Just for background...from Blackstone:
BURGLARY, or nocturnal houfebreaking, burgi latrocinium, which by our antient law was called hamefecken, as it is in Scotland to this day, has always been looked upon as a very heinous offence: not only becuafe of the abundant terror that it naturally carries with it, but alfo as it is a forcible invafion and difturbance of that right of habitation, which every individual might acquire even in a ftate of nature; an invafion, which in fuch a ftate, would be fure to be punifhed with death, unlefs the affailant were the ftronger. But in civil fociety, the laws alfo come in to the affiftance of the weaker party: and, befides that they leave him this natural right of killing the aggreffor, if he can, (as was fhewn in a former chapter ) they alfo protect and avenge him, in cafe the might of the affailant is too powerful. And the law of England has fo particular and tender a regard to the immunity of a man's houfe, that it ftiles it his caftle, and will never fuffer it to be violated with impunity: agreeing herein with the fentments of antient Rome, as expreffed in the words of Tullyq ; “quid enim fanctius, quid omni religione munitius, quam domus uniufcujufque civium?” For this reafon no doors can in general be broken open to execute any civil procefs; though, in criminal caufes, the public fafety feperfedes the private. Hence alfo in part arifes the animadverfion of the law upon eaves-droppers, nufancers, and incendiaries: and to this principle it muft be affigned, that a man may affemble people together lawfully (at leaft if they do not exceed eleven) without danger of raifing a riot, rout, or unlawful affembly, in order to protect and defend his houfe; which he is not permitted to do in any other cafer..........
And as to self defense in the home:
IN the next place, fuch homicide, as is committed for the prevention of any forcible and atrocious crime, is juftifiable by the law of nature r; and alfo by the law of England, as it ftood fo early as the time of Bracton s, and as it is fince declared by ftatute 24 Hen. VIII. c. 5. If any perfon attempt to burn it t,) and fhall be killed in fuch attempt, the flayer fhall be acquitted and difcharged. This reaches not to any crime unaccompanied with force, as picking of pockets, or to the breaking open of any houfe in the day time, unlefs it carries with it an attempt of robbery alfo. So the Jewifh law, which punifhed no theft with death, makes homicide only juftifiable, in cafe of nocturnal houfe-breaking: “if a thief be found breaking up, and he be fmitten “that he die, no blood fhall be fhed for him: but if the fun “be rifen upon him, there fhall blood be fhed for him; for he “fhould have made full reftitution” At Athens, if any theft was committed by night, it was lawful to kill the criminal, if taken in the fact w: and, by the Roman law of the twelve tables, a thief might be flain by night with impunity; or even by day, if he armed himfelf with any dangerous weapon x: which amounts very nearly to the fame as is permitted by our own constitutions.
Query: havent we developed a bit since the the time of Moses and Solon?
WildsorryabouttheffAlafka ™
