Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1856-04-17
TERMS $3.50 A YEAR, In ADVANCE.
WHOLE NO. 023

imposed upon Us, like that annual payment
of chosen youths and virgins to be devoured
by the Minotaur, which Minos of Crete is
said to have levied upon the conquered
Athenians. However this act may general
y be regarded at the North as .'inexpedient
unjust and oppressive" Judge Leavitt-and
no doubt there were similar tools of despot-
ism among the Athenians-is fully of opin-
ion that it must be quietly and patiently
submitted to till our Cretan masters-those
awho dominate over Congress, or those who
dominate over the Supreme Court of the
United States-shall see fit to release US
from it.
Such appears to be the doctrine upon
which Mr.. Justice Leavitt bases his decision
IA decision which he attempts to buttress
up by course of augmentation not less
extraordinary than the doctrine itself.
"In holding as must do in this case, tn,
the right of the Marshal to the custody of
the persons in question must be respected
| am not to be understood as asserting that
a fugitive slave is not responsible for viola
tion of the criminal laws Of the State to
whlch he tnn5 hate fled: It is the undoubt-
ed right of every State to punish crime COM
tnitted within its limits. A State destitute
of this right in its frecst and fullest exer-
else could have no just claim to sovereignty.
Aid if ali escaped SLAVE could violate law
with impunity, many States of this Union
would be in deienseless condition. 1t is
not asserted, therefore, that they are not
liable to punishment. but merely that il they
are in custody of an officer. under law of
the United States, before their arrest for
crime against the State law, the latter arrest
cannot be enforced till the disability exist
ing by the prior arrest is removed. In 9TH
er words, the slave being in custody of an
officer acting under the authority of another
and, for the purposes of this question,
foreign jurisdiction, he cannot, by the mere
force OF a subsequent arrest, be delivered
from such custody"
1t has been laid down as an axiom of
physics that the same body cannot be in two
places at once; but this doctrine does not
apply to Judge Leavitt. In the very same
breath in which he admits that State des-
titute of the fight Sin its freest and fullest
exercise" of furnishing crimes committed
within its borders by fugitive slaves, "could
have no just claim TO sovereignty" lie
held that provided some claimant-perhars a
Claimant tr;tmPed Up fer the occasion in COL
lusion with the .crimnal-who perhaps mere
ly pretends To be fugitive slavc--can but
succeed in nabbing him first, the State is
ousted of it's jurisdiction, stripped If it's
sovereignty and must submit td see this
criminal taken out its own Jail and Carried
out of its Limits, with no other reliai.ce for
v;rdicating its laws ard asserting its severe
ighty except the poor privilege of trusting
to the ''comity" of slaveholdinI Governvr
to surrender for trial a Save who before he
can be asked for will surely be sold out of
the State, and whom the State of Ohio
might pursue from State to State till dooms-
day without the slightest chance of ever
laying hands upon him.
The reasoning of Judge Leavitt upon this
subject of the demand upon the Governor
of Kentucky, is a queer specimen of his
knowledge of law; and we give il, that our
readers may see how very small provision
of that sort will answer as an outfit to q
slavecatching District Judge:
at is said m argtment that if these per-
sons cannot be held by the arrest of the
Sheriff under the State process, the rights
and dignity of Ohio are invaded without the
possibility of redress. | cannot corcur in
this view. The Cone titution and laws of
the United States provide for reclamation
of these persons, by demand on The Ex-
ecutive of Kentuck,. 1t is true, if now re-
manded to the claimant and taken back to
Kentucky as slaves, they cunrot be said to
have fled from justice in Ohio; but it would
clearly be a case within the spirit and inten-
| tion Of the Constitution and the Act of Con-
gress, and trust that nothing would be
hazarded by the prediction that upon dema nd
properly made upon the Governor of Ken
lucky, he would order thsaa te be surrruder-
ed to the authorities of Ohio to answer to
its violated law. | am sure it is not going
too far to say that if the strictness Of the
law did not require this, an appeal to comfy
would not be in vain."
An appeal to comfy would not be in vain,
Has the Governor OF Kentucky, We should
like to know, any right, out oI comfy and
politeness merely to the State Of Ohio, and
where there is no obligation to do so, to
strip Messrs. Gaines and Marshall of their
property, and tc surrender j. up to be hang
ed or imprisoned in Ohio!
The only show of authority offered for the
doctrine that the alleged slaves, while in the
custody of an officer under the Fugitive
Slave Act, cannot be arrested for murder, is
a remark of Judge Mclean in DORIS case,
that prisoners held under process of
State Courts cannot be brought upon habeas
corpus before the United States Courts; and
why not! Because the act authorizing the
issue of writs of habeas corpus Dy the Unit
ed States Courts, specially excepted the
case of such prisoners-which exception,
by the way, has never been done away with.
But what bearing has this right to issue
writs OF habeas corpus upon the question of
the priority of civil over criminal process,
None in the world.
If Judge Leavitt had not resolved to de-
eide the case as he did, law or no law, pre-
cedent or not, he might have found an opin-
ion of Judge McLean's which does bear
precisely upon the question. In his eabor-
ate opinion given in the famous Prigg case,
Judge Mclean thus expresses himself:
"Can the master seize his slave and re-
move him out of the State in disregard of
its laws, as he might take-his horse which
is running at large! This ground is taken
in the argument. Is there no difference in
principle in these cases!
"The slave. as sensible and human he.
ing. is subiest to the local author ,y. into
whatsoever jurisdiction he may go. lie is
answerable under the laws for his acts, ard
he may claim thei. protection. The State
may protect him against all the world en-
cept The clsirs cf his master. Skoeld any
ofye. commit lawless violence on the slave,
the offender may unquestionably be punish!
ed; ard Should TIE STARE commit fysurder, he