"Exotic Fruit": The Right Against Compulsory Self-Incrimination in Colonial New York

Abstract

HE Bill of Rights epitomizes one of our history's most noble and enduringly important themes, the triumph of individual liberty, yet has been strangely one of the most neglected subjects. Although constitutional guarantees of personal liberty go to the heart of American political philosophy, there is no satisfactory study of the origins and framing of the first state bills of rights and few studies of particular rights. The American origins of the right against compulsory self-incrimination are especially shrouded in obscurity. That fact is all the more striking because the courts have assured us, again and again, that our understanding in this instance is quite dependent upon Chief Justice Warren, for example, noting that the right against self-incrimination was hard-earned by our forefathers, stated that the reasons for its inclusion in the Constitution-and the necessities for its preservation-are to be found in the lessons of history. 1 However, the lessons of history have hardly been made abundantly clear by historians, despite the reliance of jurists upon them. Over half a century ago when the Supreme Court, in Twvining v. New Jersey, resorted to every historical test by which the meaning of the phrase [self-incrimi-