Now I submit, that this taking cannot be held piratical, under the ninth section, on this indictment; because it was a taking, not on pretence of authority from Jefferson Davis, but under authority of the Confederate States, exercised by Jefferson Davis. And, in a case of this kind, I must say that I consider it will prove the greatest Godsend to the Government, and to the prisoners on both sides who now anxiously await the result, if, without touching the other questions, this indictment shall fall to the ground on a mere technical point. That is one reason. Another reason is this: The Act is for taking vessels under a commission from any foreign Prince or State, or on pretence of authority from any person. Now what is a foreign Prince or a foreign State? If your honors please, at the time this Act was enacted, within some three years of the United States coming together, is it conceivable that the thought entered into the heart of any man who had anything to do with it that it was to take effect against any man acting under the authority of any of the States of this Union? The States all were authorized, under certain circumstances, to have ships-of-war and to have armies. There was no telling what collision there might be; and the idea that this Act, almost a literal transcript from the English statute of 11 and 12 William III., contemplated that punishment for acting under the authority of domestic persons, is inconceivable. In construing an Act so highly penal as this we must be very sure that we are not only within the letter, but within the very spirit and contemplation, of the Act; and can you think that the framers of this Government gravely provided for the offence of taking a commission under some of the persons acting as Governor, or in connection with the domestic institutions of this country? I submit that the Act was intended to operate against foreign States and nations, and a foreign person; and it is inconceivable that the Act should have been contemplated to embrace any such thing as is now brought up. I submit, therefore, as the third of my specifications under this point, that Jefferson Davis was not a foreign person, nor assuming the authority of a foreign Prince or Ruler. The statute was one against commissions under foreign authority of some kind or other, either Prince, or State, or person.