Mr. JOHNSON. I know that is stricken out. The committee have stricken that out because, in the judgment of the committee, it is liable to objection; but they substitute for it what, according to my view, makesitalmost as obnoxious as the passage they propose to strike out. They propose to substitute for it the following: The man robanrli shall lie upon the defendant where probablecause is shown for such prosecution, to be juded of by the court beforewhom the prose cutionis ad. Now, what is “ probable cause” for a prosecution? What must a judge say is probable cause? That the goods have been imported contrary to law by somebody, and that the man prosecuted has received soereboonudgly, t or sold them. The fact of the illegal importation connected with the fact of the reception or the buying or the selling the judge may consider as sutheient probable cause to believe that the man is guilty, and cast upon him the burden of proving his innocence. I know of no case in which a rule of evidence so harsh as that has been adopted. It is a very good thing to prevent smuggling in order to secure as much revenue as we can; but it is pay g very dearly if we accomplish that objectiy breaking down the landmarks which have here tofore been supposed by all the jurists of the country necessary to protect the individual citizen against an improperprosecution. Now, it seems to me, it would be better to leave the case to stand upon the rules of evidence applicable to all offenses. Why is it necessary to say in this case, more than in any other case, that the defendantshall have thrown upon him the burden of proving his innocence? In all cases, if there be of before the jury reasonably tending to thhoconviction of the offender, because reasonably establishing his ilt of the offense, he is called on to defend imself. You do not want snya ditional stat ute in order to cast upon the offender who may be prosecuted the burden, in a case of that description, of proving hisinnocence; and the object, therefore, of this provision is to place him in a much worse situation than he is p seed in now. Whenever the court, not the jury, shall think that the man is guilty upon the evidence which the prosecution has produced, then a verdict is to be pronounced against him unless he proves his innocence. 1he judge therefore, will be bound to tell the jury, i think it is perfectly immaterial what you think that the man is guilty upOn the evidence already adduced, and you must find him guilty” that is the necessary result, provided the law is carried out “you must find him guilty, unless he, by evidence, assures you that he is not guilty.” It seems to me, and I submit it to the honorable member from Maine, that that is going infinitely further than in any country that I know of it has ever been sopposed necessary to go where the rights of the individual citizen are regarded at all. We might all be placed in that situation.