It was necessary to appoint a commission because there was no tribunal appertaining to the States-General.  The general government of the confederacy had no power to deal with an individual.  It could only negotiate with the sovereign province to which the individual was responsible, and demand his punishment if proved guilty of an offence.  There was no supreme court of appeal.  Machinery was provided for settling or attempting to settle disputes among the members of the confederacy, and if there was a culprit in this great process it was Holland itself.  Neither the Advocate nor any one of his associates had done any act except by authority, express or implied, of that sovereign State.  Supposing them unquestionably guilty of blackest crimes against the Generality, the dilemma was there which must always exist by the very nature of things in a confederacy.  No sovereign can try a fellow sovereign.  The subject can be tried at home by no sovereign but his own.

The accused in this case were amenable to the laws of Holland only.

It was a packed tribunal.  Several of the commissioners, like Pauw and Muis for example, were personal enemies of Barneveld.  Many of them were totally ignorant of law.  Some of them knew not a word of any language but their mother tongue, although much of the law which they were to administer was written in Latin.

Before such a court the foremost citizen of the Netherlands, the first living statesman of Europe, was brought day by day during a period of nearly three months; coming down stairs from the mean and desolate room where he was confined to the comfortable apartment below, which had been fitted up for the commission.

There was no bill of indictment, no arraignment, no counsel.  There were no witnesses and no arguments.  The court-room contained, as it were, only a prejudiced and partial jury to pronounce both on law and fact without a judge to direct them, or advocates to sift testimony and contend for or against the prisoner’s guilt.  The process, for it could not be called a trial, consisted of a vast series of rambling and tangled interrogatories reaching over a space of forty years without apparent connection or relevancy, skipping fantastically about from one period to another, back and forthwith apparently no other intent than to puzzle the prisoner, throw him off his balance, and lead him into self-contradiction.

The spectacle was not a refreshing one.  It was the attempt of a multitude of pigmies to overthrow and bind the giant.

Barneveld was served with no articles of impeachment.  He asked for a list in writing of the charges against him, that he might ponder his answer.  The demand was refused.  He was forbidden the use of pen and ink or any writing materials.  His papers and books were all taken from him.