the interest of the sufferers: yet there are
others in which wanton depredations are made
on the property of individuals

Your memorialists are aware that it may be said
that the law does not discriminate between them &
others and that they ought equally to support the
public burthens, and yield their services to the exigen-
ces of the state. This objection supposes that a general
law cannot have a partial or unequal operation.
It supposes that what may be deemed a nati-
onal concern may supersede the chartered rights &
and privileges of the people. But your memorialists
cannot suppose that these principals which indeed
are no other than the maxims of tyrant will ever
be deliberately adopted and acted upon by this
legislature. If one member of the community
believe that it is duty to fight and to slay the
enemies of his country, and if another believe
that he is prohibited by divine command from
planning the destruction of shedding the blood of
his fellow creatures, the question as it relates to the
present subject is not which or whether either is wrong
but whether a law commanding both to take up
arms would not operate unequally and violate
the rites of conscience? It would operate unequal
-ly because it does not discriminate because to
the conscience of the one it does not enjoin the
performance of a duty, to that of the other the
commission of a crime. It would violate the
liberty of conscience because it would compel