o
make out on proof, _the whole of the grounds upon which he proceeds to
make that paper proper evidence_; that the evidence that is produced
must be _the demeanor_ of the party respecting that paper; and it is the
connection between them, _as material to the charge depending_, that
will enable them to be produced."

Your Committee observes, that this was not a paper _foreign_ to the
prisoner, and sent to him as _a letter_, the receipt of which, and his
conduct thereon, were to be brought home to him, to infer his guilt from
his demeanor. It was an office document of his own department,
concerning himself, and kept by officers of his own, and by himself
transmitted, as we have said, to the Court of Directors. Its proof was
in the record. The charge made against him, and his demeanor on being
acquainted with it, were not in separate evidence. They all lay
together, and composed a connected narrative of the business,
authenticated by himself.

In that case it seems to your Committee extremely irregular and
preposterous to demand previous and extraneous proofs of the demeanor of
the party respecting the paper, and the connection between them, as
_material to the charge_ depending; for this would be to try what the
effect and operation of the evidence would be on the issue of the cause,
before its production.

The doctrine so laid down demands that every several circumstance should
in itself be conclusive, or at least should afford a violent
presumption: it must, we were told, without question, be material to the
charge depending. But, as we conceive, its materiality, more or less, is
not in the first instance to be established. To make it admissible, it
is enough to give proof, or to raise a legal inference, of its
connection both with the charge depending and the person of the party
charged, where it does not appear on the face of the evidence offered.
Besides, by this new doctrine, the materiality required to be shown must
be decided from a consideration, not of the whole circumstance, but in
truth of one half of the circumstance,--of a demeanor unconnected with
and unexplained by that on which it arose, though the connection between
the demeanor of the party and the paper is that which must be shown to
be material. Your Committee, after all they have heard, is yet to learn
how the full force and effect of any demeanor, as evidence of guilt or
innocence, can be known, unless it be also fully known _to what that
demea