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the claimant, for the purpose of removal to the state or territory from which the elopement was made. The state of Pennsylvania is the only one, as far as I am informed, that has undertaken to curtail the authority of its officers, in the execution of this law. The act of 1826, has very greatly increased the difficulty, of carrying away from the state a free coloured person, under the character of a fugitive slave; yet even this law, important as it unquestionably is, virtually constitutes a tribunal for deciding a question of fact, which, according to the observation of Blackstone, ought only to decide upon questions of law. The case of a fugitive from labour, may be supposed analogous to that of a fugitive from justice; and this supposition may be strengthened by their contiguity in the constitution of the United States-they are, however, widely different. "A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall, on demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the crime." Delivered up, for what? To be immediately consigned to the penitentiary or the gibbet? Or to the avenger of blood? No such thing, but to the legal tribunals, in order that the truth or falsehood of the charge may be investigated; that the fact of his innocence or guilt may be determined by an impartial jury of his peers (pares,) and if proved to be guilty, that the punishment awarded by the laws may be inflicted.

Very different, both in contemplation of law, and in point of fact, is the case of the fugitive from labour. "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 is due." Though the word slave is here, as in other places in the constitution, studiously avoided, this article has always been considered as relating to slaves; and plainly amounts to this; that no state shall legislate for another; that those whom the laws of any state have subjected to the servile yoke, shall still be slaves, notwithstanding their elopement to a state where that condition is proscribed or unknown. Whether this constitutional provision is to be considered as a compromise, or as the recognition of a right, there are probably few, if any sober politicians who would wish it changed. However we may disapprove the whole system of negro slavery, we do not covet the privilege of legislating for our brethren of the south, nor desire to break, even the iron sceptre of slavery, with a ruthless hand. It is proper, however, to remember, that while we disavow the wish to interfere with the legislation of the south, we claim in return the right of protecting our own people, whatever shade they may assume, from the grasp of lawless authority. The constitution does not require, that every person claimed as a fugitive from labour, shall be given up to the claimant. A difference of the phraseology, clearly marks the difference of the cases of these two descriptions of fugitives. The person charged with a crime is to be given up for trial; the slave escaping to another state is to be given up to his owner, to return into slavery. But here a fact is to be established, before the alleged fugitive is

to be surrendered. When a person is arraigned before his proper tribunal, and charged with a crime, the fact of his guilt is determined by a jury, before the judge can pronounce the sentence of the law. When an alleged fugitive from labour is claimed, the fact must be determined by some tribunal, before the claim can be allowed.

The free states cannot emancipate the slaves that escape to them from the south; they must give them up, on claim of the party to whom labour or service is due. But they are bound in justice to their own coloured population, to require, that proof should be made, that the person claimed is really a slave, before they deliver him up. Who then is to judge, whether proof has or has not been made? The laws of the United States answer, a judge of the Circuit or District courts, or magistrate, &c.—the laws of Pennsylvania say, a judge of the proper county; Lord Coke and Judge Blackstone, pronounce an impartial jury the proper tribunal to determine the fact. If a man, whether black or white, is charged in the free states with a crime, which, if proved, will subject him to a few months' confinement in the penitentiary, he must be tried by an impartial jury, toward whom he may exercise the right of challenge, be allowed counsel for his defence, and if the prosecutor fails to remove from the minds of the jury all doubt of his guilt, he must be pronounced innocent;* but a man, who

*To the conviction of a crime, the undoubting and the unanimous sentiment of the twelve jurors, is of indispensable necessity. The consequence, therefore, unquestionably is, that a single doubt, or a single dissent, must produce a verdict of acquittal. Wilson's Lectures on Law, Vol. ii. p. 35.

has the misfortune to wear an African mantle, being claimed as a slave, is tried for his freedom during life, by a single judge, against whom no right of challenge is admitted, and from whose decision there is no appeal.

