New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1861-01-09

"them." Nevertheless, the ruling ia the Prisr
case has become Law, in accordanss therowitl.
the Fugitive Slave act Of 1850 imposes tAs
Judicial duty connected herewith upon Fedeex
officers. securing their decision in favor Of tie
slaye-catcber by bride so small as to indicate
the character of the man chosen to receive H.
The States, in conforming to the sams decisiou,
and forbidding their own officers to render aay
assistance in executing the law, are simply obs.
dent to that Northern sentiment of humsnity
and sense of selfrespect which revots at so bax
business as hunting men.
Some gentlemen in Boston, learned in the Law,
have recently pronounced the Personal Lbcrs
bill Of Massachusetts unconstitutional, aud other
gentlemen, more or less learned, in other places
have passed similar judgment upon similar lava
elsewhere. If the reader has followed us pa.
tiently thus far he will see that such opinions
are good for nothing 30 far as the prohibition u
State magistrates, which we have just been con.
sidering, is concerned. II can only be pretended
hat such enactments are unconstitutional whsre
their purpose il to aid in the recapture oil fuy-
tiyes. or to prevent it. The right OF State
however, TO protect it's own citizens is unques
tionable. aud one that should never be surrsa-
dered. because it is an act of State sovereignty
which was never delegated to the Federal Cor.
ernment; because the Constitution expressly pre-
yides that the rights of the people to be secure
in their persons shall not be violated; because
that instrument provides expressly against sAs
suspension OF the writ of habeas corpus, except
in cases Of rebellion or invasion; and because,
both by the terms Of the Constitution and the
decision of the Supreme Court, no citizen Or
subject is excluded from the benefit Of the geo.
eral law of liberty, unless he be fugitive from
labor. No Northern State has ever passed sa
act proposing, in the last result, to absolye 70.
gtive, Justly claimed, from his obligation to ssr-
vice under the laws Of the State whence ho
escaped: no Northern State has ever passed any
act relating to persons claimed as fugitives, IN
any other spirit, or with any other purpose, than
simply to extend the protection OF law to thoss
free citizens, whom, under color of law, it Is
attempted to kidnap and reduce to Slavery. II
any of the laws for the protection OF liberty IN
the Free States, therefore, are unconstitutional,
~ Is IN tDc IttltT oiny, ohu n"s :" WV
Such laws, then, like our own of 1870, need not
to be repealed, but to be amended. They need
TO be amended only 80 far as to make their Par-
pose clear of protecting their own citizens,
whether white OF. black, against kidnapping; and
they can be further made IN perfect accordance
with the decision in the Prigg case, by attaching
penalty to any interference on the part OF all
persons holding the commission of the State with
the unhappy duty Of surrendering fugtiyes from
labor-a duty belonging exclusively to tho Federal
Government. The simple duty of the State is 10
avoid the enactment of any law which shall
" discharge from service or labor" one justly
owing such service or labor under the laws Of
the State whence he has fed. To go further
than this, will be to surrender the clearest and
dearest obligation of free government, the test
alike of It's purity and its streugth-tle obligation
to protect the humblest and most helpless OF its
citizens. -r-t T-L