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The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: the Tipping Point

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The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: the Tipping Point The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: The Tipping Point During the Antebellum period, tensions between the Northern and Southern regions of the United States escalated due to debates over slavery and states’ rights. These disagreements between the North and South set the stage for the Civil War in 1861. Following the end of the Mexican-American War in 1848, the United States acquired 500,000 square miles of land from Mexico and the question of whether slavery would be allowed in the territory was debated between the North and South. As a solution, Congress ultimately passed the The Compromise of 1850. The Compromise resulted in California joining the Union as a free state and slavery in the territories of New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and Utah, to be determined by popular sovereignty. In order to placate the Southern States, the Fugitive Slave Act was put into place to appease the Southerners and to prevent secession. This legislation allowed the federal government to deputize Northerners to capture and return escaped slaves to their owners in the South. Although the Fugitive Slave Act was well intentioned, the plan ultimately backfired. The Fugitive Slave Act fueled the Abolitionist Movement in the North and this angered the South. The enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act increased the polarization of the North and South and served as a catalyst to events which led to the outbreak of the Civil War. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 brought into sharp focus old differences between the North and South and empowered the Anti-Slavery movement. Prior to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, the Act of 1793 was passed and this allowed for slave owners to enter free states to capture escaped slaves. The law also placed a penalty of $500 dollars on any Northerner who aided a slave by harboring or concealing them. Calling it legalized “kidnapping”, Northerners 1 intentionally ignored the unpopular law and some helped fugitive slaves.1 The Northerners prevented the law from being enforced into the mid 1800s and this infuriated Southerners. In 1850, when California was to be added to the Union, Congress passed the Compromise of 1850. This was a victory for Southerners because the Compromise consisted of a stronger Fugitive Slave Act. This Act was revised to appease the South because California joined the Union as a free state. This law hardened opposing views and increased hostility over the subject of slavery between the regions. Under the Act of 1850, Fugitive Slave cases were in control of the federal government and not the local judicial systems. Slaves were not given the right to a free trial and this was very beneficial to the Southerners, as they were rarely freed. The Northern response to both Acts was to create Personal Liberty Laws. The Personal Liberty Laws were passed in an effort to counter the Fugitive Slave Act. Their main purpose was to allow jury trials for escaped slaves and to forbid state governments from cooperating in their capture and return. The Fugitive Slave Act allowed Northerners to witness the brutality of Slavery first hand, thus spurring the growth of Abolitionist movements and stronger opposition against the “Peculiar Institution”. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 which was enacted to encourage unity, changed the political and social landscape and ironically escalated sectional tensions between the North and South. The Act required free Northern states to arrest runaway slaves, despite Personal Liberty Laws to the contrary. It inserted the federal government into local matters and commanded citizens to assist in the process. Northern and Southern reactions were starkly different and the Act resulted in a deepening divide. In the North, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was viewed as ethically and morally wrong and the brutality of slavery became immediate and real. Some 1 Anika Rede and Maryum Ali, "Tom's Cabin: Generating a Rising Tide of Responsibility to End the Institution of Slavery," Uncle Tom's Cabin, accessed December 12, 2017, http://66753557.weebly.com/reactions-of-southerners.html. 2 Northerners were being exposed to slavery for the first time in their communities and this had a profound effect on society, as free slaves were pulled from their new lives in the North. Northerners were infuriated because their liberty was taken away. Northerners were further angered because captured slaves were denied the right to a fair trial. Each fugitive slave was tried by a government official outside the local court system. If the federal commissioner ruled in favor of the slave owner he would be paid $10 dollars, if he ruled in favor of the slave he would only be paid $5 dollars.2 This was perceived by Northerners to be an obvious bribe. The disadvantaged position of the slaves is supported by the statistics. Between 1850 and the start of the Civil War, 343 African Americans were tried before federal commissioners. Only 11 slaves remained free, and 332 were