Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: V SAFEGUARDING INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY WHILE most of the guarantees of personal liberty found in the Federal Constitution are designed to protect the individual citizen against the arbitrary exercise of Federal power, practically identical provisions are contained in each of the state constitutions. It will be proper, therefore, to first refer to some of the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, designed to prevent arbitrary action by the government or any of its officers or agents. It will not be attempted to give all such provisions but only the following as sufficient to show that the founders of this government sought and did provide for the protection of each individual in his natural rights before the law and further to show that this lofty and beneficent purpose has been accomplished. The Privilege Of The Writ Of Habeas CorPus Shall Not Be Suspended, Unless When In Cases Of Rebellion Or Invasion The PubLic Safety May Require IT.1 A "writ" is a written order or command, issued by or under the authority of a court. The writ of habeas corpus is an order and command that the person named in the writ shall be physically brought into court, so that the judge may publicly inquire into the grounds for or cause of his imprisonment. The writ of habeas corpus is a writ of right —that is, the court cannot refuse to issue it. It is not necessary that the person who is imprisoned should make the application. Any person may do so upon behalf of the prisoner. It is a summary proceeding and the one imprisoned must be at once brought in person before the court. 1 Const. U. S., Art. I, § 9. No Bill Of Attainder Or Expost Facto Law Shall Be PASSED.2 A bill of attainder is a special law affecting a particular individual and which forfeits his property and makes...