Witches and the pursuit of them were common in early modern Europe and the Americas. While witches are still prevalent in our culture today, they are often seen as a source of entertainment in movies, children's literature, and during Halloween celebrations. A timely topic for October is the historical relationship between witch trials and the law.
Witchcraft Acts
In the 1500s and 1600s, various laws were established across England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland to control magic and witchcraft. Among these, England's three primary witchcraft acts had the most impact on additional regulations and history.
The Witchcraft Act of 1542 (33 Hen. VIII c. 8) was the first to define witchcraft and to criminalize it as a felony punishable by death without clergy or sanctuary. The Act was repealed after the death of Henry VIII in 1547 (1 Edw. VI, c12) and was not replaced until five years into Elizabeth I's reign.
In 1562, an Act Against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts (5 Eliz. 1. c. 16) reclassified witchcraft as a felony and shifted trials from church settings to secular courts. It also created penalties for first and second offenses that were less severe than death.
In 1604, The Witchcraft Act, officially titled "An Act Against Conjuration, Witchcraft, and Dealing with Evil and Wicked Spirits" (2 Jas. I c. 12), expanded the Act of 1562 by increasing the scope of crimes and expanding the death penalty punishment.
Witch Trials
Most of what we know about England’s historic witch trials comes from records of the assize courts. The Assizes, or Courts of Assize, served as the foundation for civil and felony criminal cases in English counties until 1971.
The book Witch Hunting and Witch Trials: The Indictments for Witchcraft from the Records of 1373 Assizes Held for the Home Circuit, 1559-1736 A.D., offers legal insight and a general historical examination of this time period. Some noteworthy sections include the names of convicted witches, jury instructions, jail rolls, and charging details by date within each monarch's reign.
The book is part of the Notable Trials Collection at the State of Oregon Law Library. This collection is not limited to European trials; it also features notable American cases. Among the collection is The American State Trials, a 17-volume set that includes The Trials of Bridget Bishop and George Burroughs. Bishop was the first person sentenced to death during the Salem Witch Trials in colonial Massachusetts, while Burroughs was the only Puritan minister to be executed.
Trials Collection
The law library's Notable Trials Collection includes significant historical trials from Britain and France, the Nuremberg war crime tribunals, and important American trials spanning from the colonial period to the 1980s. This collection addresses a wide range of topics, including treason, sedition, land use disputes, murder and assassination, court-martials, Cold War espionage, art and obscenity, as well as both judicial and presidential impeachments.
August is National Make-A-Will Month, a yearly reminder about the benefits of creating or updating a will. While end-of-life issues may not be everyone's favorite topic, having a plan can help avoid family disputes and costly court proceedings. The State of Oregon Law Library has several resources to help.
What is a will?
A will is a legal document that determines how your assets are divided upon death and who becomes the caretaker of any minor children. It also allows you to establish a personal representative or executor to carry out your wishes.
What happens if you die without a will?
You are not legally required to draft a will. If you die without a valid will, it is called dying intestate. When this happens, state law and the court determine how your assets get distributed. Assets go to your closest relatives first, as defined by Oregon law, regardless of your relationship with them.
Who can create a will?
In Oregon, any person who is 18 or older and of sound mind may make a will. (ORS 112.225)
Where do you start?
The Legal Information Reference Center is a great starting point. This database contains reference books, legal guides, and forms written in plain language. Look for The Quick and Legal Will Book for instructions on drafting a basic will. The Wills & Estate Planning category lists additional end-of-life planning tools. Both are available online with a State of Oregon Law Library Account. Oregon residents can sign up for a free account online.
The Oregon Barbooks are written by Oregon attorneys and published by the Oregon State Bar. Administering Trusts in Oregon and Administering Estates in Oregon are two books that can assist in your life planning. Available in print and online with a digital token.
When should you update and/or review your will?
It's a good idea to review your will every five years or whenever there is a significant change in your life. Examples of changes include:
Other estate and planning tools
An estate plan is a more comprehensive plan that can be used during life and after death. More specifically, an estate plan often includes a will, trusts, a health directive, and various types of powers of attorney.
Using a lawyer
A lawyer can give legal advice on drafting a will and developing an estate plan. Search for Wills or Estate Planning in the legal directories on SOLL's resource page.
The State of Oregon Law Library (SOLL) is thrilled to announce that we are celebrating our 50th anniversary of providing federal government documents to the public!
The Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP) was created to make sure people have access to government information at the local level. Under Title 44 of the United States Code, the public has free access to government documents in designated depository libraries. SOLL officially joined the FDLP program in February 1974.
There are two types of depositories in the FDLP: regional and selective depositories. Regional depositories receive copies of all federal government documents. In Oregon, our regional depository is the State Library of Oregon.
SOLL is a selective federal depository library. That means we choose which federal publications to add to our collection.
