as are appointed to be publicly read in churches and other aſſemblies. It may laſtly be notified by writing, printing, or the like; which is the general courſe taken with all our acts of parliament. Yet, whatever way is made uſe of, it is incumbent on the promulgators to do it in the moſt public and perſpicuous manner; not like Caligula, who (according to Dio Caſſius) wrote his laws in a very ſmall character, and hung them up upon high pillars, the more effectually to enſnare the people. There is ſtill a more unreaſonable method than this, which is called making of laws ex poſt facto; when after an action (indifferent in itſelf) is committed, the legiſlator then for the firſt time declares it to have been a crime, and inflicts a puniſhment upon the perſon who has committed it; here it is impoſſible that the party could foreſee that an action, innocent when it was done, ſhould be afterwards converted to guilt by a ſubſequent law; he had therefore no cauſe to abſtain from it; and all puniſhment for not abstaining muſt of conſequence be cruel and unjuſt[1]. All laws ſhould be therefore made to commence in futuro, and be notified before their commencement; which is implied in the term “preſcribed.” But when this rule is in the uſual manner notified, or preſcribed, it is then the ſubject’s buſineſs to be thoroughly acquainted therewith; for if ignorance, of what he might know, were admitted as a legitimate excuſe, the laws would be of no effect, but might always be eluded with impunity.
But farther: municipal law is “a rule of civil conduct preſcribed by the ſupreme power in a ſtate.” For legiſlature, as was before obſerved, is the greateſt act of ſuperiority that can be exerciſed by one being over another. Wherefore it is requiſite to the very eſſence of a law, that it be made by the ſupreme power. Sovereignty and legiſlature are indeed convertible terms; one cannot ſubſiſt without the other.
- ↑ Such laws among the Romans were denominated privilegia, or private laws, of which Cicero de leg. 3. 19. and in his oration pro domo, 17. thus ſpeaks; “Vetant leges ſacratae, vetant duodecim tabulae, leges privatis hominibus irrogari; id enim eſt privilegium. Nemo unquam tulit, nihil eſt crudelius, nihil pernicieſius, nihil quod minus haec civitas ferre poſſit.”