returned to the South.3 This supports the contention that the legal system was corrupt and slaves were not given a fair trial. In response, some Northern states which had traditionally supported a strong central government, supported states rights and passed Personal Liberty Laws. In fact, Personal Liberty Laws passed in reaction to the Fugitive Slave Act were cited as justification for secession by the South. When the Confederacy seceded in 1860, the Confederacy released it’s “Declaration of Causes” for secession, which stated that “fourteen of the States have deliberately refused, for years past, to fulfill their constitutional obligations, and we refer to their statutes for proof.”4 Another Example of Northern resistance was the 1854 trial of Anthony Burns, a fugitive slave from Virginia, who had moved to Boston. His owner came to Boston to claim Burns who was subsequently put on trial. After he lost the trial, the Boston Vigilance Committee, an Anti-Slavery Activist group, tried unsuccessfully to 2 "Fugitive Law Law of 1850," Ohio History Central, accessed November 30, 2017, http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Fugitive_Slave_Law_of_1850. 3 James Mcpherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (n.p.: Oxford University Press, 1988), [Page 70]. ​ 4 "Declaration of Causes of Seceding States," The Civil War Trust, accessed December 12, 2017, ​ https://www.civilwar.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states. 3 derail the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act by rescuing Burns. The Anthony Burns conflict was viewed by Southerners as an example of Northern refusal to respect their rights. In response to the Anthony Burns Affair, the Richmond Examiner summarized what the conflict meant to the South, "such an execution of the Fugitive Slave law as that which we witness in Boston is a mockery and an insult [and must] awaken the South to a sense of its position and the necessity of an independent and exclusive policy”.5 The trial of Anthony Burns was a significant event and fallout from the Fugitive Slave Act that elevated tensions in the sectional divide. Northern response was to strengthen the abolitionist movement with renewed intensity. New local organizations came into existence in opposition to the Fugitive Slave Act. In fact, the city of Boston voted to remove federal courts from the courthouse and this prevented many slaves from being returned to the South. In the North, the Anthony Burns decision proved to intensify the resentment against slavery and the Fugitive Slave Act. Despite successful enforcement of the Act, the South questioned the violent protest in Boston and felt the hatred from the North, thus creating more sectional tension. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 spurred a cascading series of events in which the abolitionist movement gathered strength, increasing hostility to the South and making Civil War all but inevitable. The powerful rise of the Abolitionist movement in the North was galvanized by the publishing of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852. The book, ​ ​ which was written in response to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and the practice of slavery, has been called “America’s first protest novel” by the poet Langston Hughes.6 It was serialized and 5 Earl Maltz, "The Trial of Anthony Burns," Encyclopedia Virginia, accessed December 12, 2017, ​ https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Burns_Anthony_The_Trial_of_1854. 6 Rowland Hughes, "Uncle Tom's Cabin," Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed December 12, 2017, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Uncle-Toms-Cabin. 4 widely read, exposing Northerners to the inhumanity and brutality of slavery. Southerners were infuriated by the book and it was ultimately banned in the South. The Southern reaction was that Stowe was slandering them and that the book was a “pack of lies”.7 The book prompted outrage in the South, and Southerners responded with “Anti-Tom” novels. In these novels, slave owners tried to justify slavery and how it was integral to their way of life. Literature and propaganda between the North and South added to tensions and pushed the Union closer to divide. Uncle ​ Tom’s Cabin became a part of the fabric of the Northern anti slavery culture and permeated the ​ consciousness of society, adding energy to the anti slavery sentiment. The South reacted with resentment and the sectional divide hardened. Another response to the Fugitive Slave Act was the growth of the Underground Railroad which reached its peak in the 1850s. Spanning over fourteen states the network of safehouses assisted over a thousand slaves to escape to the North from U.S. jurisdiction.8 This movement, which gained momentum after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act is credited as one of the causes of the Civil War. In the South’s “Declaration of Causes of Seceding States”, Southerners stated that the Northerners “have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their ​ homes… ”9 The South viewed the Underground Railroad as being a reason for secession because Southerners believed the Northerners were violating their property rights, since slaves were considered “property”.
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