Here are some examples of government documents available at the law library:
Visit the State of Oregon Law Library at 1163 State St., Salem, Oregon or online at https://oregon.gov/soll/
In the November election of 1910, the voters adopted a constitutional amendment that was "a complete revision of article VII, the judiciary article of the state Constitution."1 The amendment had been put forward by the People's Power League, a progressive organization dominated by its influential secretary, William S. U'Ren.2 The object of the People's Power League, as the League itself described it, was "to perfect the direct power of the voters of Oregon over their State and local government in all its branches and officers."3
U'Ren, the charismatic leader of the People's Power League, was extraordinarily powerful in state politics at the time. A 1906 editorial went so far as to assert that: "In Oregon the state government is divided into four departments -- the executive, judicial, legislative and Mr. U'Ren."4
While U'Ren was a motivating force behind the proposed amendment of Article VII, "the original draft of that amendment was wholly the work of" a Supreme Court justice -- Thomas Allan McBride.5 McBride had been appointed as a justice of the Oregon Supreme Court on May 1, 1909, after 17 years as a circuit court judge.6 He would serve continuously on the court until his death in 1930.7
The voters pamphlet suggests that there was little interest in the amendment to Article VII: the pamphlet contained one argument for the amendment (filed by the People's Power League itself) and no arguments against.8 U'Ren, however, would later assert that the amendment "raised...a hullabaloo in the [legal] profession at that time."9
The purpose of the proposed amendment to Article VII, according to the People's Power League, was "to allow three-fourths of a jury to render a verdict in civil cases, and to generally simplify court procedure, especially appeals to the Supreme Court."10Some of the changes made by Article VII (Amended) were as follows.
Section 1 of Article VII (Amended) relaxed the constitutional restrictions on the sorts of courts that could exist in the State. While the original Article VII had vested the judicial power in the Supreme Court, circuit courts, and county courts (plus justices of the peace and municipal courts), Article VII (Amended) vests the judicial power "in one supreme court and in such other courts as may from time to time be created by law."11
Section 2 of Article VII (Amended) gave the Supreme Court discretion to hear original proceedings in mandamus, habeas corpus, and quo warranto.
Section 3 of Article VII (Amended) addressed judicial review. Facts decided by a jury cannot be re-examined "unless the court can affirmatively say there is no evidence to support the verdict." If there were any errors at trial, the Supreme Court nevertheless is required to affirm the judgment, if the Court concludes that the trial court's judgment "was such as should have been rendered in the case." If the trial court entered an erroneous judgment and the Supreme Court can determine what the correct judgment should have been, then the Supreme Court is authorized to enter the correct judgment "in the same manner and with like effect as decrees are now entered in equity cases on appeal to the supreme court."
Finally, section 5 of Article VII (Amended) authorized jury verdicts in civil cases to be rendered by a three-fourths majority, instead of being unanimous.
Interestingly, the amendments to Article VII left in place much of the original Article VII. Section 2 of Article VII (Amended) provided: "The courts, jurisdiction, and judicial system of Oregon, except so far as expressly changed by this amendment, shall remain as at present constituted until otherwise provided by law." The effect was to leave effective the unrepealed provisions of original Article VII, but only as statutes, and thus subject to later change by the Legislature.12
In 2007, the Supreme Court considered an argument that Article VII (Amended), in its entirety, had not been adopted in the manner prescribed by the Oregon Constitution.13 The Court concluded that it did not need to decide that question. Article VII (Amended) itself had been amended 10 times in the 97 years since it had been originally adopted.14 Those later amendments, the Court concluded, implicitly validated Article VII (Amended) and cured any irregularities in the 1910 adoption.15
Footnotes:
FN1. Hall S. Lusk, Forty-Five Years of Article VII, Section 3, Constitution of Oregon, 35 Or L Rev 1, 1 (1955).
FN2. Official Voters Pamphlet, General Election, November 8, 1910, at 166-77 (1910); James D. Barnett, The Operation of the Initiative, Referendum, and Recall in Oregon 17 (1915). See David Schuman, The Origin of State Constitutional Direct Democracy: William Simon U'Ren and "The Oregon System," 67 Temple L Rev 947, 951 (1994) (noting political power of U'Ren).
FN3. Official Voters Pamphlet, General Election, November 8, 1910, at 168 (1910).
FN4. The Portland Oregonian, July 17, 1906, at 8, quoted in Schuman, 67 Temple L Rev at 951 (1994).
FN5. Remarks by W.S. U'Ren, In Memoriam: Justice Thomas Allan McBride, 133 Or xxi, xxiii-xxiv (1930).
FN6. Officers of the Supreme Court, 53 Or (ii) (1908-09).
FN7. Resolutions of the Multnomah County Bar Association, In Memoriam: Justice Thomas Allan 7 McBride, 133 Or xix,xix (1930).
FN8. Official Voters Pamphlet, General Election, November 8, 1910, at 200-02 (1910); see Lusk, 35 Or L Rev at 1 (noting absence of arguments against amendment).
FN9. Remarks by W. S. U'Ren, In Memoriam: Justice Thomas Allan McBride, 133 Or xxi, xxiii-xxiv (1930).
FN10. Official Voters Pamphlet, General Election, November 8, 1910, at 166-67 (1910).
FN11. Or Const, Art VII (Original), § 1; Or Const, Art VII (Amended), § 1
FN12. See Yeaton v. Barnhart, 78 Or 249, 257, 150 P 742, 152 P 1192 (1915) ("Section 1 of Article VII of the fundamental law was amended November 8, 1910 (see Laws 1911, p. 7), but does not alter the clauses quoted until future legislation is had upon the subject, and, no statute for the entire state having been enacted in any of these particulars, these original provisions of the Constitution remain intact.").
FN13. Carey v. Lincoln Loan Co., 342 Or 530, 157 P3d 775 (2007).
FN14. Id. at 541.
FN15. Id. at 541-42.