2003. DEBT, Imprisonment for.—
It May
be safely affirmed that neither natural right
nor reason subjects the body of a man to
restraint for debt. It is one of the abuses
introduced by commerce and credit, and
which even the most commercial nations have
been obliged to relax, in certain cases. The
Roman law, the principles of which are the
nearest to natural reason of those of any
municipal code hitherto known, allowed imprisonment
of the body in criminal cases only,
or those wherein the party had expressly submitted
himself to it. The French laws allow
it only in criminal or commercial cases. The
laws of England, in certain descriptions of
cases (as bankruptcy) release the body. Many
of the United States do the same in all cases,
on a cession of property by the debtor.—
To George, Hammond. Washington ed. iii, 396.
Ford ed., vi, 38.
(Pa.,
May. 1792)
