Treason and the Supreme Court
Treason is defined in Article III, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution, limiting the crime to acts of war against the United States or providing aid to its enemies. To secure a conviction, the law mandates the testimony of at least two witnesses to the same overt act or a confession from the accused in open court. This narrow definition was deliberately designed by the Framers to prevent the misuse of treason laws for political purposes. Historically, the Supreme Court has addressed several treason cases, beginning with Ex parte Bollmann in 1807, where Chief Justice John Marshall emphasized that armed hostilities are a key element of treason. In more recent cases, such as Cramer v. United States and Haupt v. United States, the Court clarified that a defendant's intent can make otherwise non-treasonous actions qualify as treasonous, depending on context. Moreover, in Kawakita v. United States, the Court ruled that U.S. citizens can be charged with treason for acts committed anywhere in the world, establishing that treason has no geographical boundaries. Since the mid-20th century, however, there have been no significant Supreme Court cases addressing treason. This historical framework illustrates the complexities and evolution of how treason is interpreted and adjudicated within the American legal system.
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Treason and the Supreme Court
Description: Breaking allegiance to the U.S. government through acts of war against it or aiding its enemy.
Significance: The Constitution carefully defines treason, making it the most difficult of all federal crimes to prove. The Supreme Court rendered the final decision in a number of treason cases.
Article III, section 3 of the Constitution limits treason to acts of war against the United States or giving aid and comfort to its enemies. The crime must be proved by the testimony of at least two witnesses to the same overt act or by the defendant’s confession in open court. Treason is the only federal crime for which both the substantive and evidential elements of culpability are spelled out in the Constitution. By defining the crime narrowly, the Framers sought to prevent the political abuse of treason law.
The Whiskey Rebellion and Fries Rebellion in the 1790s resulted in three treason convictions in the federal circuit court for Pennsylvania, but presidential pardons for all the defendants forestalled appeals to the Supreme Court. The Court’s first ruling on the treason clause came in Ex parte Bollmann (1807), one of the cases arising from Aaron Burr’s western conspiracy (Burr was charged with attempting to separate the western part of the country from the rest of the nation). Speaking for the Court, Chief Justice John Marshall held that war is an essential element of treason; absent armed hostilities, a conspiracy to make war does not qualify as treason. While later presiding at Burr’s trial in the federal circuit court for Virginia, Marshall instructed the jury that the Constitution requires overt acts of treason; mere plots to commit such acts are not sufficient. The instruction and Burr’s acquittal infuriated President Thomas Jefferson, who had pressed hard for a conviction.
No treason convictions were appealed to the Court before World War II, a conflict that raised several key issues. In Cramer v. United States (1945), the first conviction reviewed, the Court ruled that acts not treasonous on their face may be rendered treasonous by the defendant’s treasonous intent. However, the conviction was nevertheless overturned on the grounds that the acts alleged were too ambiguous to justify an inference of treasonous intent from the surrounding circumstances. Two years later in a similar case, Haupt v. United States (1947), the conviction was upheld on the grounds that the defendant’s acts, though also ambiguous, were of a nature to justify an inference of treasonous intent. Together, the cases hold that the inference must arise from the acts alleged as well as from the surrounding circumstances. The Court also settled the issue of whether treason can be committed beyond the territorial limits of the United States. In Kawakita v. United States (1952), the Court held that U.S. citizens are liable for acts of treason committed anywhere in the world. Unlike most other crimes, treason has no geographical boundaries. The Supreme Court has not heard any additional cases on treason since this ruling.
Bibliography
Chapin, Bradley. The American Law of Treason: Revolutionary and Early National Origins. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964.
Hurst, James Willard. The Law of Treason in the United States. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1971.
"Interpretation Treason Clause." The National Constitution Center, 2023, constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/articles/article-iii/clauses/39. Accessed 5 Apr. 2023.
Kennedy, Roger G. Burr, Hamilton, and Jefferson: A Study in Character. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Lomask, Milton. Aaron Burr: The Conspiracy and the Years of Exile, 1805-1836. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1982.