The constitutional article, as already observed, applies to real, not merely alleged fugitives from labour. And the law of the United States appears to have been founded on the supposition, that no illegal claims would ever be made; for surely the congress of 1793, with Washington at their head, never designed to place the liberty of freemen at the mercy of the inferior officers designated in the law. This seems to be legislating, as far as the blacks are concerned, upon a principle opposite to that usually assumed in law. In criminal prosecutions, the accused is always to be presumed innocent, till the contrary is proved. In some at least of the slave-holding states, it has been held, that every black man must be considered a slave till his freedom is proved, upon the ground, that all the negroes imported into these states were slaves, and therefore, the probability is, that the person in question is a slave. Applying this kind of reasoning to the coloured population found in these non-slaveholding states, the presumption would always be in favour of freedom; for a vast majority of them are undoubtedly free. We must therefore presume, when a man, found in a non-slave holding state, is claimed as a fugitive slave, that the claim is illegal, and till the fact of slavery is proved to the satisfaction of an impartial jury, the man must be considered as free. Here there are two claimants to the bones and sinews of a living man; the justice of the respective claims is to be deci

ded. The alleged fugitive is the claimant in possession. If, in one of the free states, a man, whatever may be his complexion, is found in possession of a horse or an ox, he cannot be permanently dispossessed at the fiat of a magistrate or judge. The question of ownership must, in the last resort, be decided by a jury. The question of ownership, when the man himself is claimed, is, equally with the former, a question of fact. If the person claimed is a free man, the judge or magistrate has no authority to make him a slave. If he has escaped from another state, and from the service of one, to whom, according to the existing laws of that state, his labour or service is due, our judge or magistrate has no authority to declare him free. The whole turns upon a question of fact. Decide that fact, and the case, in point of law, becomes a clear one. To secure the impunity of an alleged criminal, until his guilt has been proved to the satisfaction of an impartial jury -to adjudge the possessor of property, beyond a very limited amount, the rightful owner, till the contrary is proved to the conviction of a similar tribunal; and yet to leave the question of personal freedom, or hereditary slavery, to the decision, without the possibility of appeal, of a single magistrate or judge, is too obvious an anomaly in legislation, to admit of a rational defence.

It may be said, that a coloured person, claimed as a fugitive slave, being given up, and removed to the state from which he is said to have eloped, may still prosecute his claim to freedom, and have the question brought before the proper tribunal, and that a trial by jury, in such case, is still attainable. In some of the southern' VOL. I.-35.

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states, that is unquestionably the case, provided he can excite sufficient inte rest among the white citizens, to procure a protector. But, supposing a coloured man, who is legally free, to be claimed by an unprincipled dealer, and that, by perjury or other means, a judge or magistrate is prevailed upon to grant a certificate for his removal to a southern state, what is the prospect of his ultimate release? He is carried, as a captive, wherever his possessor may choose to convey him. The power is all on the side of the master. The certificate of the judge or magistrate is ample testimony of the legality of his authority. The person, thus reduced to slavery, is evidently in a worse situation than if he had been kidnapped. For the kidnapper has no authority to exhibit, but possession; he may be stopped in his course with less danger, and his character is universally odious; but the ostensible owner, with a judge's certificate, is doubly armed. The presumption, as well as appearance, would evidently be in his favour. The slave, ignorant of the characters of those among whom he is carried, and subject to the arbitrary control of his holder, would not easily bring his cause before any tribunal, but that of his immediate possessor.

But, imagining these difficulties surmounted,and the question of ownership fairly brought into one of the courts of the south, the case is materially changed from what it was before the first decision. The man is black; his colour is evidence against him; the claimant is the ostensible owner; he has a certificate, which, if it is not legal testimony of his right, can hardly fail of an influence in his favour the burden of proof is thrown on the slave; his witnesses can be pro

cured only at a heavy expense, and when procured, they are probably rejected as incompetent, because of their colour, though the circumstance of similarity of colour constitutes no inconsiderable claim to credibility; for similarity of colour is generally the passport to familiar acquaintance. These, and other circumstances, being duly considered, we readily perceive, that the grant of a certificate for the removal of an alleged fugitive from a free to a slave-holding state, is virtually decisive of his fate. It is, therefore, undeniable, that the tribunal before which this question is tried, decides upon a question of fact, which, according to the acknowledged principles of law, belongs to a jury, and not to a judge, to determine.

REMARKS

Upon "An Address on the Progress of Manufactures and Internal Improvements in the United States, and particularly on the advantages to be derived from the employment of Slaves in the manufacturing of Cotton and other goods. Delivered in the Hall of the Franklin Institute, November 6, 1827, by Thomas P. Jones, M. D."

