south of Pennsylvania was such as to produce a distrust of their northern brethren as to the safety of their property in slaves.

"It was no easy task to reconcile the local interests and discordant prepossessions of the different sections of the United States, but the business was accomplished by acts of concession and mutual condescension." 1

2. Provisions made by the federal convention, and by congress, for the security of the south.

The original articles of confederation contained a clause in the following words:

"If any person guilty of or charged with treason, felony or other high misdemeanor in any state, shall flee from justice and be found in any of the United States, he shall, upon demand of the government or executive power of the state from which he fled, be delivered up and removed to the state having jurisdiction of his offence."

In the convention of 1787, the committee, to whom were referred the proceedings of the convention for the purpose of reporting a constitution, reported a draft in which the fifteenth article was as follows:

Any person charged with treason, felony or high misdemeanor in any state, who shall flee from justice and shall be found in any other state, shall, on demand of the executive power of the state from which he fled, be delivered up and removed to the state having jurisdiction of the offence."

When the draft was before the convention, on the 28th of August, 1787, it was moved to strike out the words "high misdemeanor" and insert the words "other crime;" which motion passed in the affirmative.

On the next day, a motion was made to agree to the

Yeates, J., in Commonwealth v. Holloway, 2 Serg. & Rawle, 308.

following proposition, to be inserted after the fifteenth article.

"If any person bound to service or labor, in any of the United States, shall escape into another state, he or she shall not be discharged from such service or labor, in consequence of any regulation subsisting in the state to which they escape, but shall be delivered up to the person justly claiming their service or labor." This proposition was unanimously adopted.

Afterwards a committee was appointed to revise the style of, and arrange the articles agreed to by the house. The second section of the fourth article reported by the committee of revision contained the following clauses :

"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 and removed to the state having jurisdiction of the crime."

"No person legally held to service or labor in one state, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of regulations subsisting therein, be discharged from such service or labor but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."

The federal constitution, as adopted, contains the clauses thus reported, with some amendment. In the first clause, the words "to be removed" are in place of the words "and removed." In the second clause, the changes of language are more striking. The word "legally" is struck out and after the word "state," the words "under the laws thereof" inserted, and the expression "regulations subsisting therein " is substituted by the words "any law or regulation therein."

The act of congress approved February 12th, 1793 provides, that whenever the executive authority of any state in the Union shall demand any person as a fugitive from

justice, of the executive authority of any state to which such person shall have fled, and shall moreover produce the copy of an indictment found or an affidavit made before a magistrate of any state, charging the person so demanded with having committed treason, felony or other crime, certified as authentic by the governor or chief magistrate of the state from whence the person so charged fled, it shall be the duty of the executive authority of the state to which such person shall have fled, to cause him or her to be arrested and secured, and notice of the arrest to be given to the executive authority making such demand, or to the agent of such authority appointed to receive the fugitive, and to cause the fugitive to be delivered to such agent when he shall appear.

Another section of the same act provides, that when a person held to labor in any of the United States, under the laws thereof, shall escape into any other of the states, the person to whom such labor or service may be due, his agent or attorney, is empowered to seize or arrest such fugitive from labor 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 other state, that the person so seized or arrested doth, under the laws of the state from which he or she fled, owe service or labor 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 labor to the state from which he or she fled.

The last section of the act declares that any person who shall knowingly and willingly obstruct or hinder such

claimant, his agent or attorney, in so seizing or arresting such fugitive from labor, or shall rescue such fugitive from such claimant, his agent or attorney, when so arrested, pursuant to the authority herein given or declared; or shall harbor or conceal such person, after notice that he or she was a fugitive from labor as aforesaid, shall for either of the said offences forfeit and pay the sum of five hundred dollars; which penalty may be recovered by and for the benefit of such claimant, by action of debt in any court proper to try the same; saving moreover to the person claiming such labor or service, his right of action for or on account of the said injuries or either of them.

3. Judicial decisions as to fugitives from labor.

The second section of the fourth article of the constitution is confined to persons held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, who escape into another. When the master voluntarily carries his slave from one state into another, the master must abide by the laws of the latter state, so far as they may affect his right of property in the slave.'

But if the slave comes from one state into another, in any other way than by the consent of the owner, whether he comes in as a fugitive or runaway or is brought in by those who have no authority so to do, he cannot be discharged under any law of the latter state, but must be delivered up on claim of the party to whom his service or labor may be due.2

It is however only the slave escaping into another state that is provided for. Hence it has been adjudged that birth in Pennsylvania gives freedom to the child of a female slave who escaped before she became pregnant.'

1 Ex parte Simmons, 4 Wash. C. C. R. 396.

2 Butler, &c. v. Delaplaine, 7 Serg. & Rawle, 378.

3 Commonwealth v. Holloway, 2 Serg. & Rawle, 305.

A slave is incapable of contracting so as to impair the right of his master to reclaim him; and if a private individual sue out process or interfere otherwise with the master's claim, under the pretence of a debt contracted by the slave, such interference will be deemed illegal, and the claimant will have a right of action for any injury he may receive by such obstruction.'

But it is held that slaves are not exempt from the penal laws of any state in which they may happen to be. And this doctrine has been carried so far, that in a case in Pennsylvania in which there was no doubt upon the evidence of the negro being the slave of the claimant, he has been detained in prison to answer a charge of fornication and bastardy. On the part of the master it was contended that such a charge was not sufficient ground to prevent the delivery; for the object of a prosecution for it was the indemnity of the public, and a slave, having no property, could pay nothing. Tilghman, C. J., said: "Fornication has always been prosecuted in this state as a crime. By the law of 1705, it was subject to the punishment of whipping, or a fine of ten pounds, at the election of the culprit. The punishment of whipping has been since abolished, but the act of fornication is still considered as a crime; and where it is accompanied with bastardy, security must be given to indemnify the county against the expense of maintaining the child. It may be hard on the owner to give this security, or lose the service of his slave, but it is an inconvenience to which this kind of property is unavoidably subject. The child must be maintained, and it is more reasonable that the maintenance should be at the expense of the person who has a right to the service of the criminal than at that of the people of this city who have no such right.""

1 Glen v. Hodges, 9 Johns. 62.

2 Commonwealth v. Holloway, 3 Serg. & Rawle, 4.