54
CONSTITUTION OF THE U. STATES.
[BOOK III.
of ascertaining, from the common law, what constituted malice aforethought. So, that there would be no end to difficulties or definitions; for each successive definition might involve some terms, which would still require some new explanation. But the true intent of the constitution in this part, was, not merely to define piracy, as known to the law of nations, but to enumerate what crimes in the national code should be deemed piracies. And so the power has been practically expounded by congress.[1]
§ 1155. But the power is not merely to define and punish piracies, but felonies, and offences against the law of nations; and on this account, the power to define, as well as to punish, is peculiarly appropriate. It has been remarked, that felony is a term of loose signification, even in the common law; and of various import in the statute law of England.[2] Mr. Justice Blackstone says, that felony, in the general acceptation of the English law, comprises every species of crime, which occasioned at common law the forfeiture of lands and goods. This most frequently happens in those crimes, for which a capital punishment either is, or was liable to be inflicted. All offences now capital by the English law are felonies; but there are still some offences, not capital, which are yet felonies, (such as suicide, petty larceny, and homicide by chance medley;[3]) that is, they subject the committers of them to some forfeiture, either of lands or goods.[4] But the idea of capital punishment has now become so associated, in the English law, with the idea of felony, that if an act of parliament makes a new offence felony, the