IN calling the attention of my readers to this address, I am far from desiring to intimate an opinion, which the author expressly deprecates, that he is an advocate of slavery, or willing to promote any measures which are calculated to perpetuate that harsh institution. It would be with the greatest reluctance that I should adopt such an opinion, and certainly could not justify to myself, the attempt to stamp such a stigma upon so respectable a character. I must, however, be allowed to suppose, that the tendency of the doctrines contained in some parts of the address,

and those not the least prominent, is unfavourable to the cause of emancipation. The establishments, for which he so earnestly pleads, and which he asserts the philanthropist and political economist must hail with equal pleasure, appear to me, if carried into effect, likely to rivet more firmly the fetters of slavery. The author has, indeed, advanced an opinion, that the formation of extensive manufactories, in which the operatives are slaves, or at least negroes, will improve the condition of the slaves, and pave the way to their ultimate emancipation. The manner in which these effects are to be produced, is not clearly stated; we have, therefore, ample room to suppose that a contrary result may arise.

We are told, that, for a considerable period, the planters, in many places, have found it extremely difficult to pay their current expenses, and to feed and clothe their negroes, from the annual produce of their lands; and thousands have removed to the more fertile regions in the western states, not with a view of accumulating wealth, but merely for the purpose of obtaining a ready and abundant supply for their negro families; thousands more of our southern fellow citizens will be compelled to adopt the same expedient, unless some new resource be obtained. This is, in effect, an acknowledgment that the exhausted soil no longer supports the expense of slave cultivation; or, in other words, that the labour of the slaves will no longer support their masters and themselves, and that the slave-holding system requires for its support, some new resource, or a richer soil. This, to the philanthropist, affords a pleasing, rather than a painful prospect. Not that the masters

should be embarrassed, but that the

value of the slaves should be small.

The subject of regret is, that the new
and fertile soils of the west should be
subjected to the same depleting regi-
men, and slavery find an asylum in
which to maintain a sombre existence
for ages to come. Disinterested bene-
volence is lovely in theory, and not
less so in practice, where it can be
found; but experience of mankind, I
fear, will warrant the conclusion, that
motives of interest point the course,
and stimulate the exertions, of a majo-
rity of our race. The Author of our
existence has diffused into the nature
of things, a principle, by which moral
evils tend to exhaust their own sup-
plies. This principle is the vis medi-
catrix of nature. In regard to slavery,
it is particularly important. Slave
cultivation, by exhausting the soil, di-
minishes the profits of labour, and
thence the value of slaves. When
the labour of the slave will no longer
afford a surplus beyond the expense of
rearing and supporting him, the temp-
tation to retain him in that unnatural
state is removed, and his emancipa- ||
tion becomes a natural result. If this
state of things can be avoided only by
emigration, attachment to the land of
their birth, and aversion to encounter-
ing the hardships attendant on the
formation of a new settlement, will
unquestionably prevent many from re-
sorting to that expedient. Hence,
under such circumstances, emancipa-
tions will be more frequent than where
slave labour is profitable. In most of
the British colonies, official returns
have been made within a few years, of
the slave population, the number of
manumissions, and the average value
of slaves. And the number of manu-
missions appears, as might be expect-
ed, generally, if not always, greatest,

where the price of slaves is least. Thus in Barbadoes and Demerara, where the slave population is nearly the same, and the legal obstructions very similar, the number of manumissions effected in a given time, is nearly in an inverse ratio to the price of slaves. In the former, where the average value of a slave was £28, the number of manumissions was 408. In the latter, where a slave was worth £86, the manumissions amounted to 142. In Berbice, where the slaves appear to have been worth about £90 each, we find 49 manumissions out of a population of 22,000; but in the Bahamas, where the average value of a slave was £21 8s., the manumissions for the same time, are stated at 176, out of a population of 9,500 slaves, or a ratio, on equal numbers, of more than 8 to 1. If, when by the exhaustion of the soil, the value of slaves, employed in the labours of the field, has been nearly annihilated, the introduction of manufactories should furnish new and profitable employment for this class of labourers, the necessary consequence would be, that their value must rise, and the temptation to augment their numbers, by importations or otherwise, must increase. Hence, instead of a disposition on the part of the masters, to prepare them for freedom, and to promote their emancipation, they would cling more closely to what they would consider their valuable property, and frown upon every attempt which might be made to enlighten the minds of this servile class. For it is generally well understood, that knowledge in a slave, beyond what is requisite for the performance of his allotted service, is dangerous to his master.

The Doctor appears to suppose that when the condition of the master is

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