The benefit of clergy was set up and recognized in many criminal cases in the United States, during the Colonial period and the great patriot, James Otis, successfully urged the exemption in favor of Massachusetts soldiers, convicted of murder for their participation in the Boston massacre.[40] The Federal Court decided, in the year 1817, in the case of United States vs. Lambert,[41] that a person convicted of bigamy, in Alexandria, was entitled to clergy, and, if able to read, should be burned in the hand and recognized for good subsequent behaviour. In the year 1830, the Federal Court held, in the case of United States vs. Jernegan[42] that on a conviction for bigamy, in granting the benefit of clergy, it was discretionary with the trial court to dispense with the burning in the hand. In the year 1806 the Supreme Court of North Carolina held that females could claim the benefit of clergy, the same as males.[43] The Legislature of North Carolina, having, in 1816 passed a statute abolishing the punishment of “burning in the hand” for clergyable felonies, the Supreme Court of that state, construing this statute, in 1825, in the case of State vs. Yeater,[44] held that corporal punishment and imprisonment could not both be inflicted upon a person found guilty of the crime of manslaughter. In 1837, however, in the same state the same court held that one found guilty of manslaughter could be burned in the hand and also imprisoned for one year. And in the year 1855, the Supreme Court of North Carolina held that when a new felony was created by statute, the privilege of clergy was an incident thereto, unless it was expressly taken away by the statute creating the offense.[45] And in State vs. Carroll,[46] the same court held that when the defendant prayed the benefit of clergy, for a clergyable offense, if the State objected because the defendant had before had clergy, this objection must be set up by a plea in writing. In State vs. Sutcliff,[47] decided in South Carolina, in 1855, a defendant, convicted of burning a dwelling house, was held entitled to the benefit of clergy, and in the same state, the same year, another person convicted of arson in the nighttime, was held entitled to clergy.[48] In Indiana, in 1820, and in Minnesota, in 1859, the Supreme Courts of those states held that the benefit of clergy did not and never had existed in those commonwealths,[49] and in the year 1787 the Supreme Court of Virginia held that the crime of arson was not a clergyable offense in the courts of that state.[50] But in the same state, in 1795, two persons were convicted for stealing a horse, in 1793, and before the _sentence of death_ was pronounced, they both prayed the benefit of clergy and the Supreme Court held that they were entitled to clergy.[51]