The considerations on which the motion for severance was overruled were, that the charge alleged a conspiracy on the part of the persons accused and on trial, with others unknown, unlawfully, maliciously, and traitorously to kill and murder the President and others. The fact of entering into a conspiracy to do unlawful acts gives to the associated body, in law, an individuality; personality is merged in the common purpose of those thus combining themselves together, and so the declaration or act of any one of them, touching the accomplishment of the common purpose, becomes the declaration or act of all. The guilt is equally shared by all. If the government could not sustain the charge of a conspiracy, then none of the accused could be found guilty of entering into a conspiracy as alleged. The fact of a conspiracy being established, it only remained to be shown in each case that the accused was a member of it; proving this, he would be held to be a sharer in the guilt, although not present at the commission of the crime; but failing to establish the fact of his belonging to the conspiracy, his innocence must be legally admitted. In other words he could not be found guilty. There can in law be no severance of an individuality; and so the application for a separate trial was denied, or overruled. On the demurrer to the jurisdiction of the court, the Commission held that it could not admit this to be a question that it could properly take under its consideration. To the executive department of the government alone belonged the decision of this question as to the kind of trial that the accused should have; and the President, after maturely considering it in the light of the Constitution and the related facts, and after having submitted it to his Attorney General for his opinion, accepting that opinion as the correct conclusion of his very exhaustive argument, embracing all the Constitutional questions involved, had determined that these parties were offenders against the laws of war, as their offense was the act of secret, active participants in the existing hostilities, and committed with a deep political intent, the purpose of which was to give aid to the existing rebellion, and so, justly, under the Constitution, subjecting them to _law martial_, and trial by a military commission. The President, being _ex-officio_ Commander-in-Chief of the armies of the United States, had the right to order a detail of officers to constitute such court, and by order to specify the duties required of them. Their duty as officers of the army required of them simply obedience to the orders of the President of the United States and to those over them in the organization of the military arm of the government. To this they were bound by the solemn obligations of their official oath. To have entertained this question would have been an act of disobedience, subjecting them to discipline; to have refused to serve would have been an act of mutiny.