freeholders. Freemen were all who were not indentured, or apprentices, or owing service.

The power to make ordinances, granted in the next section, was to issue proclamations for police regulation, which were not to "oblige, bind, charge, or take away, the right of any person to Members, Life, Freehold, Goods or Chattels." There is no high prerogative doctrine here, but the most careful security for the liberties of the people, who are secured in the right of participation in legislation.

Doyle, p. 297, speaking of the Code sent out by the Proprie tary, and rejected by the General Assembly in 1638-39, and of the bills passed by the same Assembly, in one statute, says:

“Clergy were to be exempt from capital punishment and were to be pardoned in the case of certain offences committed for the first time.

"An Act was also passed re-enacting the Statute of Edward VI., which enforced the eating of fish on certain days. That Statute had been passed by a Protestant legislature in the interests of Commerce and possibly of public health and economy. The Romanists of Maryland re-enacted it in behalf of the usage of their own Church."

No Act was passed adopting the statute of Edward VI., nor exempting the clergy from capital, or any other punishment. At least our records show none, and we have copies of all Acts passed at this session.

Again, on p. 299, he says:

"We have already seen that the Lordship of a manor carried with it a seat in the Assembly. It also gave the right of being tried by a Jury taken from among the lords of manors although with the necessary proviso, that if twelve such could not be found, their places should be supplied by freemen.

"Moreover the lords of manors were to enjoy another privilege of the English nobility, in being beheaded, if found guilty of felony, instead of being hanged."

The Lordship of a Manor carried with it no such right. All the freemen were summoned to the first Assembly of 1637-38, as our records show. All were summoned to elect Burgesses to the next Assembly of 1638-39, and the first Act they passed was to secure to every freeman the right to vote for his representatives in the Assembly.

The Upper House, by the same law, was to consist of persons summoned by special writ, and persons were summoned not Lords of- Manors.

By the great Ordinance of 1638-39, all were to be tried by a jury, and there is no distinction between Lords of Manors, freemen, or others. No law ever secured to lords the privilege of being beheaded.

Among the bills read twice, and engrossed to be read a third time, but never read nor passed the House,' is "An Act for Erecting a Pretoriall.”

It provides that the Lord of a Manor, for a capital offence, shall be tried by a jury of twelve Lords of Manors, if there be that many in the county, if not, then of as many Lords as there be and of freeholders, and conviction shall be by the Lieutenant General and the major part of them.2

But no such bill ever passed the Assembly or became a law. Again, on pp. 304-305, he considers the Code sent out by the Proprietary in 1649, and in part adopted, at the session of 1649, by the Assembly, and then refers to the letter written by the Assembly to his Lordship, setting forth their reasons why they had refused their assent to them in full.

1 Assembly Proceedings, 1637-1658, p. 55. 2 Assembly Proceedings, 1637–1658, p. 71.