Browsing: Legal Papers of John Adams, Volume 3

“A Prisoner whose Case may be brought within the Letter of the Act [2 Jac. 1, c. 8 (1604): An Act to Take Away the Benefit of Clergy for Some Kind of Manslaughter—the so-called “Statute of Stabbing”] commonly is Arraigned upon two Indictments, one at Common-Law for Murder, the other upon the Statute. And if it cometh out in Evidence that the Fact was either Justifiable or amounted barely to Manslaughter at Common-Law, it hath been rarely known that such Person hath been convicted of Manslaughter.”