ment, 683. And lastly, the sections of the former acts which conferred authority upon the state legislatures to dispose of the ILLEGALLY IMPORTED negroes, WERE REPEALED.

*

* Notwithstanding this repeal, the state of Alabama, on first day of January, 1823, passed an act, entitled, "an act to carry into effect the laws of the United States prohibiting the slave trade." The provisions of this extraordinary violation of the act of congress, are similar to those comprised in the acts of Louisiana and North Carolina, upon which I have animadverted, authorizing in express terms, an agent, to be appointed by the governor of the state, to sell for the benefit of the state, all persons of colour who should be brought into the United States, and within the jurisdiction of Alabama, contrary to the laws of congress prohibiting the slave trade!!! See Toulmin's Digest, 643.

CHAPTER III.

OF THE ACT OF CONGRESS RELATIVE TO FUGITIVE SLAVES.

THE Federal Government being composed of thirteen distinct and independent sovereignties, in four of which, before the constitution of the United States was framed, slavery had been abolished, it was deemed expedient to secure by a stipulation to be inserted in the constitution, a right in the citizens of one state, whose servants or slaves should escape from their masters and become residents of another state, to reclaim such fugitives and subject them again to bondage. This stipulation is comprised in the third division of section 2d, article 4, in these words: "No person held to service or labour in one state under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labour, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labour may be due."

Upon the authority of this provision of the constitution, an act of Congress, dated February 12th, 1793, has been passed, which, in its actual enforcement, is the source of bitter anguish to its immediate victims, of deplorable excitement among the free coloured population, and of painful sympathy and regret to the humane and patriotic white citizen who may be compelled to witness the spectacle.

The part of the act of Congress just mentioned, which bears upon the present inquiry, is as follows: "When a person held to labour in any of the United States, or in either of the territories on the north-west or south of the river Ohio, under the laws thereof, shall escape into any other of the said states or territories, the person to whom such labour or service may be due, his agent or attorney, is hereby empowered to seize or arrest such fugitive from labour, and to take him or her before any judge of the circuit or district courts of the United States, residing or being within the state, or before any magistrate of a

county, city or town corporate, wherein such seizure or arrest shall be made, and upon proof to the satisfaction of such judge or magistrate, either by oral testimony or affidavit taken before and certified by a magistrate of any such state or territory, that the person so seized or arrested, doth, under the laws of the state or territory from which he or she fled, owe service or labour to the person claiming him or her, it shall be the duty of such judge or magistrate to give a certificate thereof to such claimant, his agent or attorney, which shall be sufficient warrant for removing the said fugitive from labour to the state or territory from which he or she fled." Ingersoll's Abridgment, 310.

Pennsylvania, from her contiguity to several of the slaveholding states, has, probably been the forum of most of the decisions which have been made under this law. The records, however, of but few of these have been preserved—a majority, unfortunately, having occurred before justices of the peace, selected by the claimant from their known willingness to subserve his interest, rather than to administer with impartiality the authority delegated to them.

The act of Congress, and the article of the constitution of the United States, above cited, are so essentially connected, that the judicial decisions to which I have alluded, have been made generally as much in reference to the one as to the other. shall, therefore, not attempt a distinct classification.

I

The first case of an important character, as relates to the present chapter, was that of Butler vs. Hopper, already inserted at considerable length. It was there said, by Judge Washington, that "the second section of the fourth article, (i. e. of the constitution of the United States,) which declares, that no person held to labour or service in one state, under the laws thereof, ESCAPING into another, shall, in cons equence of any law therein, be discharged from such service, did not extend to the case of a slave voluntarily carried by his master into another state, and there leaving him under the protection of some law declaring him free." 1 Washington's Circ. Court Rep. 501.

At October term, 1823, the principle of the decision in Butler vs. Hopper, was again recognised by Judge Washington, on an application preferred by J. W. Simmons, agreeably to

the act of Congress of February 12, 1793, for a certificate that James Mathist, a black man, was his slave. It was proved in this case, that Simmons was a citizen of Charleston, South Carolina, and had lived there, generally, till within a few years, when he came to the city of Philadelphia, took a house, and with his family had resided in the city ever since. James was admitted to have been his slave before and at the time of his leaving Charleston, and as such to have been brought by him to Philadelphia, in June, 1822. Upon these facts the Judge refused the certificate, and dismissed the application, saying, that the act of Congress applied exclusively to fugitive slaves, and not to those whom their masters themselves brought from one state to another.

A third case may be adduced, decided on the twentieth of February, 1826, by Judge Barnes, now President of the District Court for the city and county of Philadelphia, upon the following facts: "Marshall Green, a black man, was claimed as a slave, by Peter Buchell, administrator, &c. of John Buchell, deceased, who for many years before, and at the time of his decease, was an inhabitant of Cecil county, Maryland. About four years previous to the hearing before Judge Barnes, and one year before the death of John Buchell, Marshall absconded from his master's residence, and continued absent until August, 1825, when he was arrested by Peter Buchell, and carried back to Maryland. At the time when he absconded, he took with him his three children, who were alleged also to be slaves. After Marshall's return to Maryland, in August, 1825, Peter Buchell, then his master, in order to obtain possession of these children, gave him permission, and for that purpose furnished him with a PASS, to come into Pennsylvania, upon his express promise, that he would, within a certain period, if successful in the pursuit of his children, bring them to his master-if not successful, he would return himself. The time of absence granted by the master having expired, Marshall was again arrested, by virtue of a warrant issued by Judge Barnes, in compliance with the directions of the act of assembly of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, passed March 25th, 1826, and brought before him for a hearing. The Judge having taken time for deliberation, re

fused the certificate applied for by the master, under the act of Congress, upon the ground, which was ably supported in the opinion he pronounced, that the act of Congress did not embrace a case like that before him, inasmuch as Marshall was not a fugitive slave-had not "escaped from one state into another" -but, by his master's consent, had left Maryland and come into Pennsylvania.

A construction of considerable importance, has been placed upon another portion of the act of congress, by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, in a case brought before it in 1819. The following is the reporter's statement prefixed to the decision of the court: "This was a writ de homine replegiando, sued out by the plaintiff, a coloured man, against the defendant, who was the keeper of the prison of the city and county of Philadelphia, and the defendant's counsel now moved to quash it, on the ground of its having issued contrary to the constitution and laws of the United States. The facts were submitted to the court, in a case stated, by which it appeared, that the plaintiff having been claimed by Rasin Gale of Kent county, in the state of Maryland, as a fugitive from his service, was arrested by him, in the county of Philadelphia, and carried before Richard Renshaw, Esq. justice of the peace, who committed the plaintiff to prison, in order that inquiry might be made into the claim of the said Gale. The plaintiff then sued out a habeas corpus, returnable before Thomas Armstrong, Esq. an associate judge of the Court of Common Pleas. Judge Armstrong having heard the parties, gave a certificate, that it appeared to him, by sufficient testimony, that the plaintiff owed labour or service to said Gale, from whose service, in the state of Maryland, he had absconded, and the said judge, therefore, in pursuance of the act of the congress of the United States, &c. delivered the said certificate to the said Gale, in order that the plaintiff might be removed to the state of Maryland." The court having held the case under advisement for several days, directed the writ to be quashed, on the ground, that by the act of congress, the certificate of the judge was conclusive evidence of the right of the master to remove the plaintiff to the state of Maryland, and, therefore, that no writ of a civil nature could