high crime

Example Sentences

• "Lese majesty used to be a high crime, for which royal or imperial courts often put offenders to death."
• "Charles Stuart King of England. You have been accuſed on behalf of the People of England of high Treaſon and other high Crimes; the Court have determined that you ought to anſwer the ſame."
• "By way of Advice, I do acquaint you that there is no Judicature in England ſuperior to this, but the Parliament immediately. You are here impeached of a very high Crime, High Treaſon; it may be a Strain of Youth: the firſt Step to Mercy is Confeſſion."
• "For, my Lords, if I have committed any Faults or Errours in Expreſſion, yet as I inſiſt upon my Innocence with reſpect to all the High Crimes laid to my Charge, ſo I muſt ſtill inſiſt upon all the Doctrines which I have taught, as being agreeable to the Word of God, and to the Doctrine of our excellent and Apoſtolical Church, and which we of the Clergy are oblig'd both by Subſcription, and Oath to acknowledge, and defend."
• "The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."
• "Treason and bribery [in the United States Constitution, Article II, section 4] have their precise definitions; other high crimes and misdemeanors have their import, but have not been legally defined, so as to include all cases which may fall under their heads. [...] A high crime is always understood to be some great offence against the State or the public; a misdemeanor is some petty offence in office, consisting of any kind of misbehaviour, or ill behaviour."