The New International Encyclopædia/Fugitive Slave Law
FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. In the history
of the United States, the name of two statutes
enacted for the purpose of securing to the
slave-owners their rights in slaves who had escaped from
the State in which they were held in servitude.
Such statutes were directed to the enforcement of
Article IV., section 2 of the Constitution, which
provides that “persons held to service or labor
in one State, under the laws thereof,” escaping
into another, “shall be delivered up on claim of
the party to whom such service or labor may be
due.” The existence of slavery depended entirely
upon the sanction of State laws, and could in no
way be affected by Federal laws. If, however,
slavery was merely a status dependent upon
positive enactment, such status ceased when the
slave entered a State where slavery was
prohibited. On the other hand, if the master's
right in the slave was a property right, the
situation was quite different. Property rights were
defined by State laws, and the protection of such
property rights in all other States was guaranteed
by the Federal Constitution. Upon the
‘property’ theory of slavery, it was thus possible
to pass such an enactment as that of February
12, 1793. This gave the owner or supposed
owner of a fugitive slave the right to seize the
alleged fugitive, to take him before any Federal
judge or certain local magistrates, and, upon
satisfying the judge or magistrates of his ownership,
to secure a warrant for removing the slave,
or alleged slave, to the State of the owner's
domicile. There was no provision for a jury in this
preliminary trial; the warrant might be secured

upon the testimony of the owner alone, and a
heavy fine was imposed for obstructing the owner
or rescuing or concealing the alleged fugitive.
The rigor of the act gave opportunity for
considerable laxity in its enforcement, and as soon
as the controversy over slavery became acute,
efforts were made to amend the act or to nullify
its effect. A way toward the latter end seemed
to be opened by the decision of the Supreme
Court in the case of Prigg against Pennsylvania
(q.v.), in which it was held that the duty of
enforcing the statute rested solely upon the
Federal authorities. Thereupon various States
passed laws prohibiting State officials from
assisting in the enforcement of this Federal statute,
and forbidding the use of State jails for such a
purpose.

The continued and vigorous demands of the
South for a more complete recognition of its rights
led to the inclusion in the ../Compromise Measures of 1850/
(q.v.) of a new Fugitive Slave
Law, the statute of September 18, 1850. This
included many features of the old act, and in
addition provided for certain commissioners, with
jurisdiction concurrent with that of the courts,
who received a larger fee in case they decided in
favor of the claimant than if they decided in
favor of the fugitive. Ex parte testimony was
sufficient to determine even the identity of the
fugitive; the testimony of the alleged slave was
expressly barred, and he was denied a jury trial,
even after being returned to the State whence
he had fled. The enforcement of the law was
placed wholly in the hands of Federal officials,
and heavier penalties were imposed upon
violators of the law. The extreme anti-slavery
element in the Northern States soon forced the
issue by refusing to recognize the ‘finality’ of the
Compromise of 1850, and by securing the passage
of the so-called ‘personal liberty’ laws. These
prescribed heavy penalties for the seizure of free
persons, forbade State officials to aid in enforcing
the Federal act, and provided that the fugitive
should be entitled to a writ of habeas corpus, and
to a trial by jury. Other requirements of the
State laws served to minimize the effect of the
Federal statute, and in some cases almost to
nullify it. Ten States passed such laws, and thus
afforded the South an available ground of
complaint. The second Fugitive Slave Law was finally
repealed on June 28, 1864. Consult McDougall,
Fugitive Slaves (Boston, 1891). See ;
.