to the taking of an oath, and (2) of those persons who refuse to admit the binding force of an oath. Special provision was first made for Quakers, Moravians and Separatists; then followed general enactments relating to civil and criminal proceedings respectively, till finally the law was embodied in the Oaths Act 1888, which enacted that “every person upon objecting to being sworn, and stating, as the ground of such objection, either that he has no religious belief, or that the taking of an oath is contrary to his religious belief, shall be permitted to make his solemn affirmation instead of taking an oath in all places and for all purposes where an oath is or shall be required by law, which affirmation shall be of the same force and effect as if he had taken the oath; and if any person making such affirmation shall wilfully, falsely and corruptly affirm any matter or thing which, if deposed on oath, would have amounted to wilful and corrupt perjury, he shall be liable to prosecution, indictment, sentence and punishment in all respects as if he had committed wilful and corrupt perjury.” The form of affirmation prescribed by the Oaths Act was as follows: “I, A. B., do solemnly, sincerely, and truly declare and affirm,” &c. Under s. 5 of the same act a person might swear in the Scottish form, with uplifted hand (no book of any kind being used) and if he desired to do so “the oath shall be administered to him in such form and manner without question.” With the desire of making universal this method of administering the oath the Oaths Act 1909 was passed. It enacted that any oath might be administered and taken in the following form: “The person taking the oath shall hold the New Testament, or in the case of a Jew, the Old Testament, in his uplifted hand, and shall say or repeat after the officer administering the oath the words I swear ‘by Almighty God that . . . ,’ followed by the words of the oath prescribed by law.” The officer also is directed by the act to administer it in this fashion, unless the person about to take it voluntarily objects or is physically incapable of taking it so. To a person who is neither a Christian nor a Jew the oath may be administered in any way in which it was previously lawful.
The form of affirmation given above is that used for Quakers, Moravians and Separatists in the witness-box: “I, A. B., being one of the people called Quakers (one of the United Brethren called Moravians), do, &c.” A Christian swears on the Gospels, holding a copy of the New Testament in his right hand (the hand being uncovered), and his head being also uncovered. A witness may elect to be sworn on any version of the Bible which he considers most binding on him, as a Roman Catholic on the Douai Testament or Bible. A Jew is sworn on the Pentateuch, holding a copy thereof in his right hand, the head being covered. A Mahommedan is sworn upon the Koran. He places his right hand flat upon the book and puts the other hand upon his forehead, bringing his head down to the book and in contact with it. He then looks at the book for some moments. Buddhists are sworn on the Buddhist doctrines, Sikhs upon the Granth, Parsees upon the Zend Avesta, Hindus upon the Vedas, or by touching the Brahmin’s foot, and, according to caste custom, Indian witnesses sometimes insist upon the oath being administered by a Brahmin; but in India witnesses now generally affirm. Kaffir witnesses swear by their own chief, and a Kaffir chief by the king of England. When a Chinese witness is to be sworn, a saucer is handed to him, which he takes in his hand and kneeling down breaks into fragments. The colonial legislatures generally make provision for receiving unsworn evidence of barbarous and uncivilized people who have no religious belief. The great number of oaths formerly required was much reduced by the Promissory Oaths Act 1868, which prescribed the forms of oath of allegiance, the official oath and the judicial oath. The right to affirm in lieu of taking the parliamentary oath in the case of atheists was first raised in the case of Charles Bradlaugh (q.v.)
Profane swearing and cursing is punishable by the Profane Oaths Act 1745, any labourer, sailor or soldier being liable to forfeit 1s., every other person under the degree of a gentleman 2s., and every gentleman or person of superior rank 5s., to the poor of the parish.
The administering or taking of unlawful oaths is criminal in English and Scots law. Statutes relating to the offence were passed in 1797, 1799, 1810 and 1812, and it is evident from the preamble of the latter act (Unlawful Oaths Act 1812) that they were aimed at those societies in the United Kingdom at the time of the French Revolution which required or permitted their members to take an unlawful oath. Supplementary statutes were passed in 1817 and 1837. Children of tender years, who, in the opinion of the court, have not sufficient intelligence to understand the nature of an oath, may give evidence without being sworn.
In the United States an oath is required in practically every case in which it is required in the United Kingdom, and with the same latitude as to affirmation., The formula or details may vary in different states of the Union. The same may be said generally of every civilized country, with the reservation that an affirmation is not so usually accepted as in English-speaking countries. In Germany an oath is compulsory on a witness in criminal cases, except in the case of certain sects, whose tenets forbid the taking of an oath.
Authorities.-Coke’s Institutes; Book of Oaths (1689); Stephen’s Commentaries; Stringer’s Oaths and Affirmations; Tyler, Oaths; Origin, Nature, History (1835); Ford, On Oaths.
OAXACA, or Oajaca (officially Oaxaca de Juárez), a
southern state of Mexico, lying partly on the southern slope of the great Mexican plateau and covering the southern and larger part of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, bounded N. by Puebla, N.E. and E. by Vera Cruz, S.E. by Chiapas, S. by the Pacific and W. by Guerrero. Pop. (1000) 948,633, a large majority of whom are Indians. The state has an area of 35,382 sq. m. broken by mountain ranges into numerous broad fertile valleys, chiefly lying in the tierra templada region. The isthmus districts, however, have lower elevations and are distinctly tropical. The coast line is 329 m. long; behind it is a narrow strip of lowlands lying within the tierras calientes: In places this strip nearly disappears, the sierras rising almost immediately from the seashore. The culminating points within the state are Zempoaltepetl (11,145 ft.) about 50 m. E. by N. of the city of Oaxaca in a knot of sierras, San Felipe del Agua (10,253 ft.) standing on the eastern margin of the beautiful Oaxaca Valley, and the Cerro del Leone, south-west of Tehuantepec, the highest summit in the Sierra Madre del Sur. Tributaries of the Mescala drain the western quarter of the state, among which is the Atoyac or headstream of the Mescala, which rises in Tlaxcala, and flows across the state of Puebla. The streams flowing northward to the Gulf coast are the Coatzacoalcos and Papaloápam with its tributary, the San juan, all flowing across the state of Vera Cruz. The Papaloápam is navigable up to the town of Tuxtepec, in the state of Oaxaca. The largest of the Pacific coast streams is the Tehuantepec, which with its many tributaries has an aggregate length of 182 m. The Rio Verde has its source farther inland and drains the Oaxaca Valley, but its tributaries are small and less numerous. The only ports on the coast open to foreign trade are Salina Cruz and Puerto Angel—the first, the Pacific terminus of the Tehuantepec railway, with a spacious artificial harbour, and the second a deep but narrow natural harbour, the projected coast terminus of the Mexican Southern railway. The greater part of the state has a sub-tropical climate, with high sun temperatures, moderate rainfall and mild, healthful conditions. The less healthful regions include the isthmus districts, the coastal zone on the Pacific and the low country on the border of Vera Cruz. Agriculture is the principal occupation of the people; the chief products are Indian corn, wheat, coffee, sugar, rubber, cotton, cacao, tobacco, indigo and a great variety of tropical fruits. Among the manufactured products are cotton, woollen and “pita” fibre fabrics, sugar, rum, mescal, beer, furniture, pottery, soap, candles, leather, matches, chocolate, flour and cigarettes. Two important railway lines traverse the state—the Tehuantepec (trans-isthmus) line between the ports of Salina Cruz and Coatzacoalcos (Puerto Mexico), and the Mexican Southern line (narrow-gauge) from Puebla to Oaxaca, with branches to San Geronimo on the Tehuantepec line with the Guatemalan frontier as its destination, and toward Puerto Angel on the coast. Two of the most progressive Indian races of Mexico, the Zapotecas and Mixtecas, descendants, it is believed, of the prehistoric races who built the remarkable cities where the ruins of Mitla and Monte Alban (see Central